Denis the Double Standard

I do actually have a modicum of human sympathy for Denis MacShane today - my only real problem with the guy is that he's a pompous, sanctimonious windbag who invents 'facts' to support his feeble arguments and then just cranks up the pomposity and sanctimoniousness even further whenever anyone calls him out on the lies. I don't want everyone like that put in prison. But then those of us who don't go around blaming the most vulnerable in society for all of the country's ills, and who are willing to take account of mitigating circumstances that may explain those people's failings, are actually in a position to express sympathy for MacShane without being hypocritical. Tom Harris is, to put it mildly, not in such a position, and yet he still posted this extraordinary tweet a few hours ago -

"Thoughts are with my friend and former colleague @DenisMacShane on this awful day. A good man."

So it seems that, in Harris-world, teenage mothers, immigrants, the homeless and benefits claimants must be mercilessly condemned as the authors of their own misfortunes, but the Great and the Good must be understood. Remind me - just why did you join the Labour party in the first place, Tom? Ah, that's right, because it's not "some sort of charity set up to help the poorest in society". Yeah, I think a number of us are certainly forming that impression.

* * *

If the events of the day have put you in the mood, why not delve into the archives and try out the Scot Goes Pop Denis MacShane word-search puzzle? You might as well take the chance to limber up, because Word-Search Wednesday will be making a thrilling one-off return on Christmas Day!

Harris-watch : the praise for Cameron

Just before I forget, I thought I'd trawl through the archives to track down an example of Tom Harris' praise for David Cameron, bashfully posted under a pseudonym ("Devo Max") at PB -

"Cameron wants the question settled for the good of all.

Unlike Salmond, who wants the question delayed for the good of Salmond.

Another year in Bute House? Yes thanks."

The good of all? How touching. Evidently we now have one Scottish Labour MP who won't be ashamed to share a platform with Cameron during the referendum campaign - albeit only after first donning a balaclava, and pretending to have no name, past or party allegiance.

We're watching you, Tom. (And as with New Labour's beloved CCTV cameras and intrusive surveillance policies, if you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear, right?)

Has Tom Harris found a new hunting ground?

A few weeks ago, I mentioned in a comment here that it wouldn't entirely surprise me to discover that the mysteriously bashful Political Betting poster "Devo Max" is Tom Harris. It was (and I'm sure this was obvious) a joke, but the poster himself made a great issue of it, as if I was being deadly serious, and it was the most ludicrous thing he'd ever heard. That over-reaction made me wonder - doth the Brit Nat protest a little too much? Since then, my suspicions have grown. Consider this...

1) He only writes Nat-bashing posts - never, ever straying on to any other political subject.

2) His repertoire is extraordinarily well-honed - this is someone who's been at it for years on a professional basis.

3) He refuses to answer or even acknowledge any awkward question - classic Harris.

4) The name "Devo Max" itself is one Harris would probably have chosen, given his known fixation with what he describes as "I can't believe it's not independence" (which would have been too much of a giveaway).

5) A comment he once made about music could well place him in Harris' broad age range.

6) He point blank refuses to reveal which political party he supports, but tries desperately hard to distract attention from his refusal to answer. It's hard not to infer that he has something to hide.

7) He has occasionally expressed admiration for David Cameron, which is consistent both with Harris' right-of-centre tendencies, and also with his determination not to be unmasked on PB.

8) He has a writing style eerily similar to Bomber Admin. For instance, he suggested a few hours ago that the SNP might seek Iain Martin's prosecution for committing a "hate-crime" - could that be a product of the brain that gave us the Downfall video that so satisfyingly backfired?

9) In response to the controversy over The Economist's front cover, he mused that he must get himself a copy. That was almost word-for-word what Harris had been reported as saying earlier in the day.

10) The PB moderators are ludicrously zealous in protecting him when he is prodded about his identity. You'd be forgiven for thinking that they were in the know. For instance, earlier this evening, the following sequence of events occurred -

I innocently asked him a question about Doctor Who.

My post was deleted within seconds.

I asked the moderators if Devo Max required protection even from questions about Doctor Who.

My post was deleted within seconds.

I observed that it seemed the answer to my question was yes.

My post was deleted within seconds.

I told the moderator his hand was going to get tired if he kept this up.

My post was deleted within seconds.

About half-an-hour later, I was banned (just "for the night", or so I'm told) for "failing to obey the instructions about not discussing moderation". Hmmm. I must say it's got to the point where being one of the perennial targets of Mr Smithson's "I will not be defied!!!" petulance is a badge of honour. At least he isn't insulting our intelligence this time by pretending that my banning is a "technical fault" - of course last time he'd only just banned Stuart Dickson (again), and my guess is that he knew full well that admitting he'd banned two SNP posters in the space of 24 hours would not look great for the owner of a supposedly 'non-aligned' forum.

* * *

Before I forget, here is the result of the poll on how you'll be ranking the London parties in the local elections -

Won't rank them at all 70%
Liberal Democrat, Conservative, Labour 16%
Conservative, Labour, Liberal Democrat 4%
Liberal Democrat, Labour, Conservative 3%
Labour, Conservative, Liberal Democrat 1%
Labour, Liberal Democrat, Conservative 1%
Conservative, Liberal Democrat, Labour 1%

* * *

Lastly, it is with great regret that I must announce that I have decided to ban Mike Smithson from posting on Scot Goes Pop with immediate effect. He has repeatedly ignored instructions to stop his irritating overuse of the phrase "can't be arsed", and the situation has now become intolerable. Posting here is a privilege, not a right, and if people can't be arsed to follow the Sacred Commandments, they only have themselves to blame. While I'm at it, Plato can sling her hook as well.

Admin's golden alternative to a Scottish passport

This was Tom Harris' summary of Alex Salmond's speech on Saturday :

"To the homeless, the unemployed, the hungry, the vulnerable, I say this: the SNP will give you a Scottish passport!"

Hmmm. Even if that really was all that the SNP were offering, it would be considerably more use to the homeless, the unemployed, the hungry and the vulnerable than the Tory government Tom has given to them by way of an alternative. (And in so many ways it was a personal gift.)

Even if we didn't have a Tory government, what would Tom be offering the vulnerable? Triangulation. A reborn Blairite Labour party aping the Tories to win right-wing votes in the southeast of England, by slashing benefits, embracing weapons of mass destruction, blaming teenage single mothers for their own predicament, and glorifying greed in all its many and varied forms. That's what "grown-up" politicians do, apparently, because that's the only way to get elected in the UK.

Now, can you see any way in which a "Scottish passport" might just possibly free the vulnerable from that false choice? Nope, I'm well and truly stumped.

Admin, aka 'I can't believe he's not suspended from the PLP'

I was just idly looking at Tom Harris' Twitter page (it's one of my main sources of material, after all), and who do you think was listed in the "similar to Tom Harris" section?

David Drew
Denis MacShane
Eric Joyce

I hope I'm not building up David Drew too much by saying that Admin must be chuffed with that little lot.

That said, I'm delighted to spot that I do actually agree with Tom about something (other than the virtues of Doctor Who, that is) - he's absolutely right that fixed five-year parliamentary terms are an abomination. Fixed terms are a good idea in theory, but only if the term in question is four years at most. Australia has parliaments that last a maximum of three years, and I can't say I've noticed the sun falling out of the sky Down Under.

Dragon-fire and moon-howlers

This blog is in severe danger of turning into @Admin4TheYoonYoon Tweet-Watch, but here goes anyway...

Tom Harris : Comment 22 under Michael Kelly's Scotsman article really makes you feel positive about Nats: "GTF back to Ireland"

Joan McAlpine : Poison is endemic on internet. I get plenty of it from unionists whether Lab, Con or Lib Dem.

Tom Harris : Yes, Joan - the biggest problem is with unionists' comments on newspaper sites...Good grief.

Well, as it happens, Tom, I'm in a rather good position to comment on this subject, because I'm a Nationalist whose name is Kelly (for good measure my middle name is Michael) and I have been repeatedly and 'robustly' informed by a delightful unionist poster over a period of months that I cannot possibly be a Scot, on the grounds that my ancestry is Irish/American/French-Canadian. The 'name' of the poster in question is Moniker of Monza, and he posts at Political Betting. There are dozens of his ilk at that site, and elsewhere online. So don't try telling me there isn't a massive 'CyberYoonYoonist' problem.

Oh, and the fact that I don't know the real names of any of those CYYs brings me neatly onto this -

Tom Harris : Calling all Nat moon-howlers: You want to be another "Braveheart"? Well "brave" doesn't equate to writing poison under a pseudonym.

A sentiment with which I can just spot the one minor problem, Tom - namely, why have you posted your 'less constructive' Labour Hame pieces under the pseudonym 'Admin'? Or at least that was your practice until the leadership campaign was safely lost. Is 'bravery' a quality that only Nats should ever be expected to aspire to?

To turn to the Michael Kelly article itself...well, perhaps the best way of summing it up is that it bears an uncanny similarity to the irate letters Norman Hogg used to write to Scotland on Sunday circa 1995, and even in those days it was like entering a time-warp. Exhibit A -

"He [Salmond] remembers taking Mrs Thatcher on, while the rest of us recall that it was the SNP that started the Thatcher era. By bringing down the Callaghan government in 1979, the SNP forced a general election at the time most propitious to the Tories, and thereafter they ruled the UK for the next 18 years."

My money's on 2543 (for the year that Labour will finally dispense with that particular chip on their shoulder). But let's run through the actual sequence of events yet again for Kelly's benefit. The facts are these - the SNP propped up an extraordinarily unpopular Labour government for years in the late 1970s, and did so because they believed that Callaghan was acting in good faith on Home Rule. But after Scotland voted Yes to devolution in March 1979, Callaghan refused to honour that mandate. So what exactly was the SNP supposed to do - carry on propping up a lame duck government in exchange for absolutely nothing? It's true that they didn't achieve anything by bringing the government down, but neither would they have achieved anything by taking the alternative course - there would still have been no Scottish Assembly, and Mrs Thatcher's rise to power would in all probability have been delayed by only a matter of weeks (five months at the absolute outside). The idea that Labour could have overturned a 20+ point deficit if only they'd been given an extra few weeks is risible in the extreme.

Besides which, it wasn't the SNP that brought Mrs Thatcher to power. It was the people of the UK who did so by voting for her in a general election. The most sacred belief of unionists like Michael Kelly is that the will of the people of the whole UK must hold sway in Scotland - this is known as 'maturity'. Callaghan's defeat in a vote of no confidence (in which Labour folk-hero Gerry Fitt's abstention was just as decisive as the SNP's votes, let's not forget) merely facilitated and mildly accelerated the process of the UK electorate choosing a government that was more to their taste. So why isn't Kelly able to celebrate that? Isn't the fact that he feels unable to do so (especially after thirty-three years, for heaven's sake!) a rather strong indication that he is on the wrong side of the constitutional debate?

"And he [Salmond] is trying his best to fix both the timing and wording of the referendum question – the former on the grounds that he promised it would be held late in this parliament: a promise for which there is as little evidence as for a dragon’s fiery breath."

You mean, apart from the footage from the leaders' debates, and from several high-profile interviews? If both I and Hugh Henry imagined all that, then clearly we both believe in dragons.

"However, the Thatcher stopper deserves credit for being so honest in the assessment of his role. It is further to his credit that he kept quiet about his heroics for so many years, allowing us to believe that it was Tony Blair and New Labour that finally lanced the Tory boil."

Please don't try to change the subject, Michael - Alex Salmond was talking about his role in the downfall of Thatcher in 1990, not the Tory government in 1997. And if we're being strictly accurate, she was actually brought down by fellow Tories. Indeed, there's more than a grain of truth in the old joke that the Tories won the 1992 election because they'd succeeded in doing what Labour had tried and failed to do for over a decade - remove Margaret Thatcher from office.

* * *

I must say I disagree with Subrosa on her call for an entirely new national anthem to replace Flower of Scotland. It seems to me there's a disconnect between the people and elites (including the SNP elite) on this subject - the people have already made their choice of anthem, but the elite simply can't leave it alone. My guess is that if a new song was commissioned, it would be a repeat of what happened in Russia following the collapse of communism - the public wouldn't take the new anthem to their hearts, and we'd have to revert to the old one again after a few years.

It's true, though, that the use of Flower of Scotland at sporting events needs a bit of imagination - it should be played fast, and definitely not by a pipe band.

Elgin has more in common with Southend-on-Sea than with Yetts o' Muckhart : FACT

Just a very quick query for our old friend @Admin4TheYoonYoon. I'm struggling to reconcile the logic of these two recent tweets -

"But the point of my original comment was that to win *in the UK* we need to win the support of former Thatcher voters."

"Indeed. But since Scotland and England aren't that different, the Union is a good idea."

Righty-ho. So if Scotland and England aren't that different, why do Labour need Thatcher voters to win in the UK, but not in Scotland? Indeed, given that Admin endlessly scoffs at the notion that Scotland might, in some specific ways, have more in common with Scandinavia than with the south of England, could he explain why social democratic parties certainly wouldn't need the support of Thatcherites to win in a hypothetical Scandinavian political union, but do in the British political union?

Tom's final pearl of wisdom for the evening was this -

"Glaswegians have more in common with Manchester, Newcastle and Liverpool than they do with Edinburgh or Aberdeen."

No need to back that up, Tom, the assertion will do fine. Actually, in the light of Labour Hame's side-splitting spoof New Year's message from Alex Salmond ("Wha's like us? Absolutely no-one"), perhaps someone should pen an @Admin4TheYoonYoon message in which he explains that not only does Scotland have more in common with England in every conceivable area of policy or culture than with any other nation on earth, but that every individual town or village in Scotland has more in common with a hamlet in Shropshire than with any other location in Scotland itself.

Admin : Probing the psyche

Where does he find the time? No sooner has Admin been appointed by Johann Lamont to the vital role of Shadow Minister for Conducting a Review Into the Use of Modern Technology (looks like he'll be rivalling Wendy Alexander's old status as 'Minister for Everything'), than he's back at the Labour Hame grindstone, churning out yet more public-spirited citizen journalism. In his latest article, he poses the thought-provoking question -

"Does it matter that a prominent nationalist website doesn’t consider accuracy as important?"

Thought-provoking, I mean, in the sense that it provoked a few other questions to creep into my own thoughts. For example -

1. Does it matter that a right-wing politician joined a left-wing political party solely for the purposes of career advancement?

2. Given his stated concern about the supposed lack of journalistic standards at Newsnet Scotland, does it also concern him that his repeated use of the term "NewsNat Scotland" would have fallen foul of the Better Nation moderation rules had he submitted his piece as a comment there, let alone that it would have precluded the article's use in virtually any other serious publication?

3. What is the significance of his repeated use of the spelling "Yoonyoonist" when characterising the speech patterns of nationalists, given that it is a perfectly natural phonetic rendering of how anyone would pronounce the word? (Unless of course "Un-yun-ist" is preferred in the Harris household.) Could it, by any chance, betray his extraordinarily authoritarian mindset, ie. that he is incapable of seeing people who diverge from his own views as 'mature'? That his brain automatically converts their speech into 'baby-talk', and the only response he can imagine is to try to patronise them into submission? In a nutshell, does he have a deep subconscious need for others to see him as a father figure who they look to for guidance and chastisement? And should we fear for his well-being now that his own party have comprehensively rejected him for the father role, instead preferring him for the (admittedly mega) technology review role?

4. Does he have no sense of shame about going into apoplexy over hair-splitting examples of the "inaccuracy" of others, given that it's only a matter of weeks since he lied through his teeth that a nationalist banner outside the Royal Concert Hall had read "End English Rule", and given that we all know he'd never have half-heartedly acknowledged that gross inaccuracy unless he'd been supplied with incontrovertible photographic evidence? What conclusions are we entitled to draw about a politician who does lack such an appropriate sense of shame?

Mr Popular

Nobody does unintentional comedy quite like the Guardian these days...

"The least well-known Scottish leader in its history, Lamont defeated another lesser-known backbencher, Ken McIntosh, and popular Westminster backbencher Tom Harris, the MP for Glasgow South, to win. McIntosh won 40.3% and Harris 7.95% of the vote."

Call me peculiar, but I always thought elections were a rather good test of popularity. So let's recap : Tom Harris is "popular", but he's just taken a gubbing at the hands of "the least well-known Scottish Labour leader in history" and "another lesser-known backbencher". Heaven only knows what would have happened to him if he'd been unpopular.

Ah well. Scottish Labour's gain is the blogosphere's loss. Or something like that.

And I really do think the Guardian are grossly overstating the scale of the challenge facing Johann Lamont as leader. Surely it's high time the press picked up on the inspiring message of hope and renewal that Labour's electoral college has just decisively delivered, ie. "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".

Your verdict : if they were wise, Labour would pick Ken Macintosh

This is probably the kiss of death if Murdo Fraser's example is anything to go by, but for what it's worth, your advice to Labour is to elect the MSP for Eastwood -

Ken Macintosh 44%
Tom Harris 29%
Johann Lamont 25%

I must say I'm slightly astonished to see Bomber Admin in second place, although perhaps that's more an indication of just how awful a leader Johann Lamont would be. Labour's very own Ian Smart gave her this ringing testimonial over at A Burdz Eye View yesterday -

"...while Johann may even be a strategist, the problem is that her strategy is wholly misconceived.

Insofar as one can work out what criticisms she has of the 2011 Campaign, they appear to be the wrong criticisms. Not that we were insufficiently negative but rather that we were not negative enough. Not that many of our candidates were useless but that they were simply badly organised and under-resourced. Not that Scotland has moved forward but rather that it must be persuaded to move backwards.

You genuinely wonder if the only chance that she might support a multi-option Referendum would be if the other option was the outright abolition of the Scottish Parliament."

Unfortunately, Ian then ruins this perceptive analysis by announcing that he's plumping for Admin of all people, on the curious grounds that, while Harris may have the wrong ideas, it's better to have the wrong ideas than no ideas at all. Seriously, it's not, Ian. Margaret Thatcher had the wrong ideas, John Major had no ideas at all (other than the Citizen's Charter). Who did less harm as Prime Minister?

There's no denying that Admin is very articulate and has a strong personality, so perhaps that's why he did tolerably well in the poll - these are unquestionably perceived as leadership qualities. But if anyone doubts that he would be an utter disgrace to his office, it might be an idea to peruse this selection of his recent tweets, as collated by RevStu. Some of them are admittedly legitimate (if unwise) examples of political knockabout and mischief-making, but others are deeply offensive or frankly delusional.

* * *

Many thanks to everyone who left a comment of encouragement on the previous thread - I wasn't fishing for that, honestly! I just thought I'd better give some kind of explanation of why blogging here is likely to be (at the very least) slower than it has been. One interesting point that a few people raised is that "blogging matters", especially in the run-up to the independence referendum. It's very hard to judge whether that's true or not. I can't help feeling at times that I'm exclusively speaking to two groups - the already converted and the totally uncovertible (ie. people like Alex Gallagher and the Kevin Baker Fan Club). Because the daily readership of a blog like this is relatively modest, it's hard to escape the feeling that these are the only types of people who ever visit. But on the other hand, the absolute unique visitor figures over a longer period (such as a month or a year) tell a very different story. So I suppose the real question is - can a blog expect to have any real impact on the large number of casual visitors who just drop by once or twice, and perhaps only stay for a minute or two? Very hard to know. But if by any chance it can, the good news is that the pro-independence blogosphere (which of course is much broader than the SNP blogosphere) has never been in a healthier state.

Poll : if they were wise, who would Scottish Labour elect as their new leader?

Apologies for going quiet of late. I suffered a bit of a setback during the latter part of the summer - it was a very minor thing, on the face of it, but for some reason it had a profound effect on me, and I've been (for want of a better phrase) reassessing my priorities ever since. To begin with I was able to 'blog through it', so to speak, although it was probably noticeable that my posts became somewhat half-hearted. But just recently I've found that I've completely lost all interest in following political news, which makes writing a political blog a touch difficult! It may just be a temporary phase I'm going through - time will tell. In the meantime, one thing I can still do is run the poll that I've been planning for a while on the Labour leadership contest. The question is the same as for the Tory poll I ran a few weeks ago - it's not about who you would like to see as Labour leader (because it would work in the SNP's favour or whatever), but who Labour would pick if they were wise. And there's no cop-out "who cares?" option - we all know that would win by a mile, and tell us absolutely nothing!

I must admit, though, that I haven't really got a clue what my own answer would be, other than "not Admin, obviously". Macintosh is the more likeable and assured of the two credible candidates, but he's so softly-spoken that I can't help wondering if he might run into the same problems that John Swinney had as SNP leader. It also shouldn't be forgotten that he made a spectacular error of judgement over the Shirley McKie affair, giving foursquare support to the breathtakingly arrogant pronouncements of fingerprint experts who had already been utterly discredited.

You can find the voting form in the sidebar, and the poll will close tomorrow.

Admin's inspiring crusade for the Scottish people to have as little say on their future as possible

Tom Harris has got a nerve. I know that particular observation is on a rough par with pointing out that dolphins are fond of the odd swim, but he really has got a nerve. This is from a recent speech to the House of Commons, lovingly transcribed (by "Admin", no doubt) onto Labour Hame -

"And if the SNP prove that they are incapable of holding a free and fair referendum, then I want to know from the minister whether he thinks the UK government has any role in ensuring that the Scottish people are properly consulted about the future of our nation."

But how precisely does he want David Cameron (a man who, after all, he did so much to help into office) to ensure the Scottish people are "properly consulted about the future of our nation"? It turns out that he has two main things in mind -

1) Denying the Scottish people the chance to vote on a constitutional option (devo max) that opinion polls currently show to be the most popular. He instead wants the choice to be restricted in the hope that, when forced into a choice between two options they do not want, supporters of devo max will wearily plump for Tom's own preference of the status quo.

2) Denying approximately 2.5% of the Scottish people any kind of say on their future at all. He is quite open about his reasons for this - he fears they would vote the 'wrong way'...

"Polling suggests that younger people are more likely to support independence"

Hmmm. This appears to be the United Arab Emirates definition of "proper consultation of the people". Incidentally, Tom, if it's OK for you to abuse the language by repeatedly referring to a constitutional option that would leave Scotland firmly within the United Kingdom as "Separation Lite", is it OK for us to call your beloved status quo "Colonialism Diluted"?

Admin : Cameron has a "responsibility" to breach democratic principles

Given that Bomber Admin has spent a fair bit of the last couple of years fighting to maintain the "good old British" right of the minority to outvote the majority, it's somewhat curious that he still feels qualified to lecture the rest of us on democratic principles. Nevertheless, that's what he's been up to this afternoon on Twitter. Apparently he feels that the SNP have no "mandate" to add a devo max question to the independence referendum. Hmmm. Leaving aside the fact that the dogs on the street have known for years that the SNP were minded to do just that (ie. it wasn't exactly kept a secret from the electorate in May), I have a bit of a problem with the idea that a 'mandate' is a prerequisite for holding a democratic vote. It's almost a contradiction in terms - the whole point of a referendum is that you're conceding you can't act without a mandate. Doing something that isn't in your manifesto is much more problematical if you do it without a referendum - for example, if you introduce top-up fees in spite of being elected on a manifesto pledge that "we will not introduce top-up fees and have legislated to prevent them". But I digress. Let's have a closer look at Tom's logic -

Democratic Principle 1 - It is illegitimate for a government to hold a referendum that they do not have a specific mandate for.

Democratic Principle 2 - If the SNP government hold a Devo Max referendum, David Cameron's government would then have a "responsibility" to breach Democratic Principle 1 and hold an independence referendum they have no specific mandate for.

Oh-kaaay. I think I can perhaps translate the Harris doctrine into plainer language -

The SNP require an unambiguous mandate to do anything. But everyone else has a duty to act without a mandate if it would thwart the SNP.

It's not hard to see that Tom is a keen student of the Blairite dark arts. It rather calls to mind the novel principle of the "unreasonable UN veto" that Blair plucked out of thin air in his more desperate moments in the run-up to the illegal invasion of Iraq. It went something like this -

International Law Principle 1 - Even if the vast majority of Security Council members vote for a resolution, it carries absolutely no weight if one of the permanent members veto it. There's no use complaining about Israel using their American chums to get them off the hook time and again - them's the rules.

International Law Principle 2 - Principle 1 naturally doesn't count if it's France or Russia vetoing US/UK military adventurism. In those circumstances, we really have to stop being so fussy about "rules" and consider other relevant factors, ie. that George and me really want to do this.

Ah, Tom and Tony, you guys - killing us with Reason.

Admin : We can only call devolution a success if we make very sure we don't get any more of it

Our old friend Admin has continued his quest to become First Minister with an impassioned plea that he should hold as little power in that office as humanly possible -

"LABOUR must oppose moves to introduce so-called "Devo-Max", one of the key contenders for the Scottish leader's job has declared.

Glasgow South MP Tom Harris has said Labour must reject the plans, under which nearly all public spending would be raised from tax revenue collected north of the Border.

Harris says that if the party backed the proposals - which he describes as Separation Lite" - it would effectively be admitting that devolution has "failed". He also warns that Labour supporters of the plan are wrong to think that it will neuter the nationalist cause.

"Supporting Separatism Lite just because the SNP beat us in May is the equivalent of lying still and hoping that the school bully will get bored of kicking you. And as we all know, the only way to see off a bully is to stand up to him," he argues."

This, of course, is a thinly modified form of the tired old language of the Tories from the pre-devolution era. Any transfer of power to Scotland within the UK is 'appeasement' and the 'break-up of the United Kingdom'. Well, that paranoid mentality worked a treat for Michael Forsyth and co, so I can see why Tom is so eager to follow in their footsteps.

It really is very hard to understand what all the sound and fury surrounding the Admin for First Minister campaign has been about if Tom is utterly determined to be the no change, do nothing candidate. It takes some doing to make Johann Lamont look radical, but he seems to have managed it.

And while I'm thinking of it, a question for Admin (to which I presume the answer will either be "Er" or "No") : You've said that if you win this contest, you'll stand for the Scottish Parliament in 2016. Given your new-found enthusiasm for devolution (if only, naturally, in the mystical perfection of its current limited form), can we presume you will also stand in 2016 if you lose this contest?

Questions to which the answer is 'your question is important to us, please hold'

A double rollover day for any Labour people that might be passing by - I've got a couple of queries for their perusal this time...

Courtesy of Duncan Hothersall's slip of a few weeks ago, we now know that the "Admin" of Labour Hame and Tom Harris MP are, in fact, one and the same person. One being, two identities - it would be like the Holy Trinity if only there were three of them (after all, just like God, Tom is "right, and everyone else is wrong"). Is it therefore just a coincidence that Tom now only chooses to post his worthy, earnest pieces under his own name, and bashfully switches to "Admin" whenever he wants to make wild claims like...oooh, I don't know, that the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has "backed" Alex Salmond? I mean, Tom wouldn't have a slight concern that saying things like that under his own name might prove a tad incompatible with trying to mount a serious leadership bid which promises a new politics, would he?

And the second question - in the light of recent events, does Ahmadinejad's throwaway, unsolicited expression of support for Scottish independence look better or worse than Tony Blair's public embrace of Colonel Gaddafi, and the Deal in the Desert? After all, the obvious difference between the two is, to use George Foulkes' immortal turn of phrase, that Blair associated himself with a lunatic dictator deliberately.

Sorry, Duncan, but the people have spoken...

Well, blow me down with a feather. I can confirm that our poll to decide whether Duncan Hothersall was right or wrong was conducted to the most rigorous scientific standards of online self-selection, and the result was overwhelming...

Wrong 90%
Right 9%

In true "Bomber Admin" style, I hereby certify the question well and truly ANSWERED.

VOTE NOW : Does calling Tom Harris a toad make me a "nasty Cybernat"?

We've learned a lot of intriguing things about Tom Harris recently, most notably that he wants to be First Minister. We also learned at the weekend from his exchange with Kate Higgins on Twitter that one thing he really detests (almost as much as teenage mothers) is online, self-selecting polls. So I thought the time could hardly be better to hold an online, self-selecting poll all about Tom Harris...

On the last thread, Labour Hame contributer Duncan Hothersall complained that by calling Tom Harris a toad (in the context of the whimsical observation that he wasn't so much a "King Over The Water" as a "Toad Over The Puddle"), I had taken a "step too far" if I didn't want to be considered "just another nasty Cybernat".

Question : Is Duncan Hothersall right, or wrong?

You'll find the voting form at the top of the sidebar. Vote wisely!

"Admin" for First Minister?

It seems we've solved the mystery of what these cryptic words on Twitter at the weekend were all about -

Bella Caledonia : Sorry to butt in but how's that leadership debate coming along? Found anyone who wants the job yet?

Tom Harris : Apparently.

Bella Caledonia : A big hitter?

Tom Harris : Wait and see.

Yes, it's hard to escape the conclusion that Tom sees the prospect of him leading Scottish Labour from Westminster as the equivalent of Alex Salmond doing the same for the SNP for three years, but I'm not sure "Admin for First Minister" is going to have quite the same punch as the slogan the Nationalists were able to use.

Not so much a King Over The Water as a Toad Over The Puddle.

Tom Harris' definition of the lunatic fringe : nationalists, socialists, and Ed Miliband

Tom Harris' latest piece for Labour Hame is actually quite sensible in parts (well, even a broken clock is accurate twice a day), but I had to laugh at this sentence at the beginning -

"Whatever those conclusions [of Labour's internal review] are, we can be sure of at least a few facts in advance: every single SNP member without exception will dismiss them out of hand, Ed Miliband will say they’re great, and Labour’s hard left will complain that the review doesn’t mention the renationalisation of the railways."

Now, given that he's a right-of-centre career Nat-basher, it's no great surprise to learn that Harris perceives the nationalists and the "hard left" as being parts of the lunatic fringe whose views can be safely treated as meaningless background noise. But throwing in his own party leader for good measure? Oh dear. I think we can safely conclude that Tom genuinely isn't eyeing a triumphant return to the Labour frontbench as Shadow Minister for Lightbulb Acquisition.

Tom Harris reveals that Oceania is at war with Eastasia, and has always been at war with Eastasia

If you ever find yourself reading a post by Tom Harris and sense that it's highly objectionable in some way, but can't quite put your finger on exactly what the problem is, you probably need look no further than his cavalier attitude to The Meaning Of Words. Orwell would have had a field day with some of Harris' contributions to the AV referendum debate, and his latest article for Labour Hame is in much the same vein. As a public service, I thought I'd provide you with a cut-out-and-keep Tomspeak-to-English translator...

"So why, after Labour’s second defeat at Holyrood, are we being told that we must abandon our support for the devolution settlement?"

Translation : Why are we being told that we must start supporting devolution in a meaningful way for the first time since 1999?

"let’s try to make devolution work."

Translation : Let's keep the devolved Scottish Parliament as weak as possible.

"The 1999 devolution settlement was not some kind of half-hearted compromise."

Translation : It was an imperfect compromise hungrily embraced by a country that had been totally starved of self-government for almost three centuries.

"On the contrary, the White Paper, “Scotland’s Parliament”, published by Scottish Secretary Donald Dewar weeks after he took office, impressed all sides of the debate."

Translation : It impressed some sides of the debate (roughly half).

"And yet, ever since the overwhelming “Yes” vote in the referendum, the SNP have done everything they can to belittle and undermine that devolution settlement."

Translation : After being an indispensable part of the campaign that won the overwhelming Yes vote, the SNP have built on that success by doing everything they can to strengthen the powers of the devolved Scottish Parliament.

"So, a question for the nationalists: what is it about Scotland that makes us so incapable of making devolution work?"

Translation : What is it about Scotland that makes us incapable of being ruled by others?

"What are the peculiar defects of Scottish political culture that make us incapable of taking full advantage of our devolved parliament?"

What peculiar defects of Scottish political culture make us unhappy about being ruled by others?

"Are we too small?"

Are we too small to be dependent on others?

"Too weak?"

Too weak to be dependent on others?

"Not confident enough?"

Not confident enough to be dependent on others?

"Too easily bullied?"

Too easily bullied to allow our natural resources to be exploited by others?

"Not capable of running our nation efficiently while taking a full part in the United Kingdom?"

Not capable of sitting back and allowing our nation to be run inefficiently by others?