Jay Stringer

I avoid getting political on my blog these days. But sometimes, i still feel the need to get up on a soapbox and start shouting.

So the Lockerbie bomber got released. And you know what? I’m not angry about that. That is, i don’t really have an opinion. Thinking too much about all the various aspects of that case involve stretching my noggin and taking in thoughts on justice, law and compassion. And its a Sunday. And just once, I’d like to be able to trust the people who are paid to make those decision.

BUT am i the only one who remembers the news story that Alex Salmond manufactured about this very issue two summers ago? There had been some white paper doing the round at Whitehall about changing some laws. One of the byproducts would have been that someone down in London could -theoretically- make the decision to to release Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi. That release was never discussed or proposed. It was not an issue. Except that a certain minister -Alex Salmond to be precise- raised it as an issue in one of his government speeches. Then, once the issue was out in the public arena, he jumped on it as a hot topic. He used it to rally more support for his party, and to drive a further wedge between the Scottish government and their London counterpart.

He got lots of publicity out of it. Managing at no point to mention that it was he who had raised the issue in the first place. He even went on Newsnight. Kirtsy Wark did to him what Newsnight does to all politicians; treated him like a naughty schoolboy and called him on his bullshit. He was stirring both sides of the argument and getting away with it. He was raising the issue, and using it to hammer the British government, then playing the wounded party and implyin that other people were making a mountain out of a molehill.

Except that Alex Salmond got an official apology from the BBC. Other politicians don’t get that.

So now, Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi has been released. With the blessing of Alex Salmond. And he’s giving speeches about compassion, and justice. And at no point is anyone calling him a manipulative lying little scumbag. Or pointing out how much he resembles Baron Greenback.

The fact that any other politician from any other party in the UK would not get away with this, yet the SNP seem somehow exempt, is worrying to me. Are the Scottish media that afraid of him? Or are they all pulling in the same direction?

Still, it’s good to know that the media will jump on ANY politician any time they change their direction.