I LOOK at what is happening in England with loathing and fear. Farage is playing it straight from Mein Kampf – find a scapegoat (Muslims), spread misinformation and lies about them, fire up the tame thugs of the EDL then blame the scapegoat for causing the rise in violence.
Yet again we are seeing the media in England failing to challenge Farage over his fascist intent. He is increasingly the manipulator of a fearful England that does not know who it is any more.
READ MORE: Keir Starmer says rioters will 'regret' violence in televised address
England (aka the UK) is no longer a “great power”, even with the political Viagra of Trident missiles. Courtesy of Brexit, the “City of London” has been hollowed out and now lags well behind Frankfurt and Amsterdam in trading volumes. England is once more seen as a pariah state, isolated on the edges of Europe by its European neighbours. Those at the bottom of the wealth ladder only see the rich getting richer and want someone to blame. Farage plays the migrant card: “They are taking all the ‘best’ jobs” – that is, doing all the jobs native English think are below them, keeping toilets clean and picking up rubbish strewn on the streets.
England no longer knows what England is or stands for, and what it definitely is not is the “UK”, nor is it “Great Britain” nor the “Empire and Commonwealth”. England has lost cohesion as a nation and is seeing a rise in regional identity because Yorkshire folk, first and foremost, know who they are as do Cornish, Cumbrians and Lancastrians. Identities they feel safe in and have no linkage to the “Home Counties” and the “England” where Reform now has its heartlands.
READ MORE: Could Scotland experience far-right riots like in Southport?
Now Farage’s underbelly are seeking to bring their violence to Scotland in the form of a “Save the Union” rally. If Police Scotland have the powers, no-one from the EDL should get off the train at Glasgow Central and Scotland should once more send the English fascists packing.
The EDL are only coming to Scotland to do one thing, to pick a fight. Nothing more, nothing less – that is the fascist play book.
Scotland will be fools to let them.
Peter Thomson
via email
I’LL have nothing to do with the nonsense of social media. I simply refuse to read it. Left-wing, right-wing, who cares? All that’s needed is to reveal who is writing the garbage that appears. Anonymity is the problem. Take that away and the problem disintegrates. It’s just so simple. If everyone had to post their name and address on every stupid comment there would be no problem at all. Whatever reason could there be for not taking such a simple step?
Tony Kime
Kelso
ST Andrews University has removed its rector Stella Maris as a trustee on its governing body because she called for a Gaza ceasefire and said Palestinians are subjected to “practices such as apartheid, siege (and) illegal occupation”.
None of this should be controversial. She made it clear that she was speaking as an individual, not for the university. Her removal shows how thoroughly the Israel lobby has penetrated not only US but UK universities and makes a mockery of the notion that universities are bastions of academic freedom and free speech.
Anyone can see that Israel is committing a methodical mass murder of an entire people. So can the world’s highest court, which ordered Israel to stop its genocide and withdraw from the territories it has illegally occupied since 1967.
Netanyahu’s July 24 address to Congress exposed Israel’s total control over US political elites. Congress gave the world’s leading war criminal 58 standing ovations during a 55-minute bellicose speech and has appropriated billions of dollars for weapons without which Israel couldn’t carry out its genocide. Congress is accountable not to the American people but to the donor class that funds its campaigns.
What “democratic values” do Israel’s enablers, the US, UK and EU, share with Israel? Perhaps the right to rape and murder innocent detainees, introduce polio into Gaza, and slaughter and starve more than 186,000 Palestinians? Or the right to commit political assassinations on another nation’s territory in order to ignite a wider regional war?
When the US and its European puppets give carte blanche to a rogue, immoral state that tortures, assassinates and commits genocide, it’s no wonder the Western world order is in freefall.
Leah Gunn Barrett
Edinburgh
SINCE the General Election I have waited for Gerry Hassan’s analysis of what is required of the independence movement in the new political situation before us.
Anyone who can make a 20-year political prediction for Scotland, as he did in a Fabian Society pamphlet predicting correctly five things that would happen in Scottish politics, deserves attention and his present analysis should be given deep thought (Three futures of Scotland, Jul 28).
Some of our National letter-writers with their super criticisms, hindsight and black-and-white opinions would do well to digest his proposals and ideas. When I read his articles it makes me wish I was young again and politically active.
Bobby Brennan
Glasgow
IN common with Ian Lawson (Letters, Aug 1), I too was delivered a thank-you message from new MP Susan Murray and prior to the election was bombarded with leaflets and correspondence with her pledges and priorities, which consisted mainly of devolved issues.
In this constituency LibDems have always been well funded, it being a marginal seat since the Jo Swinson days.
Similar, I assume, to most constituencies, we no longer have hustings where the candidates can challenge each other and voters can question their policies.
John Macleod
Milngavie
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