V for Vendetta YouTube

SRSM Disaffiliates from the SSP

The following is a letter sent to the SSP [National Secretary Pam Currie] by the SRSM:

Dear Pam,

I write you to notify you that the SRSM platform has taken the decision to disaffiliate from the Scottish Socialist Party. This decision was taken at an EGM on Thursday 19 October.

The catalyst was certainly the recent handling of our motion to conference to entrench clause 5 of the Party's constitution – the third time that he motion has been talked out. You will be aware that the reasons given by the platform was the final straw, for some, who found the explanation unacceptable. I must say that the Chair's remarks, when questioned by one of our members, were highly subjective. We believe that over the past few years sections of the Party did not want this passed and sought to portray the motion as bureaucratic and anti-democratic.

However, the wider reason for our decision is the Party's minimal activity on the national question. While there is no doubting the SSP's unequivocal stance for a Scottish Socialist Republic that has been made clear in manifestoes, there is doubt within the SRSM about how the Party intends to carry it forward. We believe that our cause has been relegated behind a list of issues rather than made central to these issues. I do not mean to open up a long political argument. I merely intend to at least give you the courtesy of a reason. This was a majority decision. A minority of SRSM members, myself included, intend to stay in the Party as individual members. I trust that the SRSM's status as a cross-party movement will mean that this should not pose a conflict.

Yours faithfully,

Gerry Cairns

Convenor

SRSM

Redecoration

You'll notice I've redecorated the place a smidgeon.

I've added a few feeds from places I get information from.

Man... I'm starting to love Google and it's association of companies. The Feedburner bit on the Blogger Beta was inspired.

By the time you've read this I may have found an "alternate science" feed and a "music" feed as well...

Check right, someone's gonnae have done it at some point.

Art as Simplification of Life

I sat next to a guy in work once called Barry. He was an artist trapped in the same shitty job I was and managed to escape to something FAR more interesting. Not quite art yet, but he's on his way.

Check out his stuff: Barry's Art Page

It (as you can see from the left) is astonishingly good.

This proves it then, shit jobs and unhappiness make excellent bedfellows with talent in art. Orson Welles in the third man commented about The Borgia's and the Renaissance and how Switzerland only managed the pigging cuckoo clock (joke courtesy of Craig Ferguson... ahem...)

Anyway. You HAVE to click the link. I won't forgive you otherwise.

Besides, I'm trying to talk him into letting me use that picture for my debut novel...

We'll see how it goes.

Firefox Chronicles Indy First Video

I'm not a folk music fan. That's why the video below doesn't contain any. It's not that I dislike it, it's just I only ever listen when I'm at the various events I go to.

This is an experiment for me. There are a number of far better vids out there, but I figured I'd have a play around with both YouTube and Windows Movie Maker. Bear in mind there is a disintegration of quality on YouTube (because they prefer it to be fast rather than have quality).

Joe Middleton (http://www.scottishindependence.com and http://www.independence1st.org) wrote a good piece about the march: http://scotland.indymedia.org/newswire/display/3284/index.php

Have a swatch:

Novelling

Draft Two of my Novel is complete. Fanks to Mumsie Firefox for the use of her computer while I was delocated from Firefox HQ.

And that bastard thing still isn't done. It was my fault entirely. I had included what was intended to be an 'ironic' character in my sci-fi comedy. It then transpired that it is in fact impossible to create an 'ironic' character using the name 'The Widowmaker'. Who'd've thunk it...

Anyway, there are two female characters he can be replaced by (which DOES work...) So rewrite three will have to get rid of a number of pointless tricks I tried.

My favourite line from the Novel is from a Character called Ben: "My friend Mhari knows a word called ferapy and finks you need it."

So... how are you? I can tell at least a couple of my three readers checked out the Tribal Music post (and someone even replied... it happens so rarely I barely check...)

I also had an e-mail about my rant about "Francis the Second" and who "Francis the First" was and then proceeded to threaten a "Pillar Box War part two" in an otherwise relatively well received article. Firstly, thanks to Jovan for taking the trouble to e-mail me. Always appreciate contact. When I'm not on dial-up I'll reply (still at Mumsie Firefox's).

I will (therefore) explain to the rest of you about Francis I. It is not that I didn't "know" who Francis I was. It was just that I didn't actually care. I checked Wikipedia for him, and a couple of online sources and soon realised I wanted to go to "mysistershotfriend" and consequently stopped and went for a cold shower. And that was my point. However legitimate a claimant he may or may not have been, he lost. Bonnie Prince Charlie TRIED and failed. From what I can tell, the later ones didn't even try. Why am I supposed to care?

The same is true of Elizabeth the Second, while she may well have had an ancestor called 'Elizabeth I' a) I remain "uncaring" because she's royalty and b) we never had an Elizabeth I in SCOTLAND. You need to remember that I'm a Republican and while I can tell you what colour clothes Scottish Republican John Baird wore while in the army regiment he was in a good ten years before the 1820 insurrection (Green - he wasn't a Red Coat) I haven't researched too much shinto about Jacobite claimants.

I know I'm not interested in it and act accordingly. Fortuntely I know people who ARE into that kind of thing, and their enthusiasm and general interest in their subject usually makes it more entertaining to listen to.

I'm happy to publish a Jacobite article or two explaining things I've little chance of researching. Besides, I like Jacobites. Don't agree with them, but think they're perfectly nice and fun people to get drunk with at commemorations, and you can't say fairer than that. So, there you have it: a free offer of Jacobite propaganda on a Scottish Republican Website. We'll call it an Xmas present. My e-mail address is on the right. Mark the subject heading: "You are a Commie Republican Bastard."

Anyway, bored now, bye.

Independence First March - Saturday - 1st set

Independence First March - Saturday - 2nd Set

Independence First March - 3rd Set

Independence First March - Saturday - 4th Set

Ted Christopher and William Wallace

Ted Christopher, widely acknowledged as a well accomplished mistrel of the Scottish variety, has a few interesting things to say about William Wallace at the few events I've seen him speak at.

I've seen him at Elderslie, Stonehaven and, more recently, at the Independence First march and Rally in Edinburgh.

He has a bit, where he mentions, almost in passing that politicians are as scared of William Wallace as they were back in the day when they had him brutally executed.

Every time I've heard it (and it's not been for the first time at Embra) it has been met with a general - and usually loud - murmur of agreement. I think the most precient, however, was at yesterday's rally. Maybe it because the Rally just about matched expectations, or maybe it was because the matchstick vichy parly was the background to his songs and views.

For me, the William Wallace I have read about would be rabble-rounding inside the chamber, demanding something a bit more substantial than pointless epitaphs on sporting acheievements being given cursory mentions as "Motions" inside something built for Scots designed by someone with the artistic eye of a blind banana inspector.

This, as I growled from the crowd at Bill Speirs at the Elderslie Rally, was Revisionism, which I usually despise. In my belief system, I can't 'argue' what William Wallace may or may not have done but seek to do what I believe should or should not be done. Therefore instead of William slamming the desks of Parliament demanding something better, then would I be willing to do it myself?

But the general agreement that Ted's words got, was a point that I took away from all times I've seen him speak it. It wasn't because they just wanted to give William a simple "gaun yersel" but because they actually bought into it. It seems astonishing to exist as a threat, 701 years after your own death. Robert the Bruce never achieved that, and he was the superior military tactician as well as general.

I think you could even see the spirit of Wallace inside Neil Caple as he spoke between each "act" and was, at one point heckled by someone who didn't know and cared less about. Instead he wanted him to make his points to "his face" and in due course sent him homewards tae think again. I've got to say I especially liked that bit. For info, if you're intending to heckle someone with a microphone, it makes less sense if the crowd can't hear you, no matter how benign and 'high brow' your points might or might not be.

William Wallace was walking amongst us in the crowd yesterday. The police were around trying to find him. He's still a wanted man, 701 years later. The real big yin still scares unionists and despite what Bill Spiers thinks, he still gives a fuck about US; unlike the Trade Unions, unlike the Labour Party, and unlike all the plastic unionists too delusional to realise that the day is coming when we shall rise again.

Ahlam's Story

Former Spook investigated for creativity

Former spy Richard Tomlinson, who famously released an autobiography of his experiences in MI6, is being investigated for writing a Novel which Special Branch believes is in breach of the Official Secrets Act.

Tomlinson's Blog, has been opened up and shut down various times by State Forces. Presently, Tomlinson and an un-named co-author have released what they have so-far written onto Richard's current Blog site. How long it stays up there is anyone's guess.

The state has even gone so far as to have the Treasury Solicitor WRITE to Mr. Tomlinson to remind him of his obligations, as a former spook, of not tattling on his friends.

The State suspects Tomlinson of a number of offenses relating to breaches of the Official Secrets Act, partly in relation to his book "The Big Breach" (which I have a copy of if you need to borrow it) for which he was later convicted. His main crime, is to be prime suspect in the release of names of serving officers in MI6.

Here is the first three lines of Richard's (apparently) debut novel, The Golden Chain:

The bags had been sitting in the corner of the backroom gathering dust for nearly three months. One smart lockable suitcase, too big for cabin luggage, and a black leather grip she had bought in Paris. She never went anywhere without the grip. The shoulder strap had been repaired at the heel bar down the road at least three times to Delaney’s knowledge, but still she would insist.

This clearly IS criminal, but not exactly in the way either Richard or the Special Branch actually consider. Naturally his followers are drooling over this latest twist in Richard's life, which the rest of us are left with the Civil Rights violations and secrecy traditions currently evident in MI6.

This begs a few serious questions, most of which are glaringly obvious, so I won't waste your time by repeating them. Use the comments to bring them up.

I was initially quite suspicious of both Tomlinson, and his MI5 colleague, David Shayler when the both seemed to be poster boys of evidence for corruption against MI5 and Mi6. I buy into the whole secret-police arguments against MI5 & 6, I do, but these two seemed deliciously suspect to me. Take for example Shaylers comments about "plots" against Gadaffi, as well as Tomlinson's assertions about the plot against Diana was an MI6 conspiracy. Am I the only person to think this is all rather... convenient?

Anyway, civil liberties, spookdom... I'm guessing you're expecting a rant about how this is all rather troubling and how they're all bad bad people. Well... they are, but only because they're against Scottish Independence. Personally, I accept that a Scottish State will need an Intelligence Dept. to deal with Organised Crime or foreign powers. Having a conscientious foreign policy clears 90% of threats against you, in my opinion, but typically the second oldest profession does have it's uses.

Clearly the OSA is as archaic as it is barbaric, and the treatment of Tomlinson and Shayler - if they are indeed rogue agents - is reprehensible. So many policies to fix come independence, so little time...

Grant Morrison

Saw this on Teigan's blog and figured both my Scottish readers would be interested in this video.

The Ever Closing Drums of Tribal Music

I haven't posted in a while, and aren't likely to until at least November. Poss Mid-oct but I'm busy. I've an anti-Union vid thing for Youtube to do, a flat to clean and delocate from for three weeks and a novel to write. I'm sure you understand.

To keep you going, I'm going to impart a wee bit of culture into your otherwise worthless lives. It concerns two of my favourite bands at the moment, neither of which (to my knowledge) plug their instruments in (I like Marlyn Manson as an example of my usual tastes...)

In the beginning was Clann an Drumma and it was good. Then someone took the huff and Albannach was formed. Not sure how, why, where, when and what "musical differences" caused the split but where there was 'one' so there became two.

Firstly, a (very) brief overview:

Wiki CnD: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clann_An_Drumma
Wiki Albannach: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albannach

CnD's website: http://www.clannandrumma.com/
Albannach's Website: http://www.albannachonline.com/

What seemed to happen was the Joe MacKenzie wanted to rewrite the history of pipes and drums, did it, broke up his band a few times and there ended up being two bands wanting to play tribal music. Not wanting to relish in some dudes pain, but two bands as good as this deserve (a) a plug and (b) for us to like the fact that where there was one, now there is two. Am I sick to want another? (There's one called, Trybe, but I've not heard them yet. Answers at kenny.sheerin@gmail.com ...)

I'm sure you want to listen to see why I love them so much. Some musical interludes from their own websites:

Clann an Drumma:

Full list of tracks available is here: http://www.clannandrumma.com/sounds.html
Best track is this one: http://www.clannandrumma.com/clans.mp3

Albannach:

Ripping stuff from Albannachs website is difficult (unless you have the CD itself and I like them too much for THAT kind of copyright infringement).

Stop at their Myspace website first to listen free and easy to their music:
http://www.myspace.com/albannachonline

Then go to their official "radio station" on their website here: http://www.albannachonline.com/music.htm (you'll need WINamp to hear it, and in my opinion a comment or two from the band in between their album tracks wouldn't go amiss).

Anyway, go off and have a listen and tell me you don't enjoy it.

Fanks.

My Country

I have a country.

I created it.

It is mine.

http://www.nationstates.net/tribal_music

This is being posted as I've now got 500 million residents. I'm so proud... Well... not entirely. I seem to have been categorised "Inoffensive Centrist Democracy". I'd much prefer "Commie Scottish Bastard" but there doesn't seem to be an option.

Oh well...

A 419 Scam template reply

Dear Sir,

thank you for your 419 Scam, but at the present time - unfortunately - I am presently being detained by the CIA in one of their secret rendition prisons.

Man - torture sucks.

Anyway, until I am released here is a picture for you to enjoy.

Kenny
-----------

On 9/8/06, tarek omar <mr_taomar2004@walla.com> wrote:

Dear Friend,

Confidencial and top secret

I know that this mail will come to you as a surprise. I am the bill and exchange manager in Bank of Africa. I Hoped that you will not expose or betray this trust and confident that i am about to repose on you for the mutual benefit of our both families.

We need your urgent assistance in transferring the sum of $11.3million immediately to your account.The money has been dormant for may years in our Bank here without any body coming for it.

We want to release the money to you as the nearest person to our deceased customer(the owner of the account)who died a long with his supposed next of kin in an air crash since July 2000.

We don't want the money to go into our Bank treasury as an abandoned fund. So this is the reason why i contacted you, so that my bank will release the money to you as the nearest person to the deceased cutomer.

Please we would like you to keep this proposal as a top secret and delete if you are not interested.

Upon receipt of your reply, i will send you full details on how the business will be executed and also note that you will have 25% of the above mentioned sum if you agree to transact the business with us.

MR TAREK OMAR
Bank Of Africa,Burkina Faso-West Africa

---

Walla! Mail - get your free 3G mail today

The Crann Tara Test Pictures

White Rabbit

This post is about Revolution.

It takes the virii of the other struggles and exposes you to them.

What you do with them is up to you.

"The Revolutions says:

I was
I am
I will be again"

Seed the First

Today I was at Stonehaven, to commemorate the victory of the Wallace over Dunottar Castle.

I made the rally and photographed it. Photos and story later. I didn't make social for personal reasons. Hopefully someone can recount the carousing for you. I'll probably have to ask them, but in case someone is reading this (e-mail me or PM me on the Siol nan Gaidheal forum).

http://www.waichung.demon.co.uk/william/rebel.htm

Seed the Second

"It wasn’t just about killing Americans, and killing pigs, at least not at first. It was about attacking the illegitimate state that these pawns served. It was about scraping the bucolic soil and exposing the fascist, Nazi-tainted bedrock that the modern West German state was propped upon. It was about war on the forces of reaction. It was about Revolution.

"The Baader-Meinhof Gang certainly didn’t expect to win their war by themselves. They assumed an epic proletarian backlash would be the Revolution’s true engine. They assumed their wave of terror would force the state to respond with brutal, reflexive anger. They assumed that West German civil liberties and civil rights would be quashed as the state turned the clock back 25 years to the Nazi era of open fascism. They assumed that the proletarian West Germans would react in horror as the true nature of their own government was revealed. They assumed that factory workers, bakers, and miners, would be inspired to smash their own oppressors. They assumed that they would be the vanguard of a movement where millions of Germans brought Revolution home."

Richard Huffman from: http://www.baader-meinhof.com/gun/chapter/index.htm


Seed the Third

"In 1972, Currie and McGuigan, inspired by the willingness of an elderly woman to starve herself to death for the independence of Scotland, re-established the Tartan Army, this time to "fight" on Scotland's side.

"When the name exploded on the Scots public it sounded comical. The Scots know little of their own history, political, cultural or industrial and most of them suffer from an endemic disease called The Scottish Cringe. However a journalist in a Scotch tabloid, the Daily Record, hit on the idea of dubbing the tartan bedecked followers of Scotland's national football team with the name which has now passed into the everyday vocabulary, not only of the Scots, but of soccer followers the world over; The Tartan Army."

Author Unknown - The Tartan Army:
http://www.electricscotland.com/history/tartan_army2.htm

Seed the Fourth

Tartan terrorist found hanging in cell hours before facing court

FRANK URQUHART

THE notorious Tartan terrorist convicted 11 years ago of masterminding a Scottish National Liberation Army terror campaign, committed suicide in his prison cell yesterday, only hours before he was due to appear in court on charges relating to a security alert linked to the opening of the Scottish Parliament.

Andrew McIntosh was found hanging in his cell at Aberdeen’s Craiginches prison, shortly before was scheduled to appear at the city’s sheriff court on firearms charges.

He was one of three men arrested ten days ago - the day the Queen performed the opening ceremony at the Scottish Parliament - after a massive police operation involving officers from the Grampian and Lothian and Borders forces.

McIntosh, 49, was jailed for 12 years at the High Court in Aberdeen in December 1993, after being convicted of being the tartan terrorist commander behind a ruthless letter-bomb and bomb-hoax campaign in Scotland and England.

A xenophobic nationalist extremist who hated the English, he was part of an SNLA conspiracy aimed at coercing ministers at Westminster to establish a separate government in Scotland.

McIntosh, a former army reservist, was working as an oil- company courier when he was arrested ten years ago and charged with being part of a terrorist campaign to try to secure Scotland’s freedom from Westminster rule.

During a series of interviews with detectives in 1993, he boasted: "I am a volunteer soldier with the SNLA. I am a cell commander. The actions we have taken are directed at those people who are actively working against the interests of Scotland. Whatever I did, I did in the line of duty."

He was convicted of sending letter bombs to the Scottish Office in Edinburgh, the Dounreay nuclear plant in Caithness and the headquarters of Anglian Water in Huntingdon, and of targeting improvised mortar devices at the offices of four oil companies in Aberdeen.

McIntosh was further convicted of illegally possessing a Kalashnikov assault rifle, a sawn-off shotgun and a pistol as part of a lethal arsenal of weapons and ammunition - including CS riot gas cartridges - that was recovered at his home in George Street, Aberdeen.

The trial was told that the three-month campaign of terror he helped plan and execute brought chaos to Scotland’s four major cities and endangered the lives of men and women whose offices had been targeted by the extremist cell he led.

Lord Morison, the trial judge, told McIntosh: "I take into account that your activities have not resulted in deaths or severe injury to anyone, and, had that been the case, the sentence which I propose to impose would have been considerably longer.

"But these activities have caused very serious disruption in Scotland and very serious alarm. The crimes of which you have been convicted are extremely grave ones."

McIntosh was released in 1999 after serving six years of his sentence.

He was living in a high-rise flat in Aulton Court, in the Seaton area of Aberdeen, when he was arrested on firearms charges on 9 October, shortly before the Queen officially opened the Holyrood building. He was remanded in custody last Monday and was due to make a second court appearance yesterday. But he was found dead early yesterday morning when prison officers checked his cell.

A spokesman for the Scottish Prison Service said: "A prisoner on remand was found dead in his cell this morning at HM Prison Aberdeen, Craiginches. Andrew McIntosh, 49, from Aberdeen, was remanded on 11 October at Aberdeen Sheriff Court. Police and next of kin have been informed."

The spokesman, who refused to say whether or not McIntosh had been on suicide watch, added: "A fatal accident inquiry will be held in due course."

A Grampian Police spokeswoman said: "We attended at Craiginches prison after the report of the sudden death of Andrew McIntosh. Next of kin have been informed and a post- mortem will be carried out.

"Police investigations are continuing but it appears there are no suspicious circumstances. A report will be submitted to the procurator fiscal."

McIntosh was recently named as organiser of a group called "The Scottish Patriots" which has applied to stage a march through the centre of Aberdeen on 28 November - on the same day and along the same route as a proposed march by the far-right National Front.

One of the men arrested with him ten days ago made a second appearance in private at Aberdeen Sheriff Court yesterday afternoon. Alan McIntosh, 50, appeared in connection with alleged contraventions of the Firearms Act, 1968, and the Explosive Substances Act, 1883. He was fully committed for trial and released on bail.

The Crown Office said the other man, Graeme Robert Otterson, 32, from Aberdeen, who is known as MacOtter, had been released from custody.

This article: http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=1213632004

Seed the Fifth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_McGuinness


Seed the Sixth

http://www.siol-nan-gaidheal.com/muir.htm

Seed the Seventh

Make of this what you will.

God and Man

This is partly to pay homage to a work in progress.

I lurk on a forum called first foot (which I lurk on because typing in Scottish jist rips ma knittin) but it contains possibly the most pointless thread on a Scottish Forum. To get a long long thread, usually you have to call it "my favourite music" of "images of Sarah Michelle Geller." The acronym of this practice, I think, is NAMBLA.

Anyway, tis here:

Never, has a thread (or NAMBLA) had so many pages with so little point.

I love stuff like this. It's pointless, but it's charming and they do it anyway.

So, what else has happened? I made a burny thing for a test photo. Test completed and Firefox learnt a few important lessons. Like wood doesn't like to burn. Not even when accompanied with some lighter fuel. I used half a tin and the bloody thing merely sat there looking charred.

Ah wis fair affrontit.

Fortunately I was in the middle of nowhere so my tantrum went unnoticed.

And this is the second point of my post: Why do all the interesting bits of Scottishrana seem to involve ritual sacrifice?

I mean honestly... As a people we could've chosen to specialise a wee bit. The English, for example, their main feature - the thing you think most about them - is that what they do (and do well) is conquer places. We chose to invent a lot (and I mean A LOT) of stuff, be conquered, invent some more, dabble in art, politics, music, culture blah blah blah and SACRIFICE A FEW GOATS ALONG THE WAY.

Take my burny thing. Historians who know about this kind of thing mention in various versions of my burny thing (post here) that the burnyness gets put out with the use of specially sacrificed goat. That's our Whiskey heritage, right there in action. Several drunk clansmen, burning stuff, decide "Fuck it, where's the goat?"

Anyway, to another interesting snippet of Scottishrana: the Taghairm Ceremony. Basically involving stuff like carpets, waterfulls, and oh... surprise suh-fucking-prise more ritual sacrifice (this time for divination purposes).

I wouldn't be pissed off, but I still intend to make a real, accurate Crann Tara and I'm really not sure why. And (and out of all of the sentences that there are on this blog, I really, truly, honestly, never expected to end a blog post with the following sentence... If I had a poll of things I wasn't likely to end a post with, this'd be number one).

Where the hell am I going to get some goat's blood from?