I am harsh on the media sometimes, but today I have come to offer them some praise. Many of the hacks with whom I usually have serious issues have refused to touch the HMRC “mistake” story with a 20-foot pole. Others have already poured scorn on it, as it deserves.
Oh yes, there are a few holdouts but they are the ones you’d expect; Forsyth at the Telegraph, Jack and Johnstone at the Evening Times and just about everyone at The Daily Record … the Sevco Supporters Club. What else do you expect from them?
Other outlets actually went out and found experts and asked them their views on this before running a word. And many of those experts have condemned the initial story as fanciful nonsense. But in the meantime, the craziness goes on, as if this was real.
Sevco fan groups are demanding an inquiry.
Into what? How gullible they are?
These Peepul would literally swallow anything, as has been proved time and again. They got the owners they deserved in Whyte and Green precisely because they were willing to suspend disbelief and embrace anyone or anything that confirmed their worldview.
Whyte said he was a billionaire and Green fed into their hatred and paranoia.
That’s why both men were embraced as they were, why those fans left their clubs wide open to being robbed and pillaged and run into the ground.
They never learn though, and as such these mugs are ripe to be picked clean over and over and over again. King knows it well.
It is no surprise – at all – to see their moon howling supporter’s groups grabbing hold of this straw. It justifies years of conspiracy theories and hatred. Their club were the victims after all. Wow. They knew it all this time and just needed to see the evidence, and for them that’s what this is.
To me it is only evidence of how dumb they continue to be.
Some of the Sevco sites got excited because the story ran in a “reputable” newspaper and not just a tabloid.
That “reputable” newspaper, as Paul Brennan pointed out today, also bought the Hitler Diaries once upon a time. You think there aren’t idiots working on these titles, or people pursuing agendas? Where do you think Boris Johnston got his start in life?
We still don’t know what the “agenda” here is, but the story has been entirely discredited, not least by the fact that HMRC’s own press office has tweeted an utter dismissal of it. They have rejected the idea that any “mistake” was made here.
And of course there hasn’t. RTC made this clear yesterday; indeed, BDO’s own document, which is the source of the story, said the same. HMRC sees no point in pursuing the larger amounts through the courts as there’s nobody left to pay the bill.
HMRC’s press tweet also reminds people that they won this case, which is the diplomatic way of saying “that club got what it deserved.”
Of course, some of the media lackeys seem determined to keep this story going; Forsyth in The Telegraph says the Ibrox board is considering legal action. Against who? Over what? Does that man just accept whatever he hears from that club without giving it a second thought? How does it feel, do you think, to be on such a using time after time?
There are no grounds for legal action here. None.
The bill, don’t forget, was never paid so there’s no money to recover as none was actually lost. Rangers’ problems weren’t limited to the taxman either; Lloyds wanted rid of them, as quickly as possible, and any buyer would have had to pay them off just to get the deeds. It’s the reason Whyte got the lot for £1.
Lloyds would have cost an additional £18 million to any bill.
Rangers fans simply refuse to accept the simple facts here, and I know why they are so resistant to them. Those facts make it quite clear that their club spent its way to the grave. I know that’s hard for them to comprehend at the best of times, but with the current club spending towards the same fate it must be terrifying.
So of course, any scenario which offers them an alternative explanation for what happened to Rangers will be grabbed onto like a life preserver.
I recommend reality instead.
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