SOMETHING had to give. It was going to be either the British economy or this woeful Conservative government, and at a hastily organised and excruciating news conference which lasted just seven minutes Liz Truss attempted to save her premiership by doing a U-turn on her tax cuts, throwing her Chancellor under the bus, and sacking him for a mini-budget which was as much hers as it was his.  

She looked terrified. There were long pauses between choosing reporters to ask questions, desperately looking for a friendly face, no follow up questions allowed. No apologies, no explanations, and then she fled. Beth Rigby of Sky News tweeted later that a Tory MP had told her: "Even by her standards that was really bad."

Tax cuts were the central part of her platform during the recent Conservative leadership contest. Truss has now abandoned the planned cut in corporation tax and with it has shredded what little was left of her political credibility. Talking of shredded political reputations, just yesterday Douglas Ross insisted that he had every confidence in the Prime Minister and the Chancellor.

It was just a couple of weeks ago that the Scottish Conservatives were demanding that the Scottish Government copy all the measures in Kwarteng's budget and much of the Scottish media were clapping along. Will they now be praising Nicola Sturgeon for her foresight, we all know that's about as likely to happen as a BBCQT Scottish audience that isn't stuffed full of bussed in Tories. That show has more plants than the Botanic Gardens.

Truss has sacked her Chancellor for the crime of delivering the central plank of her own policy, a policy both Truss and Kwarteng enthusiastically promoted in their Britannia Unchained book. It's the epitome of the arrogant entitled delusion of this Conservative Party, Truss has effectively admitted that she got everything wrong, but still thinks she can continue in office as Prime Minister as she performs a screeching U-turn on her flagship policy, does this mean that Truss has joined the anti-growth coalition?  This is not so much Britannia Unchained as Britannia Unhinged.

Also sacked is chief secretary to the Treasury Chris Philp, who is the political equivalent of a fart filled balloon on a stick as a contestant on Mastermind. Philp's main role in government was to heroically defend whatever indefensible nonsense the Government's just come up with. All that making himself look like an idiot on national TV was for naught. Kwarteng and Truss tried to blame Philp for the budget despite both massively outranking him in terms of ministerial responsibilities. But don't worry, there will be another principle free chancer along in a minute.

The National:

The sacking of Kwarteng means that the UK will have had four chancellors in four months. Rishi Sunak, Nadhim Zahawi, Kwasi Kwarteng, and now, may all the gods help us, Jeremy Hunt (above). What could possibly go wrong? Hunt is the man who trashed the NHS in England, another political lightweight whose burning ambition vastly exceeds his competence - so pretty much like the rest of the Cabinet then. The UK is now such a ridiculous place that a newspaper has set up a live feed of a lettuce next to a photo of the Prime Minister to see which can last the longest. So much for the strength and stability of British governance which Better Together insisted Scotland could have if it voted No in 2014.

The lettuce may very well win. Truss has the slimmest of chances of pulling this off and saving her political skin, and that is only if Kwarteng, whom she has now utterly humiliated, meekly returns to the back benches and accepts all the blame for a policy which Truss signed off on and which was the cornerstone of her admittedly deluded economic plan. However according to a tweet from the BBC's economics editor Faisal Islam: "My experience of Kwarteng is that he would not be someone to go quietly, or take one for the team, especially in a situation where he was literally enacting the signature policy of the PM." 

Not even 24 hours ago Kwarteng was asked if he would still be Chancellor next week and replied:  "Absolutely. 100% I'm not going anywhere. Thank you." Truss has now created another dangerous enemy for herself within the Conservative Party and has sent a message to those still loyal to her that their loyalty will not be reciprocated. According to the BBC's Nick Watt, a group of senior Conservatives will make a public statement next week calling on Truss to resign and added that many in the Conservative Party think that Truss will find it difficult to survive. We can but hope.

Meanwhile, on social media a screen shot allegedly taken from Neil Oliver's GBeebies show was circulating of the British nationalism's and the anti-maskers' very own propagandalf apparently railing about how “woke-a-nauts” are using “death spaniels”. 

Everyone I sent the photo of the screenshot to asked if it was real. I can only say Oliver and GBeebies' attempts to stir up hysteria about the culture wars are so far gone down a spiral of crazy, and the right wing in the UK is so detached from reality, that I find it impossible to tell. 

It's probably a fake but the scary thing is that it could all too easily be genuine. We are living in a satirical nightmare, I have no idea what “woke-a-naut death spaniels” means, unless it's a post-punk band featured on the John Peel Show in the 1980s, but two years on from my stroke, if I am ever able to get another dog it's definitely going to be a wee ginger woke-a-naut death spaniel. It would be the perfect dug for this unhinged age.

This piece is an extract from today’s REAL Scottish Politics newsletter, which is emailed out at 7pm every weekday with a round-up of the day's top stories and exclusive analysis from the Wee Ginger Dug.

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