So long, farewell...

****BREAKING NEWS****

Scottish Tory Boy has decided to call it a day and retire from blogging.

This is the blog which inspired my own, misguided ramblings.

His retirement is a sad day for the Scottish blogging scene. How will the journos get their scoops now?!

Best wishes to that man. A pint is in the offing, when you are next seen.

Sad days indeed. You shall be missed.

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Language, dear boy!

Nice to see the Scottish Parliament back in session today, with the First Minister's announcement of the legislative agenda for the coming session making all the headlines.

It was a good performance by the FM, and with Cathy Jamieson & Tavish Scott leading for their respective parties, only Annabel Goldie remained as opposition leader from the previous term. All performed fairly credibly.

While it will be the legislative agenda that will draw headlines elsewhere, I noticed something that I hadn't noticed before. While Labour continue to refer to the "Scottish Executive" and frame questions in that format, Conservative Deputy Leader Murdo Fraser (pictured in his somewhat younger days above) continually referred to the "Scottish Government". This, I am assured by others, is simply a reflection of the fact that the entity has changed its name - the Tories don't get bogged down with "trivialities" - it's the bread and butter issues they focus on.

Which is a fair-ish point. However, what interested me is that, on a couple of occasions, he referred to the Scottish Government simply as "the Government". Am I reading too much into this if I suggest that the Scottish Conservatives are now recognising the Scottish Government as THE preeminent executive operating in Scotland? Or am I just hoping that is the case?

It wouldn't be the first time that Murdo Fraser suggested a "break-away" from the rest of the UK...

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Challenge

An open letter:

Dear Adam Smith was a Socialist (and other disagreeable ramblings),

I note from your most recent post - and indeed, from previous political statistical analysis on your blog - that you fancy yourself as a bit of a politics geek. And that you take more than a passing interest in politics outside Scotland - in particular the race for the White House.

I know from previous conversations with you on the subject that we disagree on what we think will be the outcome on Nov 4th (we can't both be right!) so here's the challenge. Call all 50 states (plus D.C) according to who will win it - along with electoral college votes - and become the next President.

There are now just under 9 weeks to go until polls open, so we should set a date for predictions by - 6 weeks out. That's 3 weeks yesterday - Tuesday the 23rd of September. If your game, you should list the 50 states (plus D.C) in either the colour of the candidate you think will win (DEM/BLUE, REP/RED) or with the name of the winning party/candidate next to it. This can be done on your own blog or on the comments field here - just so we have a public record of it. Then we can work out which of us is a bigger geek - the winner will be the individual who correctly calls the most states.

Incidentally, I know there are so many other that are just dying to take part in this geek-fest. Feel free to post your predictions, either on your own blogs or in the comments here. But by 23/09 - just so we're all even!

Sincerely,
Malc

ps - you know I'm the bigger geek, right?

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Sitting, waiting, wishing

The New York Times reports that the contest alluded to in my previous post may happen sooner rather than later - with Hillary Clinton looking to become more involved in the campaign now that Sarah Palin has been named as the Republican VP pick.

Apparently, "Clinton advisers... [are] saying that some of her supporters could be open to the McCain-Palin ticket depending on how Ms. Palin performed and whether she appeared to be a forceful, sincere advocate for the concerns of working women, their families and for policies that would help them."

Also, Mrs Clinton is said to be "galled" that the Republicans might build on the movement among women that she built in the primaries.

Which really does two things: a) provides an opportunity for John McCain to gain some more of the cross-over voters who may have been Hillary supporters and will not support Obama and b) indicates even more that Sarah Palin was a great pick as VP candidate.

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