Labour's Disgrace

All his life my father voted labour.  He came from a comfortable working class background where I would think both his parents voted labour. His father was Dundonian and his mother Glaswegian so I wouldn't have expected any other political party to be considered.  That's the way it was back in the early 1900s.  Although he was orphaned at the age of nine, he once told me his political leanings were, by then, firmly entrenched, but he was always open to discussion.  By the time he died in 1988 he was very unsure of the labour party and, during one of our chats in the hospice, he said he was quite tempted to change to the SNP.  Of course he knew he'd never live to vote again because he suffered from prostate cancer which had travelled into his 71-year-old bones.

Al-Megrahi has prostate cancer.  I don't doubt that.  Since his release I've overloaded my brain with information regarding his medical condition and spoken to those who have medical experience.  Whether I think his release was right or wrong is immaterial.

But labour in Scotland, along with the unionists in Westminster and a selection of senators in America, have continually accused the SNP government - and Kenny MacAskill in particular - of impropriety regarding the release.  Alex Salmond has always said they adhered to the law.

Today's MSM exonerate the Scottish government from any wrong doing.  No apologies from the Scottish media of course but they lambast the then labour Westminster government for misleading the public.  I'm sure by now most of us who are interested will have read the dead-tree media's account and also viewed the stumbling and mumbling behaviour of Scottish labour's justice representative, Richard Baker, on Newsnight Scotland last night.

Scottish bloggers Joan MacAlpine and Lallands Peat Worrier have posed questions I would ask but I see no point in repetition.  Moridura has a clip from last night's Newsnight UK in which Alex Salmond patiently responds to Paxman.

The Scottish government have acted morally and in complete accord with the Scottish justice system. Labour have shown themselves to be reluctant to tell the truth.

My father would have voted SNP in May - I have no doubt whatsoever.  He was a man with firm beliefs including truth, morals and justice.  This incident alone shows today's labour party, in both the UK and Scotland, has none of these values.

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A Must Read - Kenneth Roy

                                 

On Wednesday Kenneth Roy led on The Megrahi Scandal in the Scottish Review.  He questioned Alex Salmond's decision to reappoint the Lord Advocate, Elish Angiolini, when the SNP took office in 2007.

He also suggests that it would take the Scottish government only 4 weeks to publish the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission's report.

Wednesday's article is here.  A must read.

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Gordon Brown's Porkies

The al-Megrahi release raises its head again in today's Telegraph.  It alleges a Foreign Office minister, Bill Rammall, sent Libyan officials detailed legal advice on how to use Mr al-Megrahi's cancer diagnosis to ensure he was released from a Scottish prison on compassionate grounds.

Several times Gordon Brown insisted the British government had no involvement whatsoever in the release of al-Megrahi, yet he must have been aware a Foreign Office minister was in direct contact with Libyan officials.

The Telegraph has published more than 480 American documents which were obtained by the Wikileaks website and passed to the newspaper.

The unionist Scotsman takes the line that the documents will 'heighten pressure on the SNP administration at Holyrood to reveal the full extent of discussions with the UK government about how and when Megrahi could be released'.  I see no evidence of any impropriety from the Scottish government in the few documents supplied online by the Telegraph.  What I do see, if the documents' facts are accurate, that Gordon Brown lied.

Surely now Dr Swire will be granted his independent inquiry.

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