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Thursday 27 June 2013

WHO'S PARANOID?

I'm sure everybody's seen the film 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit.' In it there's a place called Toon Town, where just about anything can happen, as Bob Hoskins finds out. That's what it's like when you read a blog like Bill McMurdo's and see all the crazy-arsed ideas that they come up with!  It's like walking into Toon Town. Their team has suffered at the hands of everybody in Scotland, led by Peter Lawwell, and have never done anything wrong. It's all part of some huge conspiracy, apparently, to wipe out Protestantism in our country. First it was Rangers that 'they' tried to wipe out. Next it's Alex Salmond leading an indpendent Scotland down the path to rule from Rome. You need to read this stuff - it's amazing! It's also a bit frightening that there are people out there that honestly believe this guff!

My favourite bit on yesterday's blog was when somebody called Phil Mac Giola Bhain paranoid! Talk about pots and kettles! And why are they calling him paranoid? Well, he decided to ask about the licence that Rangers were granted to play in Europe in season 2011-2012. I remember people asking questions about that at the time and I also remember that no answers were forthcoming. Rangers were under investigation by HMRC over the 'wee' tax case and they ended up having funds frozen and sheriff's officers turning up at Ibrox. Rangers should not, in these circumstances, have been granted a licence to play in Europe. Why it was granted seems to be a closely-guarded secret.

Also a closely-guarded secret is the contents of the 5-Way Agreement that allowed Green's new club to jump the queue into the league and then pretend to be Rangers. There has been a lot of speculation over exactly what is in this agreement but the actual details are still being kept hidden. Why? What possible harm could it do to make the details public?

I think the key word here is 'harm.' Whenever something is hidden away and kept secret it's usually because somebody, or their reputation, might be harmed if it became public knowledge. So, obviously, there's an element of fear dictating what we are and are not allowed to know. Our football authorities were bending over backwards to get Trigger's Brush into the SPL or, at least, into Division 1. Despite what all the idiots say on their blogs, Peter Lawwell would have welcomed Trigger's Brush into the SPL with open arms; he's all about the money, nothing else. The outrage shown by all Scottish football supporters caught the authorities on the hop. It certainly put the wind up them and they had to resort to backstairs deals to ensure that Trigger's Brush got into the league.

The way Green was constantly bad-mouthing the SFA and openly claiming that there were conspiracies against his team, with no comeback, shows that there was something dodgy going on. Could it be that they all knew that Green was not a fit and proper person to run a football team? Like I said, there was definitely something dodgy going on and this would certainly fit the bill. If the SFA turned a blind eye, which they're good at doing, to Green's unsuitability then he would effectively have had them over a barrel. If they answered any of his outrageous charges then 'somebody' might let the papers know about the SFA's cover up!

Before anyone says anything, this is not paranoia. The real paranoia lies in being afraid to let everyone know the truth. The fact that the truth is hidden means that the only recourse we have is to speculate and the only way to put an end to, or to refute such speculations, is to be open and honest!

The possibility that Green could have been unfit to run a football club is shown by the latest revelations to emerge from the Charlotte Fakes tapes, as related in the Daily Record. Surprisingly, or, perhaps, unsurprisingly, nobody seems overly concerned about these revelations. Apparently, Green, Ahman and Stockbridge were not just mixed up with Whyte but also with an internationally-known con man, who is wanted by Interpol! It seems that Green did business with this con man before. The more that comes out in these revelations the more it seems that Green was not a 'fit and proper person.' I wonder if Gordon Waddell and Mark Hateley would like these 'fit-and-proper-person' tests they keep bleating about to work retrospectively!

One piece of truth did emerge from the recordings reported in the Daily Record. Craig Whyte is reported as having said, 'McCoist is useless. McCoist is f****** useless...' Well, you can say what you like about Craig Whyte but he certainly knows how to assess football managers!

Also in the papers is the news that quite a few of the top male tennis players are pulling out of Wimbledon due to injury or illness. So if Andy Murray were to win this year it would  be 'tainted,' wouldn't it?




TAINTED

Tuesday 25 June 2013

CHEATS


A rather strange admission by Bill Mcmurdo yesterday. He is arguing for Trigger's Brush FC helping out Hearts, and even Dunfermline. He says that the Oldco had a long history of helping out other teams, saying, 'It is well-known that Rangers have extended favours to teams in the past. I remember two occasions from my boyhood when teams got end-of-season “surprise” results at Ibrox that helped them beat the drop.' How wonderfully altruistic of them!

I remember years ago I ran a competition in my class in conjunction with the local Lloyds chemist. Apparently Lloyds gave each branch a fund to encourage them to reach out to the local community; they even gave awards to the branches that did the most. So the manager was enthusiastic and offered to judge the competition and provide, not only prizes, but goodies for all the kids in the class.

The pupils were to design posters, warning of the dangers of skin cancer and reminding people to wear enough sun lotion. One of the girls asked me if she could finish her poster at home and I, without thinking, said yes. Of course, the Lloyds manager chose the girl as one of the winners. I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. It was obvious that the girl's mother had a hand in her poster, but I could hardly say anything. It was my fault and I made sure that I never made that mistake again.

So what does this story have to do with anything? Well, my point is that helping somebody in a competition invariably means that you are giving an unfair advantage to one person over the others that are competing fairly. This is the same for teams. It is one thing to go easy in a charity match and let the other team win to make the others feel good; quite another entirely to lie down to help a team in a competition. Bill McMurdo suggests that this happened in matches against Dundee Utd and Airdrie. If Rangers helped certain teams to stay in the top six, or even to avoid relegation, then it was to the detriment of other teams. There is a name for people, teams or other organisations that indulge in this sort of behaviour - cheats!

Gary Locke, meanwhile has given the Brushers an excuse to start bleating all over again about injustices etc. He has asked Trigger's Brush FC, among others, to play a fundraising match at Tynecastle. TBFC, of course, ran to the papers, trying to make out that they are they only ones he's approached. Cue all the 'nae chance' and 'let thum stew in thur ain juice' statements. Fungus The Bogeyman, aka Mark Dingwall of the Rangers Supporters' Trust, voiced the opinions of many when he said that Locke had a cheek asking. This is the lumbering dolt, remember, that told people to boycott Tannadice and then sneaked into the match himself!

This has also brought up the old chestnut of Trigger's Brush FC being Rangers, the same team that used to play at Ibrox. I've explained my position on this many times but I'll make one final point. If it is still the same club then why did SFA membership have to be transferred? If it was the same club then membership would just continue, wouldn't it? Also, if it was the same club, why did it not start with a 15-point penalty at the beginning of last season for going through a second insolvency event?

I've only just read Gordon Waddell's piece in the Sunday Mail and, depressingly, he's joined the 'our football authorities are to blame' brigade. Unlike Hateley, however, he has decided not to blame the SFA but, instead, have a go at the new SPFL. He says that it should 'learn a few lessons from its less-than illustrious genesis.' Nothing like laying your cards on the table straight off, eh? Anyway, he derides the SPFL for not having financial controls in its rulebook. Isn't it strange how all these characters are desperate for financial controls these days? I wonder why.

There were folk away back in the 1990s that were calling for some kind of financial control, or at least some kind of financial restraint, in Scottish football. These Jeremiahs were shouted down amid the general clamour to hero-worship David Murray and drool over all his plans for the future. Rangers were going to be a big force in Europe, dominate Scottish football and probably end up moving to the English leagues, where they would vie with Manchester Utd, Liverpool, Chelsea etc to be the biggest, most successful club in Britain. Of course, as we now know, all this was built on soggy foundations.

Other Scottish clubs had to spend just in order to keep some kind of place in the top tier as Rangers swept all aside. Any calls for such spending to be curtailed would also have to be extended to the cash being thrown around by Murray, and there was no way that was going to be countenanced! Murray continued to build castles in the sky while the agnivores of the Scottish media fell over themselves in praise of him. When the house of cards collapsed it almost dragged the whole of Scottish football with it.

These desperate attempts to shift the blame from Murray and Rangers is typical of our media agnivores. It does not even enter their closed minds that Rangers were to blame for their own downfall and that Murray was in any way guilty. No. It has to be the fault of the SFA, SPL and everybody else for not stopping Murray, or Whyte for that matter, in their tracks. As I've said before, they would all have been up in arms if anyone had stood in Murray's, or Whyte's, way. There is also the little matter of Whyte's involvement with Green when SFA membership was transferred to Newco. Despite the protestations coming from Ibrox, the fact that nobody is allowed to see the findings of the 'independent inquiry' speaks volumes. And yet, any suggestion that there should be a real, independent investigation into this matter is met with howls of protest. As usual, this lot want rules in place but don't want them to apply to their own team!

Finally, now that the longest day has been and gone, let me be the first to say, The nights are fair drawin' in!




Mark Dingwall, he say "No!"




Sunday 23 June 2013

BEES AND BEASTS
 

I remember when the Daily Record website used to allow comments somebody made a rather sage observation. Whoever it was said that the Ibrox hordes had what he called a 'hive mind.' They very rarely expressed an individual opinion, instead all spouting the exact same slogans and sound bites. The guy was right as it is obviously true that the supporters of Rangers, and Trigger's Brush FC, always seem to be of one mind. They are like bees, wasps, ants or termites in a nest, where pheromones are spread around to ensure that every insect is following the same script. Witness the way they all spout 'We arra Peeppill,' use words like 'cabal' and follow follow the party line in blaming others for their woes.

A prime example is Mark Hateley, whose articles in the Daily Record usually end with 'as told to...' Strangely, this did not appear in yesterday's DR article. Perhaps Hateley has been going to Adult Literacy classes! Anyway, like one of the Borg from Star Trek, he echoes the sentiments expressed a couple of days earlier in the same paper by Kevin Kyle and the same sentiments expressed in Bill McMurdo's blog and any other Brushers' blog you care to name. Although Hateley is too timid to express the full thoughts of the 'hive mind' he points the finger at the usual suspects.

The usual crap is trotted out: the SFA are responsible for the financial mess at Hearts and other clubs and they should be vetting owners to make sure they are 'fit and proper.' Aye, right! As I said yesterday, it's okay everyone being wise after the event but can you imagine the reaction if the SFA had knocked back Craig Whyte?

He goes on to suggest that the SFA should be examining the books of each club on a yearly basis to check that everything is in order. What are they supposed to do then? Hateley agrees with Stewart Regan that licences should be withdrawn from clubs that 'create their own financial meltdown.' According to Hateley, it's 'too little too late.' So I take it he would have been happy for Rangers' licence to be removed when they could not produce signed-off accounts! Somehow I doubt it. To the 'hive mind' the normal rules don't apply to them!

There is also another problem with this idea. Years ago I knew somebody that worked for the owner of a certain football team. The football team was not his only business interest; he had many companies operating under the umbrella of his holding company. The main job of the person I knew was, along with others, to use computers to constantly transfer funds between the different companies in order to show healthy balances and make it easier for these companies to secure loans. With this way of working it would have been easy for the football team to show a healthy balance sheet every year. I'll give you three guesses which football team I'm talking about and who the owner was!

Meanwhile Tam Cowan is optimistic about the chances for Hearts' survival. He thinks the fans will come through, the way they did at Motherwell. Strangely, though, he says, 'When Rangers were flogged for £1 to Craig Whyte before going belly up, it was the punters – not Charles Green – who gave the Ibrox club the kiss of life.' Eh? How the hell does he make that out? When Rangers went into administration all the supporters did was demonstrate outside Ibrox. Even then all they could chant and sing about was 'Fenian bastards' and being 'up tae wur knees in Fenian blood.' Yes, that must have been a geat help! They're still blaming 'Fenian bastards' for what happened to this day!

I had to laugh, though, when Tam brought up something that I, and no doubt everybody else, had forgotten about: the crossbar challenge! So what happened to that? Did anybody win it? And if they did, were they just added to the list of creditors of the old 'holding company'? Talk about fooling all of 'The Peeppil' all of the time!

Meanwhile Sooperally might be handed the most exciting incentive ever to prove himself a proper coach and manager and to inspire his team to climb to the top tier as quickly as possible. Greggs are in talks to supply snacks to all the grounds in the SPL. Now if that doesn't prove a filip to Sooperally nothing will!

In closing, a reading from Chapter 13 of The Revelation of St John the Divine. I wonder if the second beast's name is Green!


13:1 And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.
13:2 And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority.
13:3 And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast.
13:4 And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him?

13:11 And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon.
13:12 And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.

13:15 And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.




'It's the same team!'

Saturday 22 June 2013

EGG ON THEIR FACES AND EGGSHELLS ON THEIR HEADS

Graham Spiers further alienated himself from the Trigger's Brush FC hordes by taking a stick, shoving it into their nest and stirring it around. The WASPs soon came swarming out after he had the nerve to claim that their club is a new one. They claim vindication due to the Advertising Standards Authority's ruling and the BBC watchdog supporting their complaints about BBC pundits talking about Oldco Rangers and Newco Rangers. Unfortunately, however, this vindication comes about due, not to the justice of their case, but through abject fear.

Remember a few years ago the furore over some foreign newspaper printing caricatures of the prophet Mohammed (P.B.U.H)? The usual death threats followed and the story was broadcast all over our newspapers and TV. Not one paper or TV channel, however, would show us what all the fuss was about. It is difficult to believe that in the hard, cynical world of news reporting that it was respect for Islam that prevented them from showing the offending cartoons. It was fear, plain and simple. Although the majority of Muslims are peaceful folk there are more than a few extremist nutters that are prepared to die and kill, as they claim, for their faith. It's the same scenario with Trigger's Brush FC.

The disgraceful destruction in Manchester and the threats on the life of Neil Lennon and others shows that this kind of extremist element exists among the Trigger's Brush support as well. The decisions to uphold their complaints, therefore, are primarily driven by the fear of getting home-made bombs through the post and of instigating destructive rampages through our streets. This can hardly be called 'vindication'!

The majority of the Brushers, however, are too concerned with what's going on at Tynecastle to bother about what Spiers has to say. Again, they seem to think they've been vindicated; they warned us all that the SPL would collapse without them, didn't they? As usual, in their self-absorption, they ignore the facts. Hearts have been teetering on the brink for years. Even Wallace Mercer saw the warning signs twenty-odd years ago and proposed a meger with Hibs. To the Jeremiahs of the Trigger's Brush FC support, however, this is just the start. The whole of Scottish football is heading into the abyss and then the Glorious Trigger's Brush FC will take its place at the top table of English football!

Their main concern, though, is that Hearts are treated the same as Rangers were. Many of them are demanding that Hearts are tossed into Division 3 now. They forget, of course, that this did not happen to them until their club was liquidated. In fact, it did not happen at all; it was the new team that had to start at the bottom, albeit the rules were bent so they could jump the queue into the Scottish leagues proper.  The exact same thing will happen if Hearts go into liquidation. Any new club based at Tynecastle will need to apply to get into the league, exactly the same as happened with Rangers and Gretna before them. The delusion that they were somehow treated unfairly, however, seems to have become ingrained.

Kevin Kyle was in the Daily Record yesterday, blaming the SFA for everything. According to him, the SFA should have ensured that people like Romanov and Whyte were not allowed to take over their respective clubs. Quite apart from the fact that this is not the job of the SFA, can you imagine the reaction if Whyte had been prevented from taking over Rangers? Remember all the 'In Whyte we trust' nonsense? Remember how they demonstrated outside BBC Scotland because said channel had the nerve to question Whyte's suitability? If the SFA had blocked Whyte's takeover they would all have been claiming that Peter Lawwell was to blame; pretty much the same as they do now. No matter what happens, everyone else is to blame!

They are also indulging in a major case of straw-clutchery and whatabootery at the moment. They are claiming that Celtic were sold land for £1 by Glasgow City Council and are determined that this is all some kind of 'Fenian' conspiracy to help Celtic. Good luck to them with that one! It is common practice for councils to sell land to companies for a nominal sum if it means regenerating a deprived area and providing employment. It would be easy to find other examples of such business and I've no doubt that Rangers took advantage of such deals too.

Much more potentially criminal was Duff and Phelps's cheap sale of the assets of Rangers to Charles Green. A blind eye was turned to this underhand deal, even though it was incumbent on Duff and Phelps to act in the interests of creditors and sell assets to the highest bidders. A blind eye was also turned, indeed, support given, to turning the holding-company model on its head to let Green claim that his new club was still Rangers. Nor does anyone want to look too closely into the health-and-safety implications of a football stadium full of asbestos. Not to mention the blind eye and deaf ear that have been turned for decades to the racist and bigoted chanting and singing at Ibrox and the sectarian signing policy pursued by the club until relatively recently. Yes, if it comes to enquiries uncovering misdemeanours and cover-ups then the Ibrox clubs would win hands-down!

As to what is happening to Hearts and other teams it is being caused by huge changes in society. Changes have happened before in Britain and it is easy to be cold and dispassionate when reading a History book; living through the changes, however, is another matter. To the Luddites of the Industrial Revolution, they were fighting to preserve their way of life, as were the unions in the 1970s. Equally, the British Empire was a symptom of economic weakness, as other European countries caught up with Britain in industrial competitiveness. At the time, however, the Empire was made out to be something glorious, even though Britain had always tried to avoid this kind of costly enterprise. Football in Scotland is now going through the same kind of change.

Since the end of the Second World War the entertainment industry has changed considerably. Cinemas closed, and became bingo halls, in the face of competition from television. Now those bingo halls are closing due to people being able to play on the internet. Playstations, X-Boxes, Netflix, Sky TV etc are forcing other forms of entertainment to change and football is primarily an entertainment. Many youngsters would rather play Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto than go to a football match and this is reflected in the falling crowd sizes at football grounds. The situation in England is somewhat disguised by the huge payouts from Sky Television; when this dries up then football there will be in serious trouble.

In Scotland the same mega-bucks from television is just not available. At one point it looked as if Scottish football could ride the same gravy train as English football and clubs spent money accordingly. The big money, however, did not materialise but Scottish football was caught in a cycle of spending that spiralled out of control. This reckless spending was instituted by Rangers and everyone else tried to keep up. Clubs like Celtic were derided for their 'biscuit-tin' mentality and even the fans complained that the boards were not spending enough. In the long run this spending could not be maintained in the face of declining ticket sales. Now Scottish football is finally having to face up to reality.

The supporters of Trigger's Brush FC, however, refuse to recognise reality. Like crops in a farmer's field they have been fed nothing but horseshit by Murray, Whyte and then Green. In their desperate need to believe in their own, and their club's, superiority, they simply cannot accept that Rangers were to blame for their own demise. To their brainwashed way of thinking it had to be external enemies that were responsible. They blame a 'Fenian,' Peter Lawwell-led SFA and SPL, a 'Fenian' media, a 'Fenian' HMRC and a 'Fenian' Scottish Government. I read one idiot that even claims that Hearts' problems are down to the SPL and SFA, led by Peter Lawwel, naturally, who have victimised the Gorgie club because of the guy that attacked Neil Lennon!

What the hell is to be done with these people? You can't debate with them. The only answers you get back are, 'We arra Peepill' and 'Shut it ya Feenyin bastird!' It is one of the main problems that a modern Scotland is going to have to address, whether independent or not: how to eradicate this anachronistic thinking from a sizeable portion of our population. They are an acute embarrassment, not only to Scotland, but to themselves.



 
An Ibrox spokesman





Wednesday 19 June 2013


BIG BROTHER AND THE HOLDING COMPANY

The news that Hearts are about to go belly-up has brought all the Trigger's Brush FC supporters out of the woodwork. Amid all the gloating they are demanding that Hearts are relegated the way they imagine their team was. They still can't seem to get their heads round the fact that they were not relegated; their club died and started over again. No matter how much they scream and shout it does not change what really happened. Hearts are going into administration and will be deducted points, exactly the same as happened to Rangers.

Bomber Brown, meanwhile, is accusing Hearts of cheating; holding back from going into administration until now so as to avoid relegation. So all the appeals for the supporters to buy season tickets etc was a sham, then? Obviously, Brown's links to Ibrox have clouded his judgment and he thinks everyone's out to get him!

Instead of the Brushers whining it should be Hearts supporters that are complaining. Why is their team being deducted 15 points when Rangers were only deducted 10? Is that fair? SPL rules specify a penalty of -10 points, as happened with Rangers, so why the extra penalty for Hearts? The rules also specify that any further insolvency event will incur the same penalty. I would expect SFL rules to be the same, so 'Rangers' should have started the season just ended with a ten-point deduction. Of course, being a different club this rule did not apply to them!

The Brushers like to interpret the rules to suit themselves and are not above lying if it helps to promote their agenda. I have seen a couple of them argue that the SPL rulebook explicitly separates the club and company. This, of course, is pish! The only time the term 'holding company' is used is in the regulation concerning registration of playing grounds:

 "A Club participating in the League must:-

A2.5.3.1 itself, or through a subsidiary or holding company of such Club, own its Registered Ground;"

That's it. Nothing about the company and the club being separate entities.

Some Brushers even go so far as to lie and say that SPL rules say that a club cannot trade, only a holding company. Again, this is pish. Throughout the SPL rulebook the only 'company' spoken about is the SPL itself. All the member clubs are referred to as just that: clubs. It is also interesting to note that UK law specifies that if a holding company owns a subsidiary, that subsidiary must be a trading company! So that puts their gas at a peep.

It is interesting to have a look at how the 'holding company' model works and what a holding company is for. In essence, the holding company is just for providing initial funds and collecting dividends; it has nothing to do with the day-to-day running of subsidiaries, its business transactions or even its debts. Any debts incurred by the subsidiary are solely the responsibility of the subsidiary; the holding company is not liable. In this way, if the subsidiary goes into liquidation then the holding company is unaffected.

This, of course, puts a whole new slant on affairs at Ibrox. If Rangers were insolvent then the club, not the holding company, would be liable for the debts. The attempt by everyone involved, including the agnivores in the Scottish media, to turn the holding-company model upside-down is disingenuous and does not stand up to scrutiny. A holding company cannot be held liable for the debts of a subsidiary. If they wish to claim that the club was a non-trading entity, then they have broken the law. And if they try to claim that the club is just an asset, like the ground, then the whole edifice comes crumbling down. How can an asset be a member of the SFA/SPL/SFL etc?

The bottom line is that Rangers went into liquidation and the club now resident at Ibrox is a new one. Any other explanation involves either breaking the law or re-writing the whole notion of what a club actually is! Maybe this guy Kieran Prior, with his off-the-radar IQ, can come up with a better story!

Speaking of Kieran Prior, I was interested to read his take on what is currently going wrong at Trigger's Brush FC. According to Prior, there is too much money being paid out to those in charge at Ibrox. I think no matter who you support we can all agree that Traynor is not earning his money. Even if he is only being paid a tenner a week, that's £10 a week too much! What, exactly, does he do? Prior, however, is not interested in Big Jabba's sinecure; he's after somebody else. The whole article in the Daily Record was a tirade against Brian Stockbridge; how he is earning too much, how he contributes nothing, how he shouldn't be there. Unsurprisingly, Prior admits that he is a friend of Malcolm Murray! So that's another one ready to take sides.

So this guy, who has threatened to buy more shares, is out to get Stockbridge while supporting Murray, the Krays have yet to show their hand, Blue Pitch Holdings are still hanging around like a bad smell and it doesn't look like Craig Whyte is going to give up anytime soon. All this before The Laxative arrives in December to further complicate things!

I see Big Brother is back on our screens but everyone has lost interest. The goings-on at the Big Hoose are much more entertaining and the Ibrox boardroom has a bigger collection of cheats, crooks, weirdos and assorted attention seekers than the Big Brother House could ever hope to assemble!





The Board of Directors of Trigger's Brush FC.











Saturday 15 June 2013

BLUE McCOISTER CULT

I'm reading a book at the moment called 'Killer Cults.' It's a bit of a misnomer because not all of the cults are killers. No matter what these cults believe, or who is leading them, they all have a few things in common. Firstly, they are paranoid in the extreme; they believe that the whole world is out to get them and that there is a great conspiracy keeping the wrong people in power. Secondly, they bolster each other with their paranoia and convince each other that they are in the right, no matter what common sense or the real world says. Thirdly, their hatred is usually blamed on the object of their fear and loathing, justifying anything they might say or do. Lastly, Armageddon is coming and the only ones left will be the members of the cult.

The followers of Trigger's Brush FC are showing all the trademark signs of being a cult. In themselves, they've always known this; don't they always say that 'Rangers is more than just a team, it's a way of life'? Now they're getting more and more like Charles Manson's Family or the inhabitants of Jonestown. The big worry is what they're all going to do. Are they going to drink the poisoned Kool-Aid or start indescriminately slaughtering folk?

The paranoia has been in evidence for a while now, but it's getting worse. The campaign for Scottish independence, apparently, is a plot for Catholics to take over the country. Alex Salmond is working to an agenda worked out in the Vatican and is looking to destroy all of Scotland's fine, old, Protestant institutions, especially Ibrox. You think I'm making this up? Go and read some of their blogs! Now somebody else has joined in the plot. There is a rumour going around that Celtic have been guilty of some kind of fiscal misdemeanours, aided and abetted by Glasgow City Council. This is all grist to the mill of the mentality that has always claimed that Glasgow is run by Catholics. Now they have gone further: it seems the whole Labour Party in Scotland is run by Catholics. So let's see if I've got this right: the Vatican is controlling the SNP and the Labour Party in order to destroy Trigger's Brush FC. I doubt even Jim Jones was as paranoid as that!

Of course, it only takes a few of them to put forward an idea and they all follow follow like sheep. They have got each other so utterly convinced with all this 'holding company' nonsense that they have got to the stage now where they believe that Rangers did nothing wrong. It was the holding company that was involved in all the financial chicanery, not Rangers. This leads them directly to the conclusion that, as well as still being Rangers, their team should not have had penalties imposed for going into administration and should still be in the SPL as a full member. This belief helps to shore up their delusions about everybody being out to destroy them.

These mad fairy stories help to give some justification for all their hatred. They claim there was no bigotry in Scotland until the Irish arrived, ignoring the age-old sectarian hatred and discrimination against Scottish Catholics. Celtic fans sing songs about Ireland, which, in their minds, justifies their loathing of Celtic. Some of them even go as far as saying that bigotry had all but disappeared until Neil Lennon arrived! Exactly what Lennon did to stoke up all this bigotry, apart from existing, they omit to explain.

The Trigger's Brush blogs are full of triumphant gloating about the death throes of Hearts. They're desperately hoping that all the other teams will follow them until only Trigger's Brush FC is left. Again, this is just like the cults I've been reading about. The story doing the rounds now, and some of them honestly believe this, is that Peter Lawell engineered all the financial problems at Rangers in order to eliminate the competition! Hearts, and all the other SPL clubs, are dancing on the end of strings being manipulated by Peter Lawell. But the Day of Judgment is at hand and they're all going to die slow, lingering deaths; apart from Trigger's Brush, that is. Mad as bloody hatters the lot of them! I can just see them all, holed up in Larkhall, fighting against the police like another Waco!

Unfortunately, politicians have a tendancy to try to ingratiate themselves with these types of maniacs, so long as there are votes in it. In the 1880s Joseph Chamberlain, who had decided that his imperialist dreams and personal ambition were more important than his erstwhile political ideology, left Gladstone's Liberal party and crossed the House, taking a group of Liberal Unionists with him. The Conservative Party soon became known as The Conservative and Unionist Party, a name which it maintained right up until the 1970s. Thatcher wanted to present her party as modern and forward-looking,  so the 'Unionist' bit was dropped. I noticed recently that it has made a comeback. Ostensibly this is because of the possibility of Scotland seceding from the Union but that was never what the 'Unionist' bit was about; it was to do with Ireland. It seems that the Tories are seeking the Orange vote by pandering to the outlandish belief in a papist conspiracy!

So now we know what the speakers at this year's annual Rickets Suffererers Parade will be talking about. Normally they bang on about Antichrists, Whores of Babylon and Protestant Freedoms, while the 'loyal' lie about on the grass, pissed out their nuts and ignoring these calls to arms. I wonder if they'll be more attentive this year if the speakers start tub-thumping about papist conspiracies involving Labour and the SNP, and the evil war against Trigger's Brush FC!

While we're on the subject, the police were out in force at our local Gala Day last weekend, making sure that nobody was drinking in public. Anyone in the park with a bottle or a can of beer or whatnot had it confiscated and received a warning. I wonder if the boys in blue will be as vigilant in Glasgow come the second week in July!

Meanwhile, the Daily Record is salivating over the story that some financial bigwig in London, with an off-the-radar IQ, has invested in Trigger's Brush and intends to put more money in. This reminded me of the last lines of a poem, which I'm sure was written by Jimmy Copeland:

"Aye, yer clever, damn clever
But ye hivnae a clue what yer daein'!"



'It's more than just a team - it's a way of life!'

Thursday 13 June 2013

THE DOG IS NOW WAGGING THE TAIL

The Brushers are frothing at the mouth over the vote by the SFL to amalgamate with the SPL to form a new body, the SPFL. They're shouting, as usual, about cabals and how Peter Lawwell is looking to run the whole of Scottish football, to the benefit of Celtic and the detriment of Trigger's Brush FC. How the hell they make this out is anybody's guess, but they are trying to have us all believe that the whole buisiness of reconstruction is purely in order to damage their team!

As far as I'm concerned, it's about time somebody had the bollocks to stand up to these diddy teams, who seem to think they have a God-given right to run football in this country. As I've said before on here, this goes back to the snobbishness of the Nineteenth Century, when amateurs were called 'gentlemen' and professionals were looked down upon. Some of this snobbery still lingers (for example, the phrase 'professional foul' speaks volumes) and there is still a feeling among the 'gentlemen' that the game belongs to them and that professional teams are mere interlopers. Witness the disproportionate influence some of these teams have had in the SFA over the years.

Even in this day and age these wee teams want to be running the show. They previously threw out the SPL proposals, while still standing with their hands out, expecting the teams in the SPL to keep subsidising them. The First Division teams, however, had had enough and called their bluff by threatening to go it alone with the SPL. Today, realising that the game was up, most of the Division 2 and Division 3 teams fell into line. Exactly what their initial objections were is unclear since they came up with no counter-proposals of their own. The reason for one individual's objections, however, are all too transparent; but I'll come to that later.

The biggest objectors, by far, to league reconstruction, are the fans of Trigger's Brush FC. In tandem with the wee, diddy teams, Rangers always had undue influence in the corridors of power. The disgraceful behaviour of Jim Farry showed how this influence could be misused. In later years Gordon Smith, a Rangers apologist, who argued that Rangers' bigoted songbook was just 'tradition,' got his hands on the reins of power. Nowadays, however, things are slightly different. Rangers are dead and buried and their influence has gone as well. Certainly Campbell Ogilvie is still hanging around like a bad smell and Vincent Lunny has followed the usual procedure by refusing to act on the sectarian chanting and singing of both Rangers and Trigger's Brush FC supporters. In the main, however, the team at Ibrox no longer holds sway over Scottish football.

This is what sticks in the craw of the Brushers. They can no longer take for granted that the football authorities are on their side. Those days are gone. They make up stories about cabals and Peter Lawwell being a puppet master but, in their heart of hearts, they know that this is garbage. They got so used to their team being in charge that they cannot bring themselves to believe that things are fairer now. In the darkness of their minds they have to believe that somebody else must have replaced them in the corridors of power!

I might seem to have contradicted myself here by saying that the diddy teams have had undue influence but then saying that Rangers practically ran Scottish football; but I haven't. In the area of finance Celtic and Rangers always stuck together against everyone else but, in terms of power it was Rangers backed up by the diddy teams. As many English folk said to me over the years, it was always obvious from our media that Rangers was the Establishment team. Scottish football has been a backwards-looking institution for over a hundred years. 'Traditions' and 'Precedent' have always been more important than bringing the game into the modern world. It wasn't that long ago that we couldn't see a big-name European tie on TV because Diddytown United were playing the Bricklayers XI that evening!

There is always a harking back to the Golden Age of football, when men were men and players would turn up on a Saturday, after a night out on the piss, stub their fags out, put their false teeth somewhere safe and then blooter a soggy bladder up and down the pitch for ninety minutes. None of these characters would last five minutes in the modern game, used as they were to dribbling round defenders coughing their guts up with emphysema! But Scottish football finds it hard to move past this 'Golden Age' and Rangers have always been seen as the upholders of these 'traditions.'

Which puts a different light on the whining and moaning of Jim Ballantyne, president of the SFL, chairman of Airdrie and member of the SFA board. He complains that the SFL has been 'taken over' and mourns the loss of the Scottish Football League. As usual, his point of view is backwards-looking. There is, however, a further element to this man's opposition to league reconstruction: Ballantyne used to be a shareholder in Rangers FC! He's hardly what you would call impartial, then, is he?

A big deal is also being made about the demands for 'due diligence' from the SFL over the SPL's accounts. All these scroungers really need to know is that the gravy train will still be running. Who the hell are they to question the financial viability of the SPL? That's like Albania demanding to see the books before joining the European Union!

While all the wailing and gnashing of teeth is going on, Bill McMurdo decided to take issue also with the proposal for new disciplinary procedures. He wondered out loud whether the 'law would be evenly applied.' I decided to comment:

"The new law won’t be evenly applied? Is the current one? Mr Lunny could not hear thousands at Hampden last year singing ‘The Billy Boys’ but managed to get his ear trumpet fixed in time to hear a couple of dozen singing IRA songs at a Euro tie!"

Have a look at some of the well-thought-out, reasoned replies I got:

"Why is the Roman here, obviously ignoring bloggers who blog Romanism. Seriously, normally I don’t use profanity unless trying to stress a point, simply Fuck off, back to your House of Rome and continue to revel in the corruption that blights this land perpetuated by all things Roman.
Figures mentioned in your post, proves your Roman Education sorry, Roman Arithmetic leaves a lot to be desired."

"Spot on BILL. Funny how pat, mick and ourrivalry go missing when pzy was giving us all the info about there manky team, then pat crawls out from the sewers to talk about something completely different to divert all the attention away from pzj info. Think Pat shiting himself that its all being exposed. BILL just show him the BLUE(Sorry Red) card as he talks utter shite, and take his BILE somewhere else"

"I often wonder where we would have been,if we had,nt taken you in."

"Fuck of back to your rock ya fkn twat , what is your obsession????"

They really can't help themselves, can they? And they pour scorn on my education!!!

Meanwhile the Establishment is looking for revenge. If a key prosecution witness fails to turn up at a trial then either the trial goes ahead without the witness or the case is thrown out for lack of evidence. It seems that this is not the case when the witness is Craig Whyte. A warrant has been issued for his arrest, border agencies have been told to look out for him and there is even talk about Interpol and extradition procedures! My God, they don't even go to these lengths for the drug dealers on the Spanish Costas! Do you think maybe Whyte has upset somebody?

And here's a good idea to get all the Brushers onside: instead of 'Reconstruction' we'll call it 'Reformation'!




'Hey! Don't go bringin' me intae it!'



Wednesday 12 June 2013

WILL THE REAL IRISHMAN PLEASE STAND UP!


It's all quiet on the Western Front just now, as everyone settles in after the recent power struggle at Trigger's Brush FC. It'll be a while before The Laxative turns up to rile them all up again so, in the meantime, they can enjoy a period of relative calm. This means that the Brushers have got time, in between discussing 'cabals' etc, to muse over the tweets of Charlotte Fakes. These exposés of Green's dealings with Whyte have rattled a few cages. Unfortunately, I can't be bothered listening to recordings or ploughing through reams of documents so I'm unable to comment on any of it. As usual with the Brushers, however, it's not the substance that bothers them; their worry is who is leaking the stuff! Anyway, it hardly matters as the SFA will undoubtedly do sfa about Green's links with Whyte so the whole business is pretty much an irrelevance.

Bill McMurdo has decided to do a Leggat and publish an e-book exposing Dermot Desmond. For some reason the Brushers think that anything they get on Desmond will reflect badly on Celtic. Maybe they don't know it but it's extremely difficult to find anyone that is both a millionaire and a nice person. As Lord Acton said, 'Great men are always bad men.' These characters did not make their fortunes by being phlanthropic and most of them would sell their own grandmothers for the sake of a fast buck; I doubt that Desmond is any different. I, personally, don't look up to such selfish, greedy individuals but they have become a necessary evil in the world of football. That does not mean that we have to love them. Possibly the only real difference between Desmond and Whyte is that Desmond is a real billionaire! So, I for one am not overly concerned about any 'revelations' Old Bill comes up with.

I've had a bit of fun this weekend researching all this British Israelism stuff, which I mentioned the other day. As an historian myself I find this kind of guff endlessly fascinating. And to think that there are people out there that actually believe it!

Although all this shite had been around for a while, it became most popular at the end of the Nineteenth Century. Then, and now, it seems to be the preserve of Protestant groups, who are looking to prove their superiority. It is especially popular among supremacist WASPs in America, who can claim, through their European ancestry, to be descended from the lost tribes of Israel and, consequently, God's Chosen People! Some rednecks take it to extremes, claiming that today's Jews are the descendants of pagan tribes and, therefore, are not real Jews at all! Further, they believe that the Chosen People (ie themselves) are the only ones that God is going to save. They say that black people are just animals and that they do not have souls. Nice people!

One major fly in the ointment for these white, Protestant supremacists is the fact that the story goes that the descent from the Ten Tribes comes through the Irish. They have, however, managed to find a way round this. Apparently the people we call 'Irish' are, in fact, descended from the Tribe of Dan, who turned away from God and practised idolatry. The WASPs claim that this is the reason the Irish stuck with Catholicism. A serious flaw in this argument is that, according to the Bible, the Tribe of Dan, one of whom was Samson, was renowned for abstaining from alcohol. This hardly sits well with their usual stereotype of the drunken Irishman, shillelagh in hand, looking to fight with everyone in the world!

Reading all this guff I realised how cleverly it's presented. Most of their arguments are of the post hoc ergo propter hoc kind. Anyone who has studied History at university should recognise this phrase; it's something that you are told to avoid at all costs. What it means is that just because B happened after A, it doesn't necessarily folow that A caused B. Anyone handing in an essay using this type of argument would be handed it back with a very low score indeed! The British Israelism adherents use this kind of argument all the time. Their writings are full of 'that must mean' and 'it stands to reason'; basically filling in the blanks where there there is no evidence to support their theories. To folk that are naive about how to approach History these arguments can seem convincing.

Another device they use is to quote historians extensively. This can seem impressive and, again, extremely convincing unless you read carefully. For example, one of them bangs on, as usual, about how civilisation in ancient Britain was more advanced than that of Rome. She quotes the Roman historian Tacitus, who waxes lyrical about the nobility of the Britons. This, however, is not proof of what she is saying. In ancient Rome the cult of the 'Noble Savage' was a strong one. Romans liked to see themselves as unsophisticated and guileless, unlike the sneaky, lying, manipulating folk from the East. It was easier to blame a Greek, like Cleopatra, for the break-up of the Republic than Romans like Julius Caesar and Mark Antony. This was why Tacitus was praising the Britons, not because their civilisation was superior to that of Rome. This kind of underhand use of the views of genuine historians can be found throughout the writings of British Israelists.

There is a strong element of anti-Catholicism pervading these stories. There is a tendancy to transfer this hatred back onto Romans in general, not just Roman Catholics. These pseudo-historians therefore try their damnedest to 'prove' that the Romans did not bring civilisation to Britain but that a, possibly more superior, civilisation already existed.

The belief in these disreputable stories go some way to explaining the attitude of many present-day extremist Protestants. It lends a sort of twisted logic to the cries of 'We are The People,' and helps to sustain them in their feelings of superiority.

It also explains how they can so easily try to re-write the history of their dead team. The idea of a 'holding company' was never heard of until Rangers went into liquidation. This lets them argue that Rangers never went into liquidation at all, that Green bought Rangers, that it is still the same club and that others, namely the Peter Lawwell-led, so-called 'cabal' are responsible for all their ills.

Speaking of anti-Catholicism, there seems to be a certain agenda at the BBC to only concentrate on the Catholic Church when looking into child abuse. There was a programme on BBC4 the other night, a repeat, investigating the cover up of abuse in America and Italy. The whole sordid business deserves to be brought out into the open and those involved prosecuted, but this should apply across the board to all those involved in these disgusting crimes.

In the USA there are ongoing investigations into exactly the same kind of cover-up of child abuse among the Jehovah's Witnesses. In Canada there are inquiries looking into child abuse at homes run by different churches; not only the Catholic Church but all churches, including the normally smug, self-satisfied Presbyterians. Why is there no mention at all in our media of these investigations and these crimes?

Equally there was outrage after the BBC investigated the complicity of the Catholic Church in Fascist Spain of practically kidnapping children and selling them for adoption. Our newspapers were suitably indignant about these sordid practices and everyone agreed about how disgraceful and disgusting the whole business was. Meanwhile, hidden away in the newspapers, was the story about the British Government apologising for the thousands of children from care homes that were sent to Australia and Africa as, essentially, slave labour.

In ignoring these stories our media is guilty of exactly the same sort of cover-up of which they accuse the Catholic Church. They seem to be rather selective in who they condemn for child abuse. This is going to be even more the case in the future. As more cases come to light under the auspices of Operation Yewtree, deflection is going to be the order of the day!




'Here we go, lads! Proof positive that it's the same team!'






Sunday 9 June 2013

WHEN JEW KNOW THE HISTORY!

I hope they had somebody ready with a mop and bucket at the Daily Record offices yesterday. The floor must have been in some mess with Mark Hateley's heart bleeding all over the place on behalf of Sooperally! Nobody in the whole world has suffered like Ally has suffered and yet his 'cheeky-chappy' smile is still in place! Mind you, I don't remember any cheeky-chappy smiles when he was whispering in Neil Lennon's ear! Get that mop and bucket round here, I think I'm going to be sick!

It's not the first time we've had to suffer all this vomit-inducing, sycophantic rubbish about how hard it's been for poor Ally! Funny, I can't remember the same sympathy being extended to Lou Macari in 1994! There was also a distinct lack of sympathy shown toward Neil Lennon when his life, and the lives of his family, were being threatened. Lennon managed to guide his team to second place in the SPL, only narrowly missing out on winning, while having to deal with this serious threat hanging over him. Unbelievably, he was not even in the running for manager of the year in 2011, some newspapermen suggesting that Walter Smith deserved it! And yet, we've all to feel sorry for poor, old Sooperally!

Over at Ibrox things are really hotting up. They still can't get rid of Malcolm Murray or Phil Cartmell and Brian Stockbridge, the man who looks like the cannibal killer in the film Sin City, is clinging on as well. Chris Morgan is not getting onto the board. All of which means that Blue Pitch Holdings have failed completely to gain a stranglehold. Unfortunately, this has opened the door for the Kray brothers to get a presence in the boardroom. And The Laxative - Colin Kingsnorth - is still to arrive. The comedy show doesn't look like stopping any time soon!

I mentioned, a couple of days ago, the nonsense about the British Royal Family being descended from King David and the Jewish Patriarchs. Bill McMurdo decided yesterday to post the whole story, for our education and edification. Amazingly, he presents this pseudo-historical guff as fact! He says that everybody used to be more aware of this 'history' than they are nowadays. That'll be the same as how everyone used to know that God made the world in six days, the Sun, planets and stars orbited the Earth and all animals were created just as they are!

These kinds of stories usually remain on the lunatic fringe but, occasionally, do make it into the mainstream. This is not the only case of people claiming descent from the Israelites. Ethiopians have long seen themselves as the 'lost tribe' and one of Haile Selassie's titles was Lion of Judah. The Rastafarians, from Jamaica, have also adopted this mantle and see themselves as having been taken from their true homeland in Africa into exile in 'Babylon.' The Mormons make similar claims about Native Americans, who are supposed to be descended from a band of wandering Israelites. They surely can't all be right! Probably none of them are!

Reading any of these pseudo-histories usually poses more questions than answers. According to the story put forward by Bill McMurdo, then the ancient Irish followed the Jewish religion, had the Ark of the Covenant, the Stone of Destiny and King David's harp in their midst and were visited by such luminaries as Jeremiah. Why, then, by the time the Romans came along, was the place full of big, hairy-arsed, head-hunting savages? The Romans considered Hibernia, like Caledonia, to be not worth bothering about. Surely if Ireland was home to an ancient, sophisticated civilisation then the Romans would have made contact? It only shows what a load of nonsense it all is!

The internet has given a home to many fanciful stories purporting to be history and Holy Grails, Illuminati, supposed blood-lines and all manner of secret societies abound. Even otherwise intelligent people are taken in by this shite! It's like the Flat Earth Society and the folk that claim the moon landing was a hoax; they present very little in the way of proof and their stories collapse when confronted by the facts.

Of course, it's not the first time that people have been taken in by such stuff. Have a look on Google for the Scots poet Ossian, who was called Scotland's Homer. Portraits were painted depicting him, music was writted to interpret his stories and Napoleon found him such an inspiration that he carried a book of his poetry with him at all times! And it won't be the last time folk fall for this kind of thing either. Even in this day and age there are people that can't understand what a football club being liquidated means and who cling to the belief that the club they follow is the same one as the one that died!

Meanwhile, a spokesman for the Orange Order in Scotland said yesterday, 'Ah don't mind aw this Jewish stuff but don't fuckin' tell me Ah'm descended frae the Irish!'




'If the Ark goes to Dublin we will follow on...'
 



Friday 7 June 2013

THE LAXATIVE IS ON ITS WAY!






Have a look at this guy. Does he remind you of anyone? He looks like a young go-getter, somebody that's out to make his mark in the world and won't let anyone stand in his way. His name is Colin Kingsnorth. I was surprised to discover that he is actually forty-nine years old. Either he is in remarkably good nick or the Daily Record is using an old photo! Anyway, the photo reminded me of a young David Murray. They both have a lot in common; both come from a monied background, both attended expensive, fee-paying schools, both have built up businesses and both have, or had, an interest in buying into the team that plays at Ibrox. There, however, the similarities end.

While Murray built up an empire that included manufacturing, service industries and a football team, Kingsnorth is just in for the quick buck. His modus operandi makes him look like some throw-back to  the 1980s, a modern-day Gordon Gekko. Not for him the arduous task of building a company from scratch or even buying into a successful business; he is just about making money, nothing more.

Of course, there's nothing wrong with wanting to make money but it's the way this guy goes about it that's the problem. He buys a small stake in a company and then causes all manner of trouble in the boardroom to force through high payments to shareholders. The reason he can cause so much bother with a small amount of shares is apparently due to some little-known part of Company Law. It seems that if you get 100 shareholders together, no matter how many shares each has, you can force votes, board meetings and EGMs. Kingsnorth's way of exploiting this is that he spreads his shares through all different subsidiary companies. He, himself, then, constitutes 100 shareholders! Clever stuff!

He has left a trail of destruction behind him, even forcing out directors! He usually succeeds in forcing through  shareholders being given a share of the profits. This is bad news for Trigger's Brush FC, which needs any profits to build a team and plan for the future, if it has one. If this guy gets his way then TBFC will end up at a complete standstill. No wonder he calls his company Laxey; he'll certainly be causing a lot of messy toilet bowls down Govan way!

Meanwhile there is still debate going on about whether or not Trigger's Brush FC is a new team. Some clowns still compare what happened at Ibrox to what happened at Celtic in 1994. They say that McCann transferred the assets of Celtic Football and Athletic Club to some 'holding company' called Pacific Shelf, which was subsequently changed to Celtic FC. This is exactly the same as what Green did, they argue. In this they show at best remarkable disingenuousness, at worst a remarkable lack of brains!

The Big Lie says that Green bought the assets and the business of Rangers Football Club Ltd, without buying the company. This is, of course, impossible. Although the word 'business' is often used as a synonym for 'company' it is, in fact, an intangible substance, the day-to-day transactions of the company. You cannot open a new shop and buy an old shop's 'business.' This would mean that your new shop would inherit all the suppliers, contracts and customers of the old shop. This is absolutely impossible unless you actually buy the old shop. Even then, the suppliers and customers are under no obligation to keep doing business with you. Granted, there are circumstances where the customers are tied in, for example with a bank or building society but, again, the company would have to be taken over, not the business on its own.

When McCann bought Celtic he bought the whole company, lock, stock, barrel and business! This required him to buy out the shares of those in power, meaning the Kellys and Whites would have made something out of the deal. This is manifestly not what happened at Rangers. Did any shareholders receive payment? Buying over the company and business of Celtic also meant that McCann inherited the company's debts. If Green, as The Big Lie tries to make out, bought the business of Rangers then he would have inherited the debts likewise.

Liquidation means that a company, and, consequently, its business, is no longer for sale. The assets should be sold to the highest bidders, together or separately, to pay the creditors. Just because Duff and Phelps did some back-door, shady, possibly illegal transfer of all the assets does not mean that Green bought the company or its business.

As to all the 'Pacific Shelf' nonsense, McCann transferred ownership of the whole company into this umbrella organisation, just as David Murray transferred ownership of Rangers to his MIH umbrella company. Murray could have changed the name of the Rangers company to anything he liked, as could McCann. That McCann dropped the 'Athletic' bit from Celtic's name means absolutely nothing.

Green bought nobody's shares but simply bought the assets. He used a new company to buy these assets, Sevco 5088 or Sevco Scotland or whatever, and started afresh. All the business of the old company vanished; he had to start afresh. He had to seek new sponsors, convince suppliers and contractors of the old company to do business with him and, above all, he had to convince customers, the supporters, to transfer their business to his new company or club. It is quite feasible that all the supporters of Rangers might have decided that their team was dead and that this new club was nothing to do with them. The fact that they snapped up the cheap season tickets in droves does not mean, in any way, that this new team was still Rangers, no matter what they might say to the contrary!

Somebody decided to post yesterday on Bill McMurdo's blog claiming that Celtic were doing something underhand in respect of paying tax. Unfortunately, like most Brushers, the guy is just a couple of steps up from illiteracy so it was difficult, if not downright impossible, to understand exactly what he was getting at. Perhaps someone with a bit more education and erudition might translate his gobbledegook and we can see if there is, indeed, any cause for concern.

The guy who posted this stuff called himself, 'Pharez, Zarah and Judah.' Obviously this is some kind of Biblical reference but I did not understand it. I googled the three names and found out that the use of these three names, Pharez and Zarah being twin sons of Judah, the leader of one of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, is generally in some lunatic arguments that our present Royal Family is directly descended from Judah! Given the Nazi sympathies of many of the Saxe-Coburg family, can you imagine how they would react to being told that they have Jewish blood? And imagine the reaction of the country's number-one bigot, the Chookyembra himself, Prince Philip! By God, he'd have apoplexy!




'Judah? Judah? Whawt the heh-all are you tawking abite? Do Ay look bladdy Jewish to you?'









Wednesday 5 June 2013

THE BIG EVACUATION


And the saga continues... Mr Dignity has apparently been given 48 hours to sack Malcolm Murray. Why it's down to him to have to wield the axe nobody has said but, if the papers are to be believed, Smith has drawn the short straw. Presumably Murray reads newspapers so it won't come as too much of a surprise when he feels the stiletto sliding against his spine. So much for Smith being ready to walk if Murray was ousted as chairman! In the space of a week he's nicked Murray's job and now he's ready to shove him out the door. And they call themselves 'loyal'!

Meanwhile there's concern over money being spent at Ibrox. Although Sooperally will need to get rid of some of his 'stars' due to SFL rules over how many over-21s a team can have, he will still have to pay the players he's bringing in. According to Bill McMurdo, Green and his associates were the ones advocating fiscal restraint, while the others are all for old-school profligacy. The appointment of Smith as chairman is a serious concern in this respect, since he is the epitome of prodigality. With Green and his cronies being forced out it looks like history is going to repeat itself and liquidation might loom again, spawning The The Rangers. But it'll still be the same club, of course!

Speaking of blogs, I see Loony Leggat is taking time out to get pished...I mean meet a deadline on some kind of work in progress. Tragically, this means another of his books. I read some excerpts of his book about the assassination of JFK and, true to form, it was mainly a racist, anti-Irish load of tripe. Apparently his book about Scott Symon, which he constantly mentions on his blog, is merely a diatribe against Jock Stein. No doubt there's a market somewhere for this bigoted rubbish; 100% of sales are probably in Larkhall!

Another item of interest to the Brushers is Kris Commons's decision not to play for Scotland again. The general consensus, which seems to miss the point somewhat, is that he should never be allowed back in the team. Strangely, I don't remember any of them complaining when the fat penalty-taker, Boyd, stormed off in the huff, wanting to pick and choose how long he should be playing in each game.

Scotland play Croatia on Friday and everybody is predicting a tanking, including the Croatian team and their manager. I see 'Wrang Door' McCall is part of the coaching staff for the Scotland team. I don't know how much influence he has but if Croatia put on light-blue tops then McCall will do his damnedest to make sure that Scotland lie down! No wonder they're so confident.

And I see Gordon Smith is hundreds of thousands in debt. There's something seriously wrong there. He must be the only person associated with Ibrox that actually has to pay back loans! Didn't anybody tell him about Murray's scheme? Couldn't Campbell Ogilvie have given him the nod? Or maybe, just maybe, he's the only one out of the whole shower that believes in paying what he owes! No; that sounds about as crazy as something Loony Leggat would come out with.

Trigger's Brush FC's latest 'blue chip' signing, Honduran Arnold Peralta, is already shooting his mouth off to the press. Described as a 'hardman,' he talks of running up and down the pitch for ninety minutes and being physical. Sounds as if Lee McCulloch's being replaced! He goes on to say how it has changed his life "going to play in Europe at a massive club." Er...has nobody told him that he's playing in the third tier and that Europe's a long, long way off? The real reason for signing, however, is there for all to see: "...financially this move is good for me and my family." So Old Bill McMurdo is right to be concerned; the big-spending days are back with a vengeance, if they ever went away at all!

Green is now reported as not selling his shares to the Kray Brothers after all. In a statement to the Stock Exchange it has been made plain that he's selling his shares to some company, based in the Isle of Man, called Laxey. That sounds like something you'd take for constipation; which is quite apt, since all the Brushers will be shiting themselves from now until December, wondering what's going to happen next!


Green unveils a new investor.
Hope the lavvies can cope!



'ASA VICKTRY, SO IT IS!'


The Sun has let us all know about a leak from the Advertising Standards Authority, which says that they have decided that Trigger's Brush FC can go on advertising itself as 'Scotland's Most Successful Club.' Predictably, the Brushers see this as another 'victory.' They see it as an official confirmation that the club they now follow is still Rangers.

The Advertising Standards Authority, however, is not a powerful organisation and does not have hundreds of thousands of pounds to expend on any kind of 'independent inquiry!' In this instance they just asked Trigger's Brush FC to provide backing for their claim. Of course, TBFC were hardly going to admit that they are a new club, were they? They sent 'evidence' in the shape of their membership of the European Club Association and Lord Nimmo Smith's pronouncements on clubs and companies. The ASA had a look, shrugged, realised they didn't really give a flying fuck and decided that the advert could stand.

What the heid-bummers at Ibrox probably didn't mention is, just like with the SFA, their membership of the ECA is associate only; they have no voting rights. And the Nimmo Smith judgment was a triumph of legalistic gobbledegook. How is it possible that a club can have double contracts, enabling them to sign players they otherwise could not afford, and yet be gaining no sporting advantage? The whole judgment was a great example of how to write screeds and screeds and yet say practically nothing!

It's a strange business all this holding-company stuff. Everybody seems to have just accepted at face value the story that Green and his associates bought Rangers. Even the European Club Association talks about Rangers going into administration and Green buying them over; no mention at all about liquidation. Then the ECA lets us know that 'Rangers' is now just an associate member - because they went into liquidation! This is the kind of doublethink that helps Trigger's Brush peddle its myths.

As everybody knows, but pretends not to, Green bought the assets of Rangers from Duff and Phelps in some dodgy, back-door deal. It was after this that all the guff about holding companies etc came about. Of course, if things were that simple then it begs the question: why wasn't the club just transfered to another 'holding company' in the first place? Why go through all the bother, not to mention the expense, of looking for a buyer, going into administration and then going into liquidation? The answer is simple: they're talking a load of Craig Whyte! It's a new club, no matter what anyone says!

The desperation of Trigger's Brush FC to somehow prove they are Rangers is shown in what they say about the ECA's judgment. Apparently, when Green 'bought the club' he also bought the club's 'goodwill,' which includes its history. I have to say that 'goodwill' is never something I have associated with Rangers, but I digress. Now this would all be true if, in fact, Green had bought the club but he patently did not. Is 'goodwill' one of the assets? If the liquidators decide that the deal between Duff and Phelps and Green was not only unethical but against the law there might have to be a re-sale of the assets. Asda might buy the stadium and the car park, while somebody else buys Murray Park to build houses. Can somebody buy the 'goodwill'? The way things have been spun then Dermot Desmond could buy it and put Celtic's titles into treble figures! It just shows how ridiculous the whole thing is.

Loony Leggat, meanwhile, continues his one-man campaign against Imran Ahmad, blaming him for absolutely everything. The story now is that Green was Ahmad's front man! He also, like many others, is adamant that Trigger's Brush FC should not join any SPL 2, using the Brushers' favourite word at the moment, 'cabal.' He suggests an instant return (?) to the top flight, an abject apology and the prize money for finishing second last year.

As Green has said in one of his more lucid moments, TBFC have never been in the top flight! As to an apology, an apology for what? Were all the rules to be broken just to suit one team? Given their complete arrogance throughout their troubles it is obvious that this is exactly what the Brushers expected. And maybe it escaped their notice but Whyte cheated last year. They can squeal all they like about Whyte alone being to blame but the fact remains that he withheld PAYE money to keep the team going. Many of Rangers' games in season 2011-2012 should be adjusted to be three-nil defeats due to this cheating. In this case there is no prize money due whatsoever. Besides, if they are the same club, and, as they seem to think, due any money due to Rangers, then it stands to reason that they are also responsible for paying Rangers' debts!

In all the talk of cabals and Rangers being kicked when they were down, the Brushers forget one major point. They say that the rest of Scottish football should have been helping them. But where was this help in 1994? Was Rangers at the forefront in trying to put plans in place to help Celtic out of its financial difficulties? So why the hell should anyone have been breaking their backs to help Rangers?

Anyway, I'm still waiting for David Murray to turn up, deus ex machina, to 'fix' things at Ibrox. The whole convoluted plot lends itself to this kind of climax and it's no more outlandish than Leggat's ravings about Ahmad running the whole show. After all, Mr Dignity is back and there are calls for the return of Alastair 'Noddy' Johnston, inter alia. It's a small step from there to Murray making a comeback! Maybe Leggat's right, with the added twist that Murray has been pulling Ahmad's strings!


Is it just me, or is there a certain similarity between these two?






A bit of 'Just For Men,' some fake tan and Bob's your uncle!

Mark my words: Murray's coming back!