The Times (in Scotland) v the World’s Fastest Man

Usain_Bolt_2012_Olympics_1

All is Spin. Never mind the bollocks about ‘keeping politics away from sport’ everything is political: from the England teams Union Jack helmets to insisting a democracy movement is a ‘protest’ – to the Queen rolling up in her Roller to the hilarious commentary.

It’s all going pretty well and in drops Usain Bolt conferring some (possibly not necessary) Serious Fame Sparkle on proceedings. The Times, displeased at Scotland having a standing in the world, anxious at our success as an independent competitor, has used the opportunity to spread some muck around.

The Times claimed Bolt had been waiting in the rain for his car to arrive shortly after meeting members of the royal family at the athletes’ village in the east end of Glasgow on Tuesday. It quoted the world 100m record holder as saying the Glasgow Games were “a bit shit” and that he thought “the Olympics were better”.

The Royal Family can do that to you.

Now Bolt has responded saying on Twitter: “I’m waking up to this nonsense.. journalist please don’t create lies to make headlines”.

Yeah Usain, we’ve got used to it.

The Times said it was standing by its story. The newspaper’s Scottish editor, Angus Macleod, said: “We stand by this story 100%. We have utter confidence in this story.”

Bolt’s manager Ricky Simms earlier told the BBC that the reports were “utter rubbish” adding “The atmosphere in and around the stadiums has been absolutely fantastic and I have absolutely no idea where these quotes have come from,” he added.

Whoever’s right, we look forward to Angus Macleod being given a slot on Radio Scotland to do his usual round up of what the ‘Unionist Papers say’, media about media, unionist press about unionist press. His position is eternal.

We all know what happened to the only radio program to deviate from the norm and report non MSM Better Together outlets? [Headlines to be Axed]

If we pit the goodwill of Glasgow, the support of people around Scotland and the world’s fastest man against the print journalists of discredited and dwindling newspapers, I know who I’d bet on.

The Times sells around 18,931 copies in Scotland.

 

 

Comments (35)

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  1. Auld Rock says:

    Let’s reduce its readership to ZERO and the same should be applied to all the rest of ‘no’ supporting MSM.

    Auld Rock

  2. Clootie says:

    Angus Macleod, said: “We stand by this story 100%. We have utter confidence in this story.”

    Well produce the evidence then. It should be straight forward – a witness, a recording etc
    I think we all know who is really pulling the strings in order to undermine the games in Scotland.

    1. gonzalo1 says:

      He’s a liar and an odious individual, just like so many of the unionist journos.

  3. John Page says:

    Like many others I have found the last few months to have been a real eye opener about the MSM
    I have cancelled my online subscription to the Guardian and stopped the Weekend FT and cannot bear to watch BBC
    If there is a Yes vote we need a new media to shape the new Scotland
    If there is a No vote we need a new media to continue the current renaissance which will see us home the next time
    Apparently the Guardian and others are doing badly online……but what about the economics of a new online venture backed by subscribers who are disgusted with the BBC et al and are motivated to continue and develop the current unprecedented engagement?

  4. To be charitable, Angus Macleod may simply be the sucker in this story.

  5. iain t says:

    On a choice of credibility between Bolt and an MSM hack, Bolt wins every time. Unless she hacked into his voicemails for the quote (thoroughly plausible, of course).

  6. The English press should know better than to poison relations between our countries. Perhaps Scots are too diplomatic to make this accusation, but there comes a time when English media types and politicians who upset people in Scotland need to ask themselves if they are anti-Scottish.

    If anyone is interested, I did an article on my blog recently examining the issue of supposed anti-English sentiment in Scotland. https://upholdingenglishhonour.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=118&action=edit Hope you don’t mind my plug – shoot me down if it’s not on.

    1. iain t says:

      I’ve read a couple of your blog posts – very good. The No campaign & their media chums see 100,000 votes from people born in England who live in Scotland. Rabble rousing will benefit them, and if it’s divisive, too bad.
      For my part, I’ve been active on the Yes side for well over a year and have never heard a single anti-English comment. As you make clear in your blog, it’s about Westminster and not England. I notice the most extreme revulsion is reserved for the anti Scottish Scots “serving” in the Commons & Lords.

      1. John Bell says:

        iain t – you are quite correct, sir. Most Scots disgust and ill-feeling is reserved for ‘the enemy within’, as Cicero put it.

    2. rabthecab says:

      Just been reading your blog – it took a bit of faffing about, as the link you’ve posted is to your wp admin page!

      Good stuff though 🙂

  7. The Times now has one less reader – someone who has read it for almost 50 years. This disgraceful piece about Usain Bolt is the last straw for me, and I have cancelled my online subscription.

  8. Douglas MacLean says:

    Do I detect a hint of jealousy?

    1. bellacaledonia says:

      Not jealousy, but I am amazed at how the old media colludes. So Angus has this permanent place in broadcast radio yet his paper sells barely more than a mid ranking Scottish blog? It’s a bizarre state of affairs. No?

      1. Ian Kirkwood says:

        Yes, absolutely is! What can we do to change it? The YES campaign seem to be playing the let’s be extremely more than fair card all the time. I know this is a sensitive area which needs to be treated very carefully but come on, there is more than enough evidence
        , including the totally disgraceful BBC England hijacking of the CW games.

    2. James Coleman says:

      Do you mean jealousy that Scotland is doing so well in the CWGames not only in performance terms but in social and cultural terms? Typical English newspaper trying to diss Scottish achievements. They really do not like us.

  9. Is he from Lewis? The church, Rangers and the UK are all important in that island!

    1. Ken MacColl says:

      Lewis, as part of the Western Isles constituency, is represented at Holyrood and at Westminster by SNP members.
      Angus MacLeod is just another tired old Labour hack who receives grossly undue deference from Pacific Quay – no surprise there.
      The Times has long departed its role as a reliable news source and its editorial policy in the approach to the referendum in Scotland would put it on a par with the Daily Star

    2. Bob Duncan says:

      As the SNP organiser for the Western Isles I can tell you that your characterisation of the islands is completely misguided. We have an SNP MP and MSP and we gained the highest percentage vote for the SNP in the recent EU elections. According to our canvass of more than half of the electorate, islanders will vote Yes with a massive majority in September.

      Please keep your stereotypes to yourself.

  10. Mo Farah decided he’d rather not take his chances in Glasgow at the Commonwealth Games in case it dented his status, so he decided to ‘reserve his ability’ for something bigger. Great sportsman. Great insult.

    1. gonzalo1 says:

      He is a Somali anyway: fact

  11. Rick Guthrie says:

    If somebody puts a copy of the crossword on facebook 17,000 English people will download it. !!

  12. tog says:

    Surprising how small the circulations of what was once called the broadsheet press are in Scotland. The Scotsman circulation is puny and although the Herald does okay the Sunday Herald ‘s numbers are shockingly low. If anything is creating the political weather in Scotland it ain’t the broadsheet press. I think this story is more a reflection of how tabloid values have adopted in the broadsheets than an example of bias. Despite the circulation the Times does seem to put a lot of resources into its Scottish edition. Would we expect the Times the paper that thought the overthrow of Allende was a good thing to be anything but pro union? Of course they will stand by the story and of course Bolt will deny it. To me he almost certainly said it in an ill tempered moment but a non story but it is summer and they have little else to report. Successful happy well organised games is the general line so any bad news is news and will be overstated..

    1. Illy says:

      Something to bear in mind about the papers’ numbers:

      One of the newsagents in Edinburgh occasionally does a “free paper for everyone who wants one”, but what they might not say is that they count the paper as handed out even if the person doesn’t want it.

      I can’t remember which paper it was doing this, and I don’t know if other places do this as well, but it’s something to remember when looking at circulation numbers.

  13. Paul says:

    As soon as I saw this story, and Bolt’s response, my reaction was that this was a unionist paper trying to stir up some sh*t to try to take the shine off the feel good factor that the games is creating in Scotland. They are probably disappointed that no-one has boo-ed the English athletes.

    Bolt probably said it was sh*t that he had to stand in the rain and wait for his car, and then the paper turned it into him saying Glasgow is sh*t, which seems to be their headline.

  14. John Russell archibald says:

    Could it possibly be that the scare stories about the welcome that some members of the press,tried to provoke prior to games commencement didn’t go to type.Now for part two,a reel whiz if we supply a loaded question and we get the appropriate answer,then the home crowd may boo the participant ! Job done let’s report racist Scots mmm.

  15. mary vasey says:

    If?????? Bolt said anthing at all I’m sure it was aimed at those journalists that ‘media conference ‘ the BBC televised, what a bunch of numpties, one of them even asked if he’d be wearing a kilt, cunningly enough having one at hand jeez I was so embarrassed.
    I’d imagine coming from Jamaica he’d know fine what ahem british media are like. Good on him for coming unlike some as grousebeater said..
    Still my own fault for going back on my word and tuning in to bbc. Pity no other channel is showing it

    1. mary vasey says:

      Sorry should be funnily enough

  16. DaveyM says:

    As for the the “hilarious commentary” link (Two English Swimmers) goes, it pays to do a bit of journalism and check the facts (surely the thing we complain about the MSM failing to do?). The race in question had two English swimmers, AND a Scot (who took the silver medal), AND a Welshman. Might be best to edit that bit out or publish a correction…

    1. bellacaledonia says:

      Thanks for the clarification, I’ve alter accordingly.

  17. Pentland Firth says:

    A reader of the Times for thirty years, I’m giving up the habit, with something close to sadness. Angus MacLeod has reduced this once fine newspaper (Scottish edition) into a risible Unionist propaganda sheet playing to the prejudices and fears of Edinburgh’s New Town. It has always been a Unionist newspaper, and I have no objections to reading leaders and opinion pieces following the editorial line. They are a useful insight into the thinking of the British “establishment”; more so, I’m sure, than the Telegraph or the Daily Mail. The change from newspaper to crude and hysterical propaganda over the last year or so, however, is too much to bear. The glee with which MacLeod fell on something Mr Bolt may or may not have said about Glasgow’s Commonwealth Games disgusts me. Goodbye Times.

  18. Iain says:

    Who knows what Bolt said but why is nobody using this as an opener to discuss the merits of the Commonwealth Games? I would like to hear some real debate around the Games, not a discussion on how well they have been organised but on why they exist.

    Are they actually of any value? Are they just a second rate event in context of the European / World and Olympic events, at best a springboard? Are the just a colonial anachronism? If not why do other former colonial powers not have their own versions? So many questions and interesting points to discuss, all suitably ignored by the media in their frenzy to scrap the barrel and control the agenda.

    The worst reason I have heard in support of the Games came today on Radio Scotland. Some Scottish sports journalist spouting that the games are ‘fab’ because they bring together countries who speak English. Really? It seems rather obvious to point out that a huge portion of those in the Commonwealth come from countries where although English is an official language it is not the main language i.e. India.

    1. Illy says:

      It’s a colonial leftover, same as the Commonwealth.

      Nothing wrong with that though (at least for an excuse for a sporting competition), the sodding Olympics are a colonial leftover as well.

    2. Dean Richardson says:

      For some time now, I’ve felt that the Commonwealth is merely a diluted version of the Empire. The Wastemnster/Shitehall classes just can’t or won’t let go. (Don’t forget that forming and maintaining the empire, and taking whatever the merchant classes wanted from it, was the British state’s main raison d’etre.). Why governments whose countries were not in the British Empire join the Commonwealth, I have no idea, apart from assuming it’s a nice cushy billet for their politicians and civil servants, just as it’s a cushy billet for their counterparts in London, which is the main reason why the Commonwealth won’t be scrapped in the foreseeable future. You get a clue to Westminster’s attitude from the name of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. it’s as if the British state thinks the Commonwealth isn’t really foreign, but another part of ‘Greater Home Counties’. Not in my opinion, it isn’t.

  19. Wullie says:

    “Macleod Mouth” of course, has form in the tartan bollocks department,

    http://www.pressgazette.co.uk/node/36608

  20. Ken MacColl says:

    Classic stuff, Willie!

    Oor Angus certainly revealed himself as an 18 carat numptie by taking such action

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