Banned !

Is there any other club who at the same time have had their two most important people punished by Government bans ?

Rangers owner Mr. (hundredaire) Whyte has served a Company Director seven year ban.
Sorry, It appears Whyte was sentenced to a seven year Company Director ban but he breached it.
Their Football Team Manager also was sentenced and probably served one year ban for drunken driving. Ally McCoist was employed by Rangers in another capacity.

Some people think that both these people give bad example to young people and neither should hold such important roles at a club like Rangers.

 

Hmm. I can just about see what you’re saying with regard to McCoist, although I had no idea he’d been done for drink driving. But I wonder if any children aspire to be Craig Whyte and look to the man for an example? Park football could become tricksy:

“You’re in goals, Joe.”
“Naw ahm no. I want to be Craig Whyte and oversee development.”
“**** sake.”

I don’t see it.

 

I would have thought the fact that it appears Mr. Whyte has got to be owner of the second biggest foot club in Scotland by cheating, fraud, deception etc. is not really a good role model for youth.
The fact that you the two together are running the Rangers is a terrible example to the young Rangers fans.
Maybe it will be all concluded soon.

 

Well, if any child is spending their time studying the balance-sheet at Ibrox whilst idly wondering about the business history of Craig Whyte, Superhoops, then it would be hard not to imagine that this is a sign of a wasted childhood.

I hear what you’re saying, though.

Slightly off on a tangent, but I remember saying to a Rangers poster on here (I think it was someone called “Edge&#8221 that I would be very uneasy about Craig Whyte if I were a Rangers fan. This was before he bought the club and I still feel the same way now. The difference, I suppose, is that I’m happy enough to wait and see how things pan out before condemning the man to hell and back. I’m just not quite interested enough to properly care (or condemn) at the moment. If he takes Rangers down the pan, however, then I’ll be interested. And then I’ll hate him a little bit, too (on which point we may slightly differ).

 

Interesting to read a different and apparently, objective, view Psycho.

 

Shut it, you, or I’ll pure mash your face (and ribs) with a hammer.

Anyway, you shouldn’t be out and about, surely, lest you fall back into heavy arguing. Why surround yourself with temptation? When I weaned myself off alcohol, for example, I had to stay away from pubs. You’re playing with fire, Rebel. Or maybe you’re telling yourself you could handle one tiny wee argument. What’s the worst that could happen, after all? Big mistake.

One argument will lead to another and another and you’ll wake up in the morning with a throbbing head and no idea what you’ve been arguing about or who you might have been arguing with and a nagging sense of dread that all of this arguing may have caused you to sit down and have a drink with a friend.

And this is my word.

EspaniaCelt: see when the Bank of Scotland merged with – was swallowed alive by – the Halifax? I didn’t like it. 300 years of independence bulldozed by an alien, unattractive and, to my mind, wholly vulgar (get rich quick) culture, the antithesis of everything the bank and Scottish banking once stood for. It makes me cringe seeing Scottish institutions subsumed like this.

Anyway, I felt similarly queasy when seeing another Scottish institution – Rangers – snapped up by a venture capitalist with tenuous working links to Scotland. I’m always feeling queasy about something or other I see on the news, so this shouldn’t come as a surprise, but I don’t trust the instincts (or morals) of these people and I don’t trust the instincts (or morals) of Craig Whyte. I’d rather such a low-calibre (flash the cash kind of a) man didn’t have his hands on one of our most instantly recognisable brand names, it’s true, but I’ll hang back before calling him a criminal. (That he may turn out to be a criminal, of course, would surely come as no particular surprise to anyone much at all - not if they’ve been paying attention, in any event, to the corrosive greed that an untrammelled capitalism may spawn.)

Brothers, at our next meeting we’ll be discussing the idea that capitalist profit is simply the extraction of surplus value from the exploited proletariat. Vast, impenetrable tracts of pseudo-intellectual gibberish will be printed up and handed out before the meeting begins, relax.

 

I understand your reluctance to call the man a criminal Psychosomatic but, to be fair, the BBC did label him so as a result of their investigation into his business practices. It's interesting that Whyte is now admitting that he was banned for seven years from being a Director but blames it on a "technicality" without feeling the need to expand on quite what this technicality was.

On another note, I suspect the next meeting will be a rather shouty affair with many Socialist Worker types chanting anti-capitalist slogans and the more sensible of debaters among us having our voices drowned out by some obstreperous feminist blaming the world's problems on a world economy built on chauvinistic, mendacious values.

That's certainly been my experience of such previous meetings on the topic of capitalism.

 

Is he just? Well, I didn’t know that, so thank you for filling in some gaps. (I have some very large gaps in my knowledge when it comes to this and most of what I say is based on instinct and a prejudiced revulsion. Impressive stuff, you’ll most surely agree.) But that’s certainly interesting news, Stereo, and brings two things to mind:

1) In common with many people in positions of some authority who find themselves in possession of some dubious morals, Whyte may very well be adopting the tactics of “deny everything, always, no exceptions” until there is simply no option but to cede some ground. Dangerous strategy – and one most likely based on an overweening arrogance and/or a dangerous detachment from reality (normal rules don’t apply to me, you grubby louts, I’m way bigger than that). People tend to be more forgiving of the contrite admission to former wrongdoings – “Tearful Whyte sobs as he tells of his criminal past and his determination to put things right” etc – rather than the drip drip drip of wounding revelations that make the accused look like they’ve something to hide and are possibly incapable of being straight and honest and possess an inexhaustible supply of abjectly twisted self-justifications. (Sociopath.)

2) This may be the first chink in his carefully assembled armour. If so, it’s likely to be downhill (for Rangers) from here on in. This stuff rarely ends well. The sound and fury of threatening legal action all over the shop may very well be the response of an indignant and (presently) innocent man, or it may be nothing more than transparent bullying and a bid to buy some time. (Robert Maxwell springs unbidden to mind, for some reason.)

Aha. You sound horribly familiar with these sort of meetings, you miserable little hippy activist. If a childhood can be said to have been wasted by reading up on Craig Whyte, then my teenage years may similarly be consigned to a laughable dustbin having been spent in just such meetings as you describe. We were so young. And so painfully, earnestly, self-righteously stupid. Ho hum.

Rebel – nice one. I’ll need to get back to you on all that later (hopefully this evening). For the time being, however, I’ve got dogs to walk and dishes to do and I need to make pretty round the house. I may even do some work, who knows? Back soon, though.........

 

"The skint Champions " are still benefiting from the fraudulent interpretation of the tax laws of which they will soon be found guilty.
They built and maintained the strength of their squad illegally from the early 00's . I don't know if yhey have actually stopped but even if they have the foundations of the team is still there.

 

Right so, let's see.....

No.

Yes.

Yes, and I find this refusal to even contemplate that something might be seriously, seriously wrong quite astonishing. It may simply be a reflexive defensive action, an unthinking (and often fairly natural) response to feeling assailed? I don’t know, but I can’t see that a failure to face potential problems helps anyone much at all or serves as useful preparation to deal with (potential) disaster.

And I’ll tell you something else – oh yes I will – but I’ve been fairly gobsmacked at the (occasional and seeming) indifference shown towards the departure of John Greig because he felt “excluded from participating in corporate governance at the club”.

Whether or not such a man should be playing any part in corporate governance, of course, is open to question – in what sensible way is he qualified to do such a thing, after all? What seems irrefutable, however, is the seminal part he’s already played in the club’s history and sense of tradition (whether you may care for these things or not). Of course he was taking a wage – this is allowed – but I’m not sure it could be sensibly argued that he had anything other than what he saw as the best interests of Rangers at heart. It’s been his life. To see such a man walk away, then, would have sent shivers of foreboding down the spine of all Rangers fans, I would have thought. But no, this doesn’t appear to be the case and I’m rather stumped by such indifference.

Who he? No matter: if he says it might be too late for Rangers to sensibly react then it looks like he may talk some sense. In the interview you linked to, Craig Whyte appears unreasonably evasive when pressed on his business interests (or successes). I could tell you right now, Rebel, that I’m involved in some astonishingly lucrative business deals – anyone could tell you such a thing – but, in the absence of any concrete (and current) evidence, you’d be forgiven for thinking I was pretty much full of bullshit.

And it’s no good Craig Whyte saying that he wishes to protect these trading partners from a public scrutiny, because anyone treading a legitimate business path should have no fear of scrutiny whatsoever. You’d think they’d maybe even welcome the publicity. So, as a means of reassuring curious minds, it might be said (at the very least) that Craig Whyte is choosing a strange sort of way to do so.

Hmm. First part, yes: no sensible consideration seems to have been given to how things may pan out in the future. Spend, success, spend, more success. As plans go, to be fair, this one has a few rather obvious flaws, not least its intrinsic vulgarity and the arrogant assumptions therein.

But to hope that the damage is terminal? Nah. This would feel rather ungracious and charmless to me (and possibly vindictive) - like a step in the wrong direction, either way. And no matter how hard I may try, I simply can't generate enough hostility towards the club, those people it employs or the fans (I'll sidestep the bigots) with an intense emotional investment built over the years to wish death upon an entire institution. I've never understood the point of such antagonisms and I'm hopeful that I never really will. I just don't get the mindset, I suppose, and can't quite see what purpose it serves. Whatever. It's a majorly minor point and must surely come down to inarguable personal preference.

In short, no thanks, although I'll feel no particular sympathy if they are shown to have indulged in tax evasion (as opposed to tax avoidance) and are made to pay a rightfully heavy price. And I'll not be sad to see Craig Whyte laid low just so long as he doesn't take the club down with him. Apart from that, I'll generally wish them well and hope that they learn from their mistakes - all of them.

 

Rebhelbhoy.
What sort of a brain have you.
Keep saying Rangers frauding the tax system isn't fraud. If it isn't is it charity with Rangers just cutting out the middle man ( their Queen's men).

 

This was precisely my feelings on reading that interview too. He's given very similar responses in all the papers, denying 'everything' yet refuses to answer any direct or specific questions regarding the BBC's allegations or his other business dealings. Like you, I find it a very strange approach to take if, as he says, he has nothing to hide and lots to be proud of.

 

I think it may take a Rangers fan to explain why this doesn't make them uneasy, Admiral. I only know that if he was in charge of my club and was behaving this way that I would be made extremely suspicious. I can't begin to imagine how the man may instill confidence in anyone. I just don't see it and wonder if I'm maybe missing something.

And withdrawing cooperation from the BBC feels like a childish mistake. (I notice Hearts have now withdrawn all media cooperation for some reason or other that eludes me. The contagion spreads......)

 

Aha. Phil MacGiollabhain. I know who you mean and I’ve actually read one or two of his things before (a long, long while back). I’ll need to try to find his blog again and see what he’s got to say for himself. How come you don’t seem to particularly care for the man? I can’t remember ever having formulated an opinion on him – maybe a touch self-important, that’s all – so I’ll go back and read him with fairly neutral eyes. He’s going to be well pleased, I imagine.

When did the BBC attack the Celtic supporters? (Just point to a link if you can’t be bothered going into the details – I wouldn’t blame you - and I’ll see if I can make sense of it all that way. The things I miss.)

We need some Rangers fans to state their case (sans hysteria). I’d quite like to know what they think of all this and how they came to think it. But there we are.