The G8 meeting in Edinburgh

A special broadcast from wayward Globaleyes punter, Shakabu.

So. Here we are. It's the 21st century and the city of Edinburgh is back in full-on witch-hunt mode. The G8's around the corner, Geldof's been sticking his oar in and the papers are chock full of stories from the "Oooh! Monsters!!!" school of journalism. The Edinburgh Evening News in particular has been whipping the good citizens of Edina into a grand old frenzy about our "mad God's dream" being besieged by molotov-wielding Mickey-D hunters.

Disaster plans and morgues

My favourite rumour circulating was told to me by a taxi driver the other day who said that the Cooncil were going to block off Chambers Street to make a temporary morgue! The best bit is that this has some foundation in truth as Edinburgh, like any responsible British city in the sights of swarthy no-good terrsts, has a Disaster Plan which requires Chambers Street to be used for just that purpose. And some bright spark has decided that if the authorities are planning for it, it must be going to happen.

The anarchists are coming

This type of silly, conspiracy-driven negative thinking, along with sandwich boards like "ANARCHISTS PLAN REVENGE FOR GENOA" (Evening News) and "BLOOD CRISIS FOR G8" (Scotland on Sunday) has whipped up storms of clucking and oching at the prospect of the city reverting to the fiery bloody times of yore. It has also provided us with the unintentionally hilarious spectacle of politicians asking where we're going to find enough portaloos at such short notice.

Camping out

There is also the very live issue of where all these protestors/demonstrators/raggle-taggle-gypsies-oh are going to stay. Being as they're not the usual hundreds and thousands of free-spending young professionals we're perfectly happy to welcome to Edinburgh to get rat-arsed over Hogmanay or the braying London fucks who come and clog our streets in the August festival (Both are times when I, and many of my fellow 'burghers despair as the streets literally run with rivers of piss at all hours of the day owing to the aforementioned portaloo shortage, which appears to be acceptable so long as the al fresco tinklers keep buying booze and stuffing their faces) they're unlikely to be staying at the Balmoral, or any of the other more salubrious hostelries in Edinburgh.

Early doors

And, with the residents of the new town being unlikely to open their doors (or even offer up the keys to their locked gardens) to such types the Cooncil in their wisdom have decided to site the campsite for demonstrators in Niddrie. The Meadows, Princes Street Gardens and Holyrood Park are all larger sites, more central and closer to the march routes. But they're in the middle of town. Fuck that.

It's better to sling the 15,000 that will be camping there out to a deprived scheme out of town, then march them ringed by thousands of police around their march site and march them straight on back again. Hopefully the local delinquent element will have all the digital equipment chored by the time the whomping squad are inevitably called in to suppress "troublemakers".

Somebody burn something

See!? All this eye-rolling conspiracy nonsense is contagious. Maybe the streets will run with blood! Maybe there will be "flashpoints". Maybe anarchists will roam the streets turning over cars and setting them on fire! But one thing's for sure. In the search for sensational revelations about events in Edinburgh already the messages from all sides are becoming incoherent. Are we marching against poverty? For Africa? Against war? For peace? Against unfettered captialism? For fair trade? No one seems particularly interested.

Watch the Edinburgh Evening News/The Scotsman keich its pants about what "might" happen.