He's not a unionist, he's a very naughty boy.

The latest shtick from 'Scottish' Labour's Sales Manager (Northern Region) is that he's not actually a unionist.

Sold to the mug in the back row.

Jim has been telling us all the last couple of years were just a horrible dream - it seems he emerged dripping from the shower this morning just like Bobby Ewing did in Dallas, totally perplexed as to why any one ever thought he was a unionist. In the same way Pam Ewing, J.R. and Miss Ellie lived Dallas Series 9 as if Bobby was dead - we lived the past two years as if Jim was an outspoken crate-abusing British Establishment fanboy. Only none of it is true, its not him - its us. We've all been living a nightmare, we've been existing in an alternate reality where George Foulkes talks a lot of shit, bears do shit in the woods and Jim Murphy has been terrorising old folk into voting for a union that disadvantages them.

Instead, he's been explaining:

“I have never been a unionist... It’s never been my political tradition...
As a family of Irish Catholic immigrants we’re not unionists."

He went on to say: 

"I grew up in a family of trade-unionists, but we’re not political unionists.”

This is the bizarre bit, its even dafter than the Dallas plot device:

“A Conservative & Unionist tradition inside the Conservative Party and elements of the Liberal Democrats, and you had a trade-unionist and socialist solidarity tradition inside the Labour Party. For a moment there was an alignment for different reasons of political culture and history, but that moment is gone.”

Even the Daily Record - a paper that revels in a good bit of misrepresentation - adopted a tone of incredulity while reporting Jim's revelation; a revelation shared while Jim could have been at Westminster voting against yet more austerity which harms the poorest for whom he claims to be a champion.

We should read between the lines and take Jim's peculiar epiphany for what it actually is - an admission that the Union and anything associated with it is now toxic in Scotland. Even people who were at the vanguard of the No Campaign accept the referendum was won with fear - its that and an increasingly slender tendril of emotional attachment, mostly among old folk, that currently keeps the crumbling edifice from collapsing entirely.

Jim wants Scottish voters to believe he's taking a stand against interference in Scottish affairs from Westminster 'unionist' parties - including his own. What he's really doing is trying to distance himself and 'Scottish' Labour from the Union entirely because he knows its septic.

Unfortunately, he seems to be labouring under the misapprehension that he can deploy the same plot device staff writers on Dallas did with Bobby Ewing. Which begs the question; how stupid does he think Scottish voters are?

The moment Pam Ewing realises she's been dreaming all along and Jim Murphy isn't a Unio- Sorry, Bobby isn't dead.

Its probably only a matter of time before Jim tells us he's actually in the SNP.

"The fact is, I've never been in the Labour party..." - Jim Murphy, March 2015.