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Monday 1 September 2014

LIVE AND LET DIE

Further proof, if such were needed, that Merlin McMurdo lives in a different century from the rest of us was provided in today's blog. He comes out with the following gem:

"A husband’s promise to buy his wife a new cooker can be delayed and waylaid by the pressing need for a new clutch."

Either his household is run along strict, puritan lines, he's gay, or he's still living with his parents. Whatever the truth he certainly has no idea of how a modern relationship works. It would be a brave, foolhardy man that announced to his wife that he was going to buy 'her' a new cooker! In normal households that would be a joint decision and would be paid for out of the joint bank account. The same would be true of the new clutch. Not that I'd know anything about the latter; I'm one of those folk that have never been interested in motor vehicles or how they work. I'm vaguely aware that the wheels on the bus go round and round but that's about it.

Anyway, his archaic simile is part of The Peeppul's supposition that Peter Lawwell has suddenly announced that Celtic is skint and needs 'Rangers' to survive. As I said yesterday, they're taking this as proof positive that if Bisto FC go into liquidation then there will be nothing to stop the next new club from walking straight into the Premiership, claiming that it's 'Stull Raynjurz'. They're all falling over themselves at Lawwell's apparent change of tack and his newfound desire to tell 'the truth'.

I don't know about anybody else but I don't remember Lawwell saying anything about Celtic being rich beyond the dreams of avarice. The only reference I can think of to this is on newspaper forums when Celtic fans were winding up The Peeppul by telling them that their new team was skint while Celtic was rolling in dosh. The fact is, all Peter Lawwell has ever said was that Celtic was in good shape financially and that it didn't need 'Rangers' to stay that way. He said nothing about running out to buy up every player he could find and winning Champions Leagues or anything, like a certain David Murray did in the grand old days of yore.

The fact is that some people just got carried away with themselves, counting up the CL and transfer money and assuming that Croesus didn't have a look in as far as Celtic was concerned. A million quid might keep you or me in reasonable luxury for the rest of our lives but for a football team it's a drop in the ocean. You can't run a business just by spending and spending, as Rangers found to their cost. As I said yesterday, this is Scotland and we need to be realistic. The whole of Scottish football is in the gutter where Rangers dragged it and it's going to take time to climb out. Let the new Ibrox club spend money it doesn't have; that's not the Celtic way.

Meanwhile The Peeppul are still peddling the myth about their new club being 'demoted' as some sort of 'punishment'. Some of them are still blaming Peter Lawwell for this imagined slight, even though, at the time, he was working as hard as the rest of them to put Sevco in the top tier. When the situation comes round again, and it looks like it won't be too long, Lawwell and the bosses at the other clubs are going to have to weigh up what's important. Do they let this other new team into the top tier, making a mockery of the whole game or abide by the rules? Doing the former might put more bums on seats at Celtic Park as the crowds flock back to see the neo-huns get pummelled. In the long term, however, it would have a completely detrimental effect on the whole game.

Essentially what such a move would say is that neither Celtic nor 'Rangers' can ever leave the top tier, no matter what happens. What would be the point in supporting any other club when the odds are so stacked against you? Two teams can outspend the rest with the comfortable knowledge that liquidation means just carrying on as usual without having to pay back your creditors. And other teams might try to follow suit and find that the same rules don't apply to them. The only criteria that matter are the size of the crowds and the size of the TV audience. Is this what anyone wants for Scottish football? I doubt it. So have a bit of patience, let Bisto FC fade away and allow our game to get back to what it is supposed to be.

Over on the referendum front the big buzz just now is about supposed organised intimidation by the YES campaigners. I've seen a few stories about YES campaigners being beaten up and threatened; one old man even got his arm broken! None of this, however, makes its way into our mainstream media. Instead all we hear is about 'cybernats' and the throwing of one egg. By God! It's like an election in the Middle East! Who knows, it might even get to the stage where somebody might - gasp! - throw an old tomato or something. Surely this cannot be allowed to continue? I'm just waiting for some Tory to come up with the suggestion that the only reason people are going to food banks is to get things to throw at the Bettertogetherers!

The latest poor soul to suffer the wrath of the 'cybernats' is Paul McCartney. The walking advert for Grecian 2000 (or Just For Men, I think it's called now) is the latest clown to sign that silly letter, already signed by all manner of no-marks and upper-class gits. Does he expect to be congratulated? Or maybe he's 'So Vain' that he thinks we're all going to vote NO just because he says so! Apparently he's now been subjected to 'vile' online abuse by the 'cybernats'.

Look away now if you're at all of a nervous disposition, but he was called 'a prick'! Er...is that it? I've been called worse than that by the weans at school! What seems to be emerging from all this is that the ones urging us to 'stay together' are shocked that nobody cares about their opinions and that they all seem to be remarkably thin-skinned. I suppose the likes of Paul McCartney is used to people fawning over him and agreeing with everything he says. Look at the abuse suffered by Heather Mills when she dared to break up with him. Relentless fun was poked at her disability, which makes hypocritical any complaints about McCartney receiving verbal abuse.

You really wonder if any of these celebrities actually know anything about the real world. The fact that they are on the same side as McMurdo in the referendum debate goes a long way toward suggesting that they do not. As for the Bettertogetherers in general I really think it's time that they grew up. The constant whining about a few posts on Twitter makes them look like 'glass half-empty' kind of people. No wonder they can't come up with anything positive in their campaign!

Take a leaf out of my book; you can find something postitive in almost anything if you look hard enough. I remember one of my pupils writing on the ground outside the school gates, in permanent marker, the legend, 'Mr. Anderson is gay.' I was extremely pleased at his use of punctuation. The capital letters were in the right place and, although I think an exclamation mark would have been more suitable, he put a full stop at the end of it. He also called me 'Mr. Anderson' which shows a certain amount of respect; in my day we'd just have written 'Anderson'!

So get off your high horse, Bettertogetherers! The fact that folk are answering you and writing about you on Twitter means that they are actually paying attention to what you are saying. Isn't that better than being ignored altogether?


A treat for Paul McCartney's Better Together friends








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