Category: Uncategorized

Saturday 21 October 2023

Genocide of the Palestinian People.

Ukraine

 The SNP Are at It Again.

So, the end of another week and an extremely busy one at that. This is the way it has been for quite some time and doesn’t look like becoming any quieter in the foreseeable future. Throughout my career in business, I feel I have always been able to plan in such a way that generally gives a satisfactory outcome. Unfortunately, I have failed miserably in facilitating my retirement.

I have been so busy that I have been neglecting my regular take on what is happening in the world through my blog, The World This Week from Mennies, so here is my take on several topical issues.

The Genocide of the Palestinian People

Yes, genocide is a very strong word but that is exactly what it is, and this has been part of a very intricately laid plan involving the Israeli government, the US and quite possibly some European countries .

So, what is behind it all? Well two main things. Firstly, Israel wishes to exterminate the Palestinian people in order to re-instate a fairy tale of their ancient homeland, in the land of Canaan.  This belief derives from a vague interpretation in the Old Testament of the bible. Now to be clear, the bible we are speaking about, tells us that the earth is only 6000 years old. Which makes that ludicrous assertion wrong by about four and a half billion years and this is supposed to be the word of God.

This belief regarding a Jewish homeland is heavily attached to the main fairy tail of the Exodus, which is a tall story about the “chosen people”, the Israelites, firstly being chosen by god to be slaves in Egypt, then God chose to send 10 plagues to convince the ruler of Egypt to allow the Israelites to move towards the promised land. For such an omnipotent entity I would have thought that God could just have changed the Pharo’s mind.

Ok, so he didn’t and instead instituted this series of catastrophic events causing the deaths of possibly millions of innocent people, including the granddaddy of them all “The Passover” where he decided to kill the firstborn of every Egyptian. Yes, I am serious and that doesn’t mean just children it means the firstborn in every family and remember this is the God of love we are speaking about.

To make matters worse, the “Angels” he was to send in this program of mass murder didn’t know who the “chosen” people were ( how he managed to “choose” them in the first place I cannot imagine) so the Israelites had to paint their doorposts with goats’ blood so that the intellectually challenged Angels could pass over the houses of the Israelites and kill only the Egyptians.

OK, so are you with me, because it is getting worse. So, this convinced the ruler of Egypt to allow the Israelites to go from Egypt. Which they did and according to the bible, in the region of a million people headed towards the promised land, however, the ruler of Egypt changed his mind and sent an army after them at which point Moses stretched out his hand and the Red Sea opened allowing a million people to cross over whereby he again raised his hand and the sea engulfed the army. I told you it got worse and now the piece de resistance.

God, this omnipotent entity, and creator of the earth, gets them bloody lost and I don’t mean just wandered off their compass bearing for an hour or two, I mean lost in the bloody desert for 40 years and to get this into perspective, the journey to the promised land should have taken 11 days.

Ok so now this million people have been wandering around the desert for 40 years and God finally tells them that they have arrived at the promised land which is the land of Cannen. Great but the only slight problem is that God wants them to slaughter all the Canaanites before they can claim the promised land and guess what that is called. It is called Genocide, and that is what these descendants of the Israelites are doing again in the same land because at that time which was 1350 BC ( over 3000 years ago) the Canaanites were Palestinians.

Ok, so before you all start jumping up and down and telling me that this is absolute nonsense then let me tell you that you are correct, as none of this has ever been proven to have happened and for a million people to have wandered the desert for 40 years there is not a single archaeological sign. There is only the word of God through the Bible., But here is the thing, there are people who actually choose to believe this nonsense, these are the Zionist leaders of Israel, and they are at this moment enacting these very deeds I have just outlined and have been doing since Britain enacted the Balfour Declaration in 1948.

Since then, various governments of Israel have been operating a slow genocide of the Palestinian people in the area that was once Canaan.

The second thing that is part of the equation is that because of US stupidity by way of Donald Trump and because the US reneged on agreements with Iran to limit any move towards them achieving weapon-grade plutonium, there have been no inspections of nuclear facilities in Iran and I am pretty sure that with an unstable neighbor like Israel, they have been working away to achieve the goal of a nuclear weapon and this is why the illogical presence of the US carrier fleet in the Mediterranean sea.

The hope will be that Iran will be drawn into the conflict in Gaza and a war with Iran will be commenced.  

Make no mistake, the attack by Hamas over the most impenetrable border on the planet was all planned and it wasn’t all in Gaza, most of it was in Tel Aviv. This is a false flag incident on the level of Gulf of Tonkin incident at the start of the Vietnam War.

Meanwhile the slaughter goes on and the west stays silent on the daily war crimes committed by Israel. The Palestinians did not invade the country of Israel as defined in the League of Nations Balfour declaration, they went into territory occupied by the Zionists of Israel.

I have blethered on more than I intended with this, so will cut short the other two items.

Ukraine

Well, the “Spring offensive” has finally come to a halt and the slaughter of young lives on the Ukrainian side goes on. Putin is doing what he said he would do and hopefully, the de-Nazification is going along apace.

Meanwhile, Zelensky ( who is a Jew) is selling arms supplied to him by the West to Hamas, to fight the, err Jews!

The SNP

Believe it or not, SNP policy to attain independence is to get the majority of seats (not the majority of people ) and all will be well with the UK government who will immediately agree to a section 30 derogation of the Scotland Act and will commence negotiations on independence. They have not noticed that they have had a majority of seats for many years and have done nothing about it.

The problem the SNP have is that if by chance there was another independence-related party in power, they would no doubt initiate an enquiry into the possible criminality which has gone on during the tenure of Nicola Sturgeon, therefore they must make such a mess of things and refuse to cooperate with any other party to allow a unionist party into power in Scotland. That is the only way they can be sure that no enquiry is ever initiated.

OK, that’s it for today folks and I am looking forward to my next travel adventure which takes in  Thailand, Vietnam, Bruni, And the Philippines and this is next Month.

So, I wish my friends the world over a great weekend. Time for a pint.

Slainte.

Remember
Sit in the same place for long enough and the whole world will pass you by, you will however, probably be arrested for vagrancy.

Well, day 6 on my European river trip along the Rhine. The last two stops were in Rhudishime and Mainz. Now in Strasbourg.

Rhudishime was quite a lively place with a very traditional German township and quite a tourist stop.

I managed to get out in the town for a few pints after dinner as the entertainment on the ship consisted of a string quartet, so after a couple of tunes I headed ashore and found a couple of bars with good live entertainment.

Strasbourg today and a very quiet place it is, but I suppose it is Sunday.

Note to self:- next time you ask the activities rep if the city centre is within walking distance and he advises taking a taxi, believe him.

He pointed out the cathedral spire protruding from the city skyline and suggested taking a taxi there.

Me of course knowing better and using my infallible sense of direction and distance assessment, reckoned that it was a walk of about 2 miles and set off.

This is me sitting in a coffee shop one and a half hours later with sore feet having walked about 4 +miles.

There is a distinct shortage of coffee shops in Strasbourg on a Sunday. However, this one is excellent and the coffee is good.

Now the French people are lovely but my experiences with them through numerous tours I have driven with them and various visits to France is that they are fully paid-up members of the awkward squad and although most of them speak very good English they do not readily cooperate with anyone who does not at least try to speak French. Some of you might remember my story concerning a trip to Monti Carlo where again, I tried to subvert local advice, decided not to take the advised taxi and walk to my hotel which I duly found after receiving directions from numerous people which took me all over Monty Carlo and that was only the people who admitted to understanding English.

Anyway, my fluent French stood by me today as I masterfully ordered my cappuccino in about the only sentence I know in French.

I remember in my touring days, I had a French group of veterinary surgeons doing a tour of Abattoirs in the Aberdeen area.

On the way back to the hotel which was on the outskirts of Aberdeen one day, the organiser asked if I could take them into Aberdeen for a short shopping stop. Now I was only booked until 5 PM each day but I agreed to take them. I stopped just off Union Street and explained that I couldn’t wait there because of parking restrictions but I would be back at exactly 5.30 and could they be on time as I could get a parking ticket if I had to wait.

Well, French people being French people, some of them did not turn up for another half an hour. Fortunately, a parking attendant did not happen by.

The following day the same thing happened as the organiser asked again if I could take them to Aberdeen. This time when I stopped to let them off I explained that perhaps an hour was not sufficient for their shopping needs and there was a good taxi service nearby so, I would be there at 5.30 and would assume that if anyone was not there, they would have decided to take a taxi so would leave for the hotel.

Every single one of them was waiting at the pick-up point when I arrived there

So, I will finish my coffee and head back to the ship

Have a nice Sunday folks

This incident came up on a Facebook memory going back to 2015, It is one of the SNP’s most disgraceful episodes in a long list of their attempts to stifle independence events in Dundee.

We, through the Yes Bus Team decided to run an independence rally and I named it “Roadmap to Independence Rally”

We also invited speakers from all political parties to speak including Tommy Sheridon who always got very large crowds when he came to Dundee during the referendum campaign.

The SNP did all in their power to stop then restrict this event including using DC Thompson, a unionist newspaper publisher to try to disparage the event.

The event was a success despite the best SNP efforts to thwart it but it was the last straw as far as I was concerned and led to my resignation from the SNP after a 30-year membership.

I have copied below my letter of resignation which better explains the situation at the time ( 2015) in the SNP.

The SNP today are a mess and must be removed from the independence arena or we will suffer the consequences for many years.
Anyone thinking of voting for the SNP next Thursday should first read this.

Letter Of Resignation From the SNP

Dear Peter

It is with much regret and very much soul searching that I must cancel my membership of the SNP. A party that I have supported for many years both financially and indeed a vast amount of my time.

To give you an idea of my commitment to the party and indeed the fight for independence which is what, up to recently I have always thought that the SNP were all about, I list below some of the input I have had to the independence cause and therefore the party.

Going back to 2013 and the wonderful march and rally in Edinburgh I supplied two coaches free of charge at a worth of £***

I also supplied a mini bus for disabled people free of charge at a worth of £***

Over the years I have allowed free storage and parking at our depot for SNP vehicles

In the run up to the referendum I took in Chris Law’s 50 year old fire engine and turned it into The Spirit of Independence, in our workshops this involved completely stripping the paint by hand and repainting it , refurbishing the brass work and completely overhauling the mechanical elements of it . The value of this was £*,***

I made available the Yes Bus Scotland’s dragon for independence to any grass roots organisation to campaign in their own particular manner. A 20 year old double decker bus with a history of service in two countries which had gained their independence from the UK. The value of this could be conservatively assessed at £**,***

This bus then went on to actively campaign throughout Dundee Angus and fife with the Yes bus team, a group of committed volunteers from all parties and none. This yes bus has continued to promote independence mainly in the City square both during and since the referendum.

The value of this could conservatively be put at £**,***

During the campaign I supplied vans and minibuses to collect yes materials from Edinburgh and distribute these materials throughout the area and convey SNP campaigners throughout Dundee.  A conservative estimation of a worth of £*,***

During the referendum campaign I supplied for a whole 2 months, a coach and driver for Business for Scotland who worked very closely with the SNP, **********************************************************************************the worth of this is £**,*** with a contribution from business for Scotland of £*,***

There have been many other areas of assistance which I have given.

So the forgoing plus the direct donations that I have made to the party I feel shows that I have had unstinting commitment both to the party and to the cause of independence.

I have since the referendum mainly through social media and discussions with SNP politicians sought to offer suggestions regarding the ongoing fight for independence. Sometimes this has been taken as being anti SNP by some of the less able to think members of the party instead of constructive criticism.

A couple of days after the referendum I approached a local SNP politician and said “well we have lost a battle but not the war so what is the plan. The response I got was “what plan”. I said that we had made mistakes during the campaign such as muddle on plan B and we failed to convince pensioners that their pensions were not at risk in an independent Scotland and before any further referendum we must at the very least answer these questions and we should continue at a lower level the grass roots campaign to make people aware of these and many other issues that they were obviously uncomfortable with. Again the equivalent of a blank look. In short we have not made any preparation for a future referendum and it is still that situation today.

During the referendum campaign   we, the yes Bus team were on the streets of Dundee almost every day talking to thousands of undecided and hard no voters explaining the positive side of independence. We had a fantastic mix of people from all walks of life and political persuasions including people from business for Scotland of which I am a member. We had people out on the periphery and the streets surrounding the city square handing out merchandise and leaflets (when we could prise the material from the SNP run Yes Hub in St Andrews Street. And most important was that all these people sometimes 20 to 30 (far more than the SNP could muster to deliver leaflets and 10 times more than the amount of people who manned the occasional SNP stall including the politicians who huddled ineffectually around their stall in the Nethergate.

Now I should have realised at the time but this reluctance to have much to do with the grass roots groups was actually apparent even then, because the only time we saw the politicians at the Yes Bus was when the press were there and they disappeared along with the press, so they did absolutely no campaigning in Dundee with the grass roots groups that I was associated with.

After the referendum the yes organisation was disbanded and I can only wonder at the wisdom of this as it was a catalyst for the grass roots groups and to my mind would have been a logical way of keeping the independence movement alive.

We sent 56 MP’s down to London out of a possible 59. A massive majority and I cannot for the life of me understand why they were not tasked with attempting to wrest the power to hold a referendum at a time of our choosing from Westminster to Holyrood. You will be aware that with a majority of one in Holyrood we managed to persuade the British Government to grant temporary power to hold a referendum after the last Scottish elections.

So I have over the last few months began to have an uneasy feeling regarding the actual commitment of the SNP to actually commit themselves wholeheartedly to the cause of independence .

I keep receiving messages and postings from unthinking people with the well-worn message of “ the SNP knows what they are doing they have a plan “ well with half a century of business behind me I have found that blind allegiance and faith generally leads to disaster.

So I have had misgivings as to the commitment or lack of strategic planning exhibited by the SNP with regards to a future referendum for some time, but what has brought this to a head is recent events in connection with a rally  myself and others organised in Dundee on Sunday 4^th October.

This rally was a “road map to independence” misconstrued by some of the mindless SNP trolls to be pressure for an imminent referendum. I realised for the reasons previously mentioned that we are not ready for a referendum should the opportunity present itself and taking into consideration the remarks from Nicola Sturgeon that “the Scottish people will decide  when we are ready for another referendum” and also realising that many people in Scotland , a great many SNP members among them are becoming restless because of the inability or reluctance of the SNP to present a reasonable way forward (a road map) I reasoned that a sensible approach and opportunity for the SNP would be to present a road map , not necessarily with a date but showing that proper preparations had been put in place . I feel that this would have been a good compromise and would have placated the unrest which is brewing.

Now we had asked Tommy Sheridan   (being a prominent pro-independence campaigner) to talk together with several other speakers. We had a great line up of top class bands to entertain the crowds. The problem was that we could not get any SNP speakers. Eventually the top brass put forward Jimmy Black who is not a parliamentarian but a councillor, who made it clear that he had been “put forward.” Now he promptly   did a posting on Facebook asking all and sundry (not necessarily his constituents) if he should appear at the same event as Tommy Sheridan. I have never in my life seen anything so transparent, immature and incompetent being initiated by anyone let alone a politician. As if that was not bad enough he actually made reference to why he thought he should not appear siting Sheridan’s conviction for perjury ( which he has served his punishment for ) and inexplicably reference to a book about Sheridan which made unsubstantiated allegations about his past. So we had an SNP politician “on Facebook” indicating that a punishment handed down in court was not sufficient and the person should continue to be ostracised presumably for the rest of his life and more incredibly acting as judge and jury on unsubstantiated allegations that for some reason have never come to court.

Now this started a torrent of abuse, mainly from insiders within the close confines of the SNP in Dundee, mainly Dundee West, both to me and another person (a woman) who was involved in the organisation of this event.

Now we had properly applied within the time constraints for permission to hold the rally but because of a misunderstanding concerning the parade element of the day we had not applied separately (despite the staff in the council offices stating that only the one form was needed) for the parade and therefore we applied as soon as we realised this. Now late applications are very common place and happen all the time and the Convener of the Licencing committee has discretion in this. This man is Stewart Hunter an SNP councillor. Now despite all the necessary departments being happy with the parade including the police who I had detailed discussions with and in an apparent attempt to harm the rally he decided not to use his disctecionaly power to allow the parade to go ahead. He used the excuse that the last time I organised a rally in May it was chaotic and he only gave permission on the morning of that rally.

So I will go on now to explain what actually happened to the last rally, again a grass roots rally organised by Yes We Care and not me .I was in fact nothing to do with the application.

This rally was to take place on the weekend before the general election. Several days before the rally was to take place I had a visit from Chris Law (now Chris Law MP) at my office. He asked me if I could use my influence to stop the rally (a yes rally) and have it postponed to the week end after the general election as he did not want people filling up the City Square waving saltires and having yes signs all over the place. Yes, incredibly the SNP did not want any mention or sign of independence before a general election. I at first expressed my disbelief at this and found it difficult to comprehend what he had just said. I firstly explained that I had not applied for the permission so he was speaking to the wrong person, although I had agreed to put the Yes Bus there on the day as a focal point and to use as a changing room for the Highland dancers. I however agreed to have a word with the organisers to see what could be done however I did mention that as the event had been booked for that particular weekend, there was no permission in place for the following weekend. He assured me that this would be sorted!   Now apparently and before I had had the chance to speak to the organisers he had asked them to go to the Dundee west office and again asked them to postpone the event until after the General election and again I believe stated both by him and another person employed by the SNP that the short notice application would be sorted. In the event the rally went ahead without, as far as I can ascertain even an application being submitted and was only passed by Councilor (SNP) Stewart Hunter on the very Morning of the Rally.

So for this councilor to try to use my late application for an event that I had nothing to do with and was in fact the internal machinations and political maneuvering of local politicians (which in itself throws up questions of probity) that caused the late (if any) application to prevent a yes parade going ahead is nothing short of a disgrace.

The event on 4^th October minus the walk around the town went ahead and was a huge success with over a thousand yes supporters present. This engendered extreme sour grapes on the part of the SNP and Stewart Hunter through the Dundee Courier (a staunchly unionist paper) tried to put a negative spin on the event calling it a shambles and stating the there was only 300 at the event. Negativity I have not witnessed since the referendum and all by unionist papers and project fear. It would seem that the Dundee SNP have taken that mantle for themselves.

Because of the success of the event, there appeared on Facebook yesterday a posting by Tom Thompson (a parliamentary assistant to both Joe Fitzpatrick and Chris Law, showing the front page of the unionist paper the Courier with a totally false impression of how the event had gone and a very negative slant on it.  This was closely followed by negative comments by several people who are either employees of the SNP or in a close cabal that can be seen regularly inhabiting the Dundee West offices, in a blatant attempt at character assassination of which I was the subject. I never thought that I would see the day when the SNP used a unionist paper to attack one of their own.

One of these people I mention is already the subject of a complaint to you in regards to libelous statements in reference to me on social media and of which I took great exception to especially as he was an officer of the SNP . A complaint by the way that you yourself have for some two months failed to address.

Well Peter I have had enough, I have supported the SNP through thick and thin for many years I have walked the streets of Dundee for months during the referendum I have engaged with people from all walks of life and convinced them to vote for independence or in the case of the General election, to vote for Chris Law .I have offered honest constructive criticism when I thought that they were straying off the road to independence. I have lived and breathed independence for the last two years and more during the campaign and after it.

During this last two weeks I have been sickened by the vile comments posted about myself and the other organiser of this Yes event by members of the SNP including staff members and I will say it again in case you missed it A YES EVENT.

I feel the SNP have indeed strayed of the road we are all going down I feel they are side-lining the grass roots organisations that did so much good work. I feel that the SNP are more interested in retaining power , power they see diminishing after a yes vote when we will have in Scotland a Labour part of Scotland , Conservative party of Scotland , a Lib Dem party of Scotland and all the smaller parties ,all off Scotland.

It is with a heavy heart that I must leave the SNP but my loyalty is to Scotland above any political party. Scotland, the place that gets me excited every time I come home to it. Scotland, the only place on the World I would ever live in and lastly Scotland, the country that belongs to the Scots

Regards

Bob Costello

Day three on my Wee trip through the waterways of Europe and just docked in Cologne.
Nice city with an impressive cathedral.

I stopped at a roadside cafe for the obligatory capachino, had a look at my blog site and was surprised at a spike in views.

Now I have been blogging since 2015 and before that, ( especially during the independence campaign)I was a pretty prolific poster on Facebook.

Now, my blog site consists of two main Blogs, A Nautical Nomad, which is a light hearted travel blog and a mainly political blog, originally, separately titled and bringing out my opinions on politics in, mainly Scotland, and in particular the shortcomings of the SNP and Nicola Sturgeon. Latterly I got fed up saying the same things time after time, mainly “ I told you so” in connection with the obvious mistakes and deliberate acts by Sturgeon and the SNP in connection with destroying the independence movement, so I started calling the blog, “ The World This Week From Mennies” and gave opinions on several topical subjects including independence in the same blog.

Now apart from a few notable occasions, my blogs do not receive anything like the viewing figures as do other bloggers in the independence movement, so it was quite a surprise , when after posting my latest Nautical Nomad blog, I noticed quite a spike in the political blogs.

As I mentioned yesterday in the travel blog , I spent some time going over the road Scotland has taken to independence in connection with a project my Granddaughter is undertaking at school into whether Scotland should be independent and I also mentioned that at my dinner table was a lady who works for Kier Starmer. She had asked me what I had been doing yesterday and when I mentioned the project for Rosa, she offered to give the arguments against independence.
Coincidentally, the blogs that seem to have been accessed are ones critical of the mess the SNP have gotten the movement into.

I wonder! perhaps dinner tonight might be interesting.

So, a nice capachino in a small cafe in the back streets of Cologne before heading back to the ship.

Have a nice day folks

So, day one on my sojourn to the Rhine, and an interesting day it has been.
Early start at 5 this morning and a run through to the airport from Jamie.

Flight on time as it wasn’t Easy Jet. That company is a nightmare. KLM is a totally different experience and all went like clockwork.

Short flight, met at the airport by the Avalon staff and conveyed streight to the ship.

Ship very different from what I am used to and will take a bit of getting used to. These river cruise ships are kind of like barges with living accommodation. Quite high end living accommodation but basicly a barge.

First wee issue was the toilet not flushing and I had to report it three times. On the third time the guy at the desk kindly suggested that he would send someone to “ show me how to work it”. You can imagine how well that went down!

I explained that I had been on, in the region of, 70 cruises and except for the sailing ships, every single one of them had exactly the same press button flushing system as the one in my cabin, therefore it is reasonable to assume that I know how to flush the bloody thing.
Eventually they sent a maintenance guy to fix it.

In the afternoon I had a longish walk into the city centre and around the canal system. Which included some window shopping at the variety of wares on display, including, cannabis and quite a variety of interesting and imaginative sex toys.

I, of course was very careful to avoid the the naughty area where scantily clad young lady’s display their more than ample attributes in Shop windows.

I then had the long walk back to the ship and a chance to cool down somewhat after quite a strenuous walk around Amsterdam.

Back at the ship there was perhaps one of the strangest safety talks I have ever had on a ship ( apart from the Concordia which safety talk didn’t exist).

This talk consisted of directing every one to the sun deck in the event of an emergency whereby you are issued with a life jacket and told what to do!!

Now the one thing you will definitely not be told to do is get into a lifeboat, for the simple reason that there is no lifeboats. So I am still wondering what the options will be in the event of an emergency. Perhaps the river is shallow and the ship will sit on the bottom with the Sun deck still protruding from the surface.
God only knows what will happen if the emergency is a fire.

Ok so after a shower and fresh up I had dinner which was very good and happened to be sitting next to a couple, the lady of which worked for the Labour Party in a public policy capacity. We got on to the question of independence and indeed the pending by-election in Rutherglen. She was delighted to hear my views on why the SNP would loose but when I got on to the subject of why I thought Kier Starmer was shit and wouldn’t last long , she decided that as she was on holiday she would prefer not to talk politics.

So sitting in a very quiet lounge with no entertainment wondering what tomorrow will bring.

Day 2 on my wee trip and a very quiet day as I chose not to go on the offered trip and instead do some work on a project my granddaughter Rosa is doing at school Believe it or not it is whether Scotland should be independent or not and she has to prove her conclusion. Absolutely wonderful that this is now being talked about at school.

We did stop briefly at Utrich ( not sure if I have spelled that correctly) but we were not allowed ashore in case anyone made a break for the airport.

When I went to school we were taught that Wallace and Bruce were traitors. The times they are a changing as Bob Dylan would say. I honestly think the future of Scotland is in safe young hands.

So, apart from that, it has been somewhat of a slow day between watching old ladies taking photos of their knitting to excite the folks back home and having a buffet lunch for 150 people which would have fed about half a dozen people on a good day. The portions are not exactly huge.

However, dinner was pretty good and that couple I mentioned yesterday came and sat at the table next to me. The lady ( who has a position in the Labour Party in London) asked what I had been doing all day and I mentioned that I had been helping Rosa with her project. She immediately offered to put the case against independence and I said I would be delighted to pass it on to Rosa and asked where she would start. She didn’t know , oh dear so I gave her a few days to make something up.

So, I am sitting at the highlight of the day which is the trivia event, I could hardly contain myself waiting for it to start. The compare has just asked how many different nationalities are on board. How in heavens name is anyone to know that , unless they are a crew member?

So, looking forward to getting off the ship tomorrow in Cologne but we don’t get there until two in the afternoon and I sincerely hope we are there overnight so that I can get ashore for a pint and possibly some entertainment to save me slitting my wrists.

So a couple of pints while every one calms down after the euphoria of the trivia evening.

Have a good evening folks

Well, Friday night again and I realy do not know where the weeks are going.
It has been extremely busy at work this week and glad to get out for a pint and a chance to relax.

Scotland

So, the SNP are to hold their contrived event tomorrow. Honestly, they get worse every time I turn on social media or listen to the news, they get worse.

This is going to be a cracker this weekend. God knows what selection of sexually confused and deviant followers are going to turn up for their much vaunted rally.

One of the more disappointing aspects of it is that Buisness For Scotland are partners in this event.

I was once a member of that organisation, mainly during the last campaign and for a time after it. My family contributed a fair amount to their efforts during the campaign, but now it seems that they are firmly intrenched in the failed Sturgeon ideology which has delivered nothing by way of advancement towards independence.

The rally this weekend is not about independence and more about an attempt at returning as many failed politicians to their well paid and inconsequential jobs in Westminster.

Please do not be fooled, this has nothing to do with independence.

Ukraine

So , it goes on and on and on. A proxy war waged by the US and their poodles in NATO. Using brave but misguided Ukrainian soldiers to attempt to damage Russia.

Well it is not working, as the Ukrainian army are being fed into a meat grinder and are being slaughtered daily.

There are over one hundred thousand Ukrainian soldiers missing and that is not counting the deaths that have been recorded. The Ukrainian government are about to bring in legislation to ban the forming of pressure groups of concerned relatives brought into being for the express purpose of pressurising the government to come clean on tgd fate of their loved ones.

Of course it is obvious that all through Europe we are feeling the effects of the imposition of sanctions on Russia and we are in for another very expensive winter because of them.

Time to wake up folks as you are being forced to conduct and finance a proxy war against a country which was forced to act to protect its borders, and if you are in doubt then do some research in to the Maiden uprising and the Minsk agreements. Or have a look at some recent blogs I and others have done. The one thing not to do is believe anything that comes out of the BBC as they are lying bastards.

Ok so on that light note, it is time for a pint , so I wish my friends the world over, a pleasant weekend and a few words of wisdom 🤔

It is the easiest thing to feel the pressure and fall back in line and it is sometimes hard to walk in the opposite direction, but it is sometimes the true road and you will know, because you will be following your conscience. As long as you have that you will
Never walk alone.

Well here’s another Saturday night . Who sang that ?
Stand in Mennies long enough and the whole world will pass you.
Standing in Mennies tonight engrossed in social media and in particular, the Russia Ukraine situation and I hear a voice from behind me. Is that Bob Costello I see?
A blast from the past, Rab Muir Great guy , and one of a bunch of equally great guys from an era gone by which was a significant 14 year period of my life.

A couple of weeks ago , I related an incident where I was in the Tay Bridge bar and a guy turned and said to me “ you look interesting , what is your story”
Well had I had a couple of days spare and related my story, Rab and the rest of the guys in that era would have played a big part in it.
So , thanks Rab for regenerating many wonderful memories of hard and trying , but satisfying times.

So to all my friends where ever on this planet you may be, have a wonderful weekend.

Remember
When in conflict with someone and before passing judgement, you should first walk a mile in his shoes.
Then, if you still don’t agree then at least you are a Mile away from him
And you have his shoes

Slainte

Continue reading “The World This Week From Mennies”

Monday 26 June.

Russia and Ukraine

 

The World this Week is coming from somewhere in the Arctic Circle this week as I am off on another travel experience, but what a week.

 

Let me give some thoughts on the events in Russia and Ukraine, as these are the events that have been surrounded by a huge amount if misreporting, wishful thinking by western media and indeed western governments .

 

Ok, so, there has been an attempt at a coup in Russia, or at least that is what all the western media outlets so joyfully pounced upon a few days ago when a force of Wagner mercenaries headed in the general direction of Moscow in a convoy of mixed vehicles.

 

They stopped in a town called Rostov. I am pretty sure that is as far as they ever intended going in the first place and here is my reasoning. Firstly , if ever a coup was planned in a country at war, at the most appropriate time to still protect the country in which it was taking place then this was it.

 

Wagner ( a virtual private army of mercenaries) had been fighting on behalf of the Russian government in Bakhmut for several months and had very successfully taken the city, allowing the Russian army to set up good defenses in expectation of a much-advertised Ukrainian counterattack. This supposed ”spring counteroffensive had eventually taken place at the beginning of June and had been a disaster for the Ukrainian army with huge causality figures and massive destruction of NATO supplied equipment. Therefore, the Ukrainian army were not in a position to take advantage of any disruption caused by a coup.

 

Ok, so let’s look at what happened over the last few days. Prigozhin ( commander of Wagner forces) made various statements regarding his dissatisfaction at how certain Russian Army commanders had cooperated with him in the battle for Bakhmut, but probably the main bone of contention was that the Russian constitution bans the employment of mercenaries fighting alongside regular forces and the Wagner employees were being required to sign contracts with the Russian ministry of defense. So, he then led a convoy consisting of probably somewhat under 100, various types of vehicles, from their field camp towards Rostov.

 

Now for a successful insurrection to take place there are a few necessary ingredients. The first is money, normally, in a case like this supplied by the CIA compliments of the US government. The next ingredient is latent or better still, patent, unrest in the general populace and thirdly and probably the most important element of any successful coup is general support in the armed forces.

 

I do not think that the first of these conditions was in question as the US/.NATO have been losing this proxy war and are desperate for some form of success.

 

The second ingredient, general unrest would have manifested itself during the supposed “ march on Moscow “ which was the convoy from the base camp to Rostov. Rostov being a convenient check point where the future of the coup could be assessed and tailored to circumstances. I believe it was at this point where an assessment was made and a decision to abort was seen as wise, as there had been no spontaneous uprising in the streets of Moscow and no defections in the armed forces, in fact, on the front lines in Ukraine, the Russian army continued to make advances against the failed counteroffensive by NATO supported Ukrainian forces.

 

I believe that from the word go when the Wagner convoy left base camp, heading for Rostov, negotiations were underway via Alexandre Lukashenko, the president of Belarus and Prigozhin, and my reasoning is this. A convoy on an open road without air support is a sitting duck and one just needs to go back to the gulf war in 1991 and the massacre of a convoy out of Kuwait on what was called the Highway of death.

 

Now the convoy was not attacked  on the first leg of the so-called march to Moscow, if it had been, it would have been destroyed, but remember, it was mainly made up of Russian nationals, soldiers who had recently taken Bakhmut after a long battle. That would have been the last outcome that Putin would have wanted.

 

So, Rostov was important from both camps. It gave time for negotiations to take place. It gave the Wagner group a chance to re-supply, if need be and it gave them civilian cover, in case negotiations did not go according to plan. It also gave the Russian forces time to plan the demise of the Wagner group, because, make no mistake, if negotiations had failed and had the Wagner convoy set off from Rostov to Moscow, then hardly a single one of them would have been alive today.

 

So overall a good outcome for Russia , a good outcome for  Prigoshin, as he now has safe residency in Belarus ( I would however advise him to stay away from open balconies for a while and enjoy the pay off from the CIA) a good outcome for Putin and a good outcome for the soldiers of the Wagner group as they now have contracts with the Russian ministry of defense.

 

As for the US and NATO, well they have an extremely large amount of egg on their faces and their best course of action from now on would be to reign in that clown Zelenskyy, get around the negotiating table with Russia and stop these stupid sanctions that are harming the economies of every country in Europe except Russia as the Ruble has never been higher on world markets and when BRICS gets going the almighty dollar will disappear as the fall back world currency.

So, on my travels again tomorrow, with a wee cruise out of Piraeus, visiting a few of the Greek islands , Turkey and Israel, or should I say, Palestine, as that is what it should be called.

Early start and I decided to go through tomorrow, early instead of booking a hotel for tonight in Edinburgh. The reason for that is that I refuse to pay the ridiculous prices, at present being charged in Edinburgh.

So, just having a pre- cruise pint in Mennies, before an early night.

In politics this week, the mad West continues to wage a proxy war against Russia and it is not going well for the US and its European poodles.

Bakhmut fell to the Russians last week after constant miss-reporting by western media. Most people in the west were surprised as they had been led to believe that the Ukrainian army were winning.

In truth they were being led into a meat grinding machine and took many thousands of casualties.

Zelensky continues to enrich himself through the good offices of NATO, who continue to pour arms into Ukraine, whereby Zelensky and his band of Nazi criminals misappropriate large amounts of them and sell them on the black market, thereby , enriching themselves using your taxes.

Just this week, a consignment of Javelin missiles sent by the US to Ukraine showed up in one of the drug cartels in Mexico. You would have thought that the US could have just delivered them direct to Mexico and saved transport costs. They could have then simply transferred the profit element direct into Zelensky,s offshore bank account beside all the rest of the money he has thieved from your hard earned taxes.

The world is a mad place today and only direct action by western populations against this madness that is being acted out by their governments will stop this craziness.

So back to Scotland where we have a first minister, who was put in place by Nicola Sturgeon after she had to resign, showing every day that he is completely out of his depth.

Mind you the team he has around him are about the most useless that one could imagine. I greave for the Scotland Surgeon left after her disgraceful 8 years in office and can’t wait to see her locked up.

So enough gloom and doom and a couple of pre-holiday pints.
So to all my friends the World over I wish you a great weekend and I will be reporting in from a different part of the world from tomorrow.

Slainte

And a wee thought for you

It is the easiest thing to feel the pressure and fall back in line. It is sometimes hard to walk in the opposite direction but it is sometimes the true road and you will know because you will be following your conscience. As long as you have that you will
Never walk alone.

Saturday 20 May 2023

Ukraine and Western propaganda

Scotland and the comedy show that is the SNP    

Ukraine and Western propaganda

Does anyone ever wonder why all Russian news outlets, (including online coverage) are banned in the UK but you can still see reports from Moscow on the same channels and newspapers. Why is it that the UK government do not wish you to make up your own mind?

Well, another week in and a couple of observations regarding topical issues.

Well, I will tell you why. It is because the UK, the US and the rest of the NATO poodle governments are waging a proxy war against Russia and because of the idiotic sanctions insisted on by the US and imposed upon Russia, every single one of you is suffering for this gross stupidity.

Ask yourself, why your power costs have increased by up to five times. Ask yourself why food prices in some cases have doubled. Ask yourselves why you are only hearing a very one-sided opinion of the Russian/Ukraine war.

It is not as your media would lead you to believe because of the Russia/ Ukraine war, it is because of sanctions against Russia. A war that Russia was maneuvered into a corner to launch, in order to protect the people of the Donbas area, who had been progressively slaughtered by the Ukrainian army, since 2014 and the coup initiated by the US in Ukraine to install a US-friendly government. A government ran by neo-Nazis.

Another week of deliberate misinformation by the whole of the Western mainstream media. It really is disgusting, the contempt the public is held in by governmental guidance of your media such as the BBC.

Please read between the lines as you are being massively misled. Ask yourselves why you have been fed almost daily reports of Ukrainian victories when in fact they have been suffering major defeats. Brave Ukrainian Soldiers have been constantly fed into a meat-grinding machine in the Bakhmut area at the behest of NATO commanders who are running the war. They are not winning they are being slaughtered daily. Now there is a radioactive cloud moving towards Western Europe because of a strike by Russia on a very large Ukrainian ammunition dump which held depleted Uranium shells supplied by the UK. Now these shells were destined for the battlefield where they would have left a legacy of cancer tumours in the local population, just like it was in Iraq, but instead, it looks like it is going to be areas of Europe that will be the beneficiaries of these awful munitions.

In short, Russia is winning this war against the West on both the battlefield and economically as the Russian economy has never been in better health as opposed to almost every other European country that is verging on recession.

Meanwhile, Zelensky’s worldwide property portfolio continues to expand, compliments of your taxes.

Scotland and the comedy show that is the SNP.     

Yes, probably no better way to describe the situation we find ourselves in after the disastrous reign of Nicola Sturgeon.

Almost everything that woman touched was a disaster, from shipbuilding to legislation concerning gender recognition and suspected misappropriation of independence supporters’ funds.

When you compare how Scotland was governed in the past under the leadership of Alex Salmond and under Nicola Sturgeon there is a vast difference and the reason, I feel was this. On the commerce and governmental side Alex Salmond had life experience as firstly his time working as an economist in the Scottish office and then as an economist with the Royal Bank of Scotland in the Oil development department. So, he came to the government with good practical business experience.

Whereas, on the other hand, Nicola Sturgeon started her working life as a lawyer and ended her short working life as a failed lawyer. She continued in the same vein throughout her political career by failing at almost everything she set her hand to and ending up basically destroying the SNP and their supposed reason d’etre, independence. She was basically a wee lassie, who was totally out of her depth, thrust into a political arena on the crest of a tsunami of sentiment occasioned by the severe disappointment of the defeat in the 2014 independence referendum but having the strength of the well-thought-out policies of her predecessor, behind her.

Her disasters are too many to go into here, it would take a book to do that but probably the one that she will be remembered for was her last one, and that was the calamity of the  Gender Recognition legislation.

Now make no mistake about what this was all about and don’t be fooled by the accusations made by her supporters that anyone with reservations regarding this legislation was against transgender people. They were not. What they were against was the usage which was to be made of this badly formed legislation to support the lifestyles of weird and sexually deviant men who would use this newfound freedom to live out their perversions on mainly innocent women and children by having access to female private places, on the basis of self-identification as a woman.

It was laughable when Shona Robison( who was responsible for leading the legislation through the Scottish parliament) stated, that no self-identifying person would use the new law to lie about their motivation to obtain access to vulnerable women. Mind you Shona Robison is not known for being the sharpest tool in the box. This statement was closely followed by a succession of cases when exactly the opposite happened involving multiple cases of rape and assault.

Looking at the various occasions where peaceful demonstrations by women’s rights groups have been violently broken up by men supposedly self-identifying as women, gives me the distinct impression that there is a very high degree of intentional violence in these men with gender issues than in normal women.

However, I remember during the time this legislation was going through the Scottish Parliament, speculating, that this was the Frankenstein monster that would destroy its maker and it would appear that both this and the investigations into the misappropriation of independence funds, did just that.

So, here we are, Nicola Sturgeon has fallen but in her place is her clone, Humza Yousaf who is at least as incompetent as Sturgeon. Every job he has had in government has been a disaster and it looks like he is set to continue in the same vein, meanwhile, the cause of independence will suffer.

Such is the state of politics in Scotland, there is however, one bright light on the horizon and that is Alba, under the leadership of Alex Salmond, the man Nicola Sturgeon tried to destroy, but it will mean starting again.