flyingrodent

For the love of... (headdesk) Look, it's a judicial opinion. I don't have to go through it and fact-check everything in it in order to give it legal heft - it has that on its own, without my assistance, because of the credentials of the author and the context in which it was written. If you want to take issue with the judgement, then you have to go through it and fact-check everything in it, then explain in precise terms why you think it is wrong. And here's a hint - see if you go through the whole thing and the biggest error you find is that at one point it says "Rangers FC won a trophy" where it should say "Rangers FC did not win a trophy", that doesn't cast any doubt on the judgement's merits. All it says is that you are a straw-clutching chancer who doesn't understand and doesn't want to understand what he's talking about. We could all treat you like this. We could all keep pointing out to you that a Rangers supporter has no right whatsoever to suggest that anyone else on Earth is gullible or credulous. Look - your club is dead because you and your fellow supporters spent years attacking any media organisation that had the temerity to warn you of its impending demise. When Craig Whyte killed Rangers, you were all dumbfounded because you had all been too busy waiting for his lawsuit against the BBC, the one that would smite all of your club's "enemies", to notice that he was a conman. And here you are, not a year later, with a dead club, waiting for David Murray's lawsuit against HMRC! Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice, shame on you. Fool me four hundred and fifty seven times, buy some shares. I mean, the scientific analysis has been undertaken; the lab tests are complete and the test results are in. Here they are - your club's supporters are, beyond all question or dispute, the stupidest, most gullible, credulous bunch of suckers ever to clamp lips upon a fraudster's bumhole. Would you like proof? Your club is dead, and you're all cheering on the man who killed it because he is distracting you with promises to smite your club's "enemies". Now, every one of us could fill every response to you with some variation on this. But we don't, because that would be boring and pointless.

Are you seriously suggesting that a minor error relating to what is at best a tangential issue in the dissenting opinion casts any doubt at all over the content? This raises your head-in-the-sand act to an artform and is, by some distance, the most inane opinion you've expressed in, oh, maybe the last seven days or so.

Well, if you have some serious reason to suspect Dr Poon's judgement, then let's hear it. If you can impugn her credentials or cast doubt upon her analysis, fire away. If you can refute her arguments or find fault with her reasoning, then testify, brother! Go tell it on the mountain! Can you do any of that, or can you only repeat some minor error somebody else found on your behalf, then act as if you've made some earth-shattering point? Because that's kind of idiotic, if that's all you've got.

Dr Heidi Poon, CA, CTA, PhD vs Bendarroch, WTF D&P (Diddies & Plastics) Hmmm. Highly-qualified expert in tax law vs repetitive internet numpty with expertise in shouting "No it isnae", "No we didnae" and "youse are all stupid" until everyone gets bored. I think I might go with Dr Poon's version of events here, however poor her grasp on football results are.

Well, your fans did claim that they wanted to go to start over in the third division, so he certainly helped you out there. Although - Crown Office do have a lot of important stuff to be getting on with, and may not be interested in facilitating a wealthy tax dodger's bullsh*t propaganda scams. There's the words "David Murray" and "Crown Office" in the same sentence, as well. It has a pleasing ring to it, almost as if it was always meant to be...

Of course not.

Does this questioning technique normally yield positive results down at the pub, Bendarroch? I imagine it'll get you a few slaps around the earhole, at any rate. Feel free to read what I wrote again - if you're still confused, I'm afraid you're just going to have to stay that way.

I was talking about the BBC, saying that It investigated Rangers because it's a clear matter of public interest, as the viewing figures showed. Although I didn't say so in my last post, HMRC investigated old Rangers because it was running a highly suspect tax-dodging scheme. This was clearly demonstrated when your old club admitted to running a highly suspect tax-dodging scheme by conceding that it was liable for taxation on a large number of cases, and also when it was found guilty on a smaller number of cases. HMRC is presently considering whether or not to appeal the decision, not because your old club was"well-supported", but because your old club was running a highly-suspect tax-dodging scheme. If Hector thinks he has a good chance of busting you on the cases that he lost, he'll appeal; if he doesn't think he has a good chance of busting your old club on the cases he lost, he won't. And that's the extent of it.

Yet another cracking column from big Archie MacPherson today, stuffed with his usual ripe imagery. http://www.heraldsco...ressed.19522821 Allow me to summarise what Archie is saying here - feel free to skip this, if you don't find terrible metaphors funny, which most people don't. The Rangers tax verdict is a flash flood that has swept away everyone except new born babies in their cradles, and the flood has swept away those who claimed to be judge, jury and executioner of David Murray more than it has swept away anyone else. I didn't need bloggers to tell me about David Murray's highly dubious, exotic tax avoidance schemes because I was already very critical of his comparatively minor and inexpensive errors, like when he signed that big huddy Tore Andre Flo and when he built that white elephant of a training ground. During the tax hearings, David Murray maintained a dignified silence and/or hid in an air raid shelter, because Ally McCoist is not the President of the United States of America and because Sandy Jardine is not Julius Caesar's most trusted captain making a speech in ancient Rome. This meant that boots began to kick David Murray, and the BBC was wearing the biggest boots. I thought that the incident in which the BBC edited a clip of McCoist to make it look like he wasn't an ancient mystic with supernatural powers of foresight seemed inconsequential and indeed, I do not advance any reason to believe that it was actually significant. So why raise it? At the crux of the BBC's booting of Rangers was their documentary, in which the BBC was the game-changing media organ probing David Murray's murky depths. I thank the BBC for exposing Craig Whyte as a fraudster, but if the BBC had not held a legendary sword over David Murray's head, Craig Whyte would never have spontaneously incarnated in physical form. The BBC was naughty because it told people that Rangers had made a series of very dodgy-sounding payments in a way that permitted people to think that the payments that Rangers had made were very dodgy-sounding. By presenting evidence of wrong-doing in a way that led people to think David Murray had done wrong, the BBC made people think that David Murray had done some wrong things. It was wrong of the BBC to depict David Murray's wrong-doing in this manner. Some questions - Why were Rangers singled out for such forensic examination when other parallel schemes existed in other institutions? (Because fifty thousand Scots don't usually turn up to cheer on Starbucks, Archie). Why did it take so long for the tribunal to come to a decision? (Because David Murray intentionally slowed the process down in an attempt to wriggle out of it, Archie) Should we investigate HMRC? (We should investigate everyone involved, Archie). Anyway, this judgement is actually a flash flood and it will surprise everyone who isn't surrounded by sandbags. ------------- Now, Archie knows as well as we do that Murray dragged out the investigation as long as he could; that Rangers have admitted to and been found guilty of serial tax dodging, and he doesn't raise a single question about the factual accuracy of the Mark Daly documentaries. In fact, he praises the bits that don't relate to Sir Minty. So the question is - what in God's name is Archie on about here?

I like the way the RFC mob believe that the SPL commission is a kangaroo court designed specifically to strip Rangers' titles AND that there's no way it could possibly strip Rangers' titles. And I hope David Murray does take some kind of legal action against bloggers or Hector. I suspect he won't, because of his well-known aversion to any kind of scrutiny of his business affairs. By which I mean, the man is a cheating rat and even the slightest scrutiny makes that clear.

About to get the suit on for a charity boxing match/dinner thing this evening. I'll be around tomorrow though, so if there's any of this intelligent, perceptive analysis of the FTT from a Rangers perspective around, I'll be delighted to catch up with it then.

There are substantial differences between these clubs and Rangers, though. For example, only one of them has this far had to liquidate and start over as a new club in the third division. Maybe one of the reasons why Old Rangers died is this inherent tendency of Gers fans to shake their heads at their club's misrule and say things like "Well, Scottish football has structural problems"? Anyway, I see from the Record that BDO say they're going to aggressively pursue everyone who bilked the dead club out of cash. I guess somebody has to, since the Rangers fans are far too busy chasing like the Keystone Kops after that dastardly tax case blogger to worry about holding the men who destroyed their club to account.

David Murray's culpability brought to his attention again; responds by complaining about "diddies", "plastics" and some blokes with websites. Again. They're being serious when they reason like this, by the way. It's not an act for our benefit.

Make that - gif of two ostriches required. (Side note - when David Murray's near-total culpability is drawn to his attention, responds by complaining about "diddies and plastics". Again).

David Murray killed your club. Whatever the outstanding issues are, that much is a fact - who killed Rangers? David Murray did, by burying the club under a mountain of toxic debt. And what are you angry about? Bloggers, diddies, plastics, journalists etc and so on. I think you're just going to have to accept that one of the major reasons why your club is dead is because so many of its fans are like you.

Ostrich gif required.

Precisely. All this flailing about for lawsuits against some guy with a website, or Hector, or the Papal conspiracy that run the SPL is about one thing only - making themselves victims of some external force, however tenuous. David Murray killed Rangers, in the boardroom, with the fountain pen. If their fans had a lick of sense between them, they'd have been laying seige to Murray Towers and demanding criminal prosecutions of everyone involved. Instead, they're all ganging together to demand justice be done upon... Some guy with a website. Tells you everything you need to know about Rangers fans as a group, IMO. And this Bendarroch nutter has the cheek to blab on about false narratives! You have to laugh, because it's that hilarious.

Well, the charge was that you're considerably *more* angry about some bloggers talking shit than you are about the men who killed your club. Your response makes only passing reference to David Murray, the Grand High Ayatollah of Rangers destruction, and then tears off at length about the evils of the awful bloggers. I'd say that I'm spot on, and that you lack the basic savvy to recognise that you're confirming my point far more conclusively than I ever could.

Blithely unconcerned about previous owners and directors making off with so much of their club's money that it keeled over and died. Raginger than raging about some blogger saying things they didn't like on the internet. Priorities, Peepul.

He's not alone. I struggle to understand the mentality of the Rangers fans in this thread. If my club had been milked for all of its cash by a bunch of grasping millionaires then destroyed utterly and forced to start over as a new team... Well, I *probably would* want to see a sizeable dollop of misery land on everyone who celebrated my club's demise, too. That said, my ABSOLUTE PRIORITY would be a) finding out who killed the club, b) finding out how they did it, in forensic detail and c) stampeding those thieving crooks to prison as quickly as possible. For real, I wouldn't give a damn about titles being removed, or bloggers being sued or anything like that. What would any of that matter, if the club had been liquidated and forced to start over? And yet, who is it that's calling for SDM to be interviewed by Plod? Not Rangers fans, at any rate, even though they're his primary victims. It's an astonishing situation.

Mutilated Elves, according to Christopher Lee. But he is very old...

I meant you and WRK - Felix and Oscar, the two of you. SS18* interposed. *He could strike the "18" and get to the point quicker, I reckon.

^^^^^^^^ Frustrated love affair IMO

Wouldn't even be a contest, for me. The titles thing, that's just football. Granted, this isn't quite Robert Maxwell level stuff but damn, somebody needs to go to the Bar-L for this. I'd love to say I'm stunned that the Teds are angrier at Hector and some fannies with blogs than they are at SDM. But I'm not.

I never had a strong opinion on the man before but now, I'd say he's about on a level with guys who mug grannies for money for crack. In fact, no - at least crackheads can claim to be compelled beyond their will by a force outwith their control. Sir Dave, on the other hand, is a scheming, mendacious crook. Still, at least it's not my club he destroyed.