ALEX SALMOND MIS-STEP?

ALEX SALMOND HAS PULLED HIS RT SHOW BUT IS THIS GOOD ENOUGH?

I was content that he and Tasmina secured a slot for his weekly Show on RT, despite Sturgeon’s views to the contrary . I have watched most of the episodes. Alex is an excellent host, and it is well produced by Tasmina. I, of course, accept that Kremlin-owned RT had not even attempted to exercise any form of editorial control over the Show. “The Alex Show” (and several other programmes) have provided credibility for non-Russian viewers in the UK and elsewhere.

However, things have changed and we should not forget that RT stands for “Russia Today” and TODAY Russia is invading a neighbouring independent country, Ukraine. It’s quite blatant. Vladimir Putin, in my opinion, is an unreconstructed former KGB Colonel in Leningrad (sic) and quite a rational megalomaniac, states that “Ukraine has no right to exist” and “is an artificial country”!

What does Alex mean when he writes ” … until peace is re-established?” Who decides that? Is that when Russian subjugation of the Ukrainian people is achieved and there is no overt fighting? There is nothing “statesmanship” about that.

Alex is just giving our opponents ammunition to lob back at us. Sturgeon and her clique are having a field day. He has not even identified President Putin as the Russian aggressor-in-chief. The unambiguous naming by Alex would certainly test his editorial independence in RT broadcasts!

I have been dipping into RT News bulletins over the two days and can scant mention of the thousands off demonstrators on the Russian street “Against the War”, or the near two thousands who have been already arrested for that offence. It’s one thing to demonstrate in Edinburgh or Glasgow, but in Moscow against the Putin regime?! 

In the world of “real politik”, Alex has made a big error and I fear it will act against the ALBA Party in May. Older readers may remember the personal stand in a BBC UK-wide broadcast in 1999 he took against NATO bombing of strategic targets in Serbia when the Serbs were carrying out a murderous campaign of ethic cleansing in the later new independent Republic of Kosovo just before the first elections for the first new Scottish Parliament. In my opinion again, it could have cost us seats in that first Parliament. Was that “statesmanlike”?

Alex condemns unacceptable abuse against Tasmina, as I do. Further, he called for prayers against any “escalation” of the war. I assume he means the military invasion of independent Ukraine by Russia but apparently can’t can bring himself to say these words. I wonder why?