"Vote SNP, get the Tories." Its election rally cry is a measure of Labour's desperation.

Negative campaigning can work - remember "Labour isn't Working" in 1979? The Tory poster which featured a very long dole queue. Negative but at least it asked a hard question of Labour.

Labour's hard question of the SNP? "Who benefits most from more SNP MPs? The Tories." That's it?

The problem for Labour is that the Tories are making exactly the same pitch.

"Vote Eck, get Ed," shriek their posters. Cameron hyperventilates about a "coalition of the people who would break up our country and the people who would bankrupt our country".

These tactics only reveal the low opinion Labour and the Tories have of Scottish voters. The Jocks as electoral zombies, sleepwalking to political disaster.

Scots know exactly what they are doing. They know what they will get by voting SNP in May.

For most, it's quite simple. A large contingent of SNP MPs will be another step towards independence. The 45% bloc is holding firm.

Many Scottish voters are also keen to have Alex Salmond carry out his pledge to hold Westminster's feet to the fire on behalf of Scottish interests. They know he can't do that with half-a-dozen colleagues.

Cameron thinks that Salmond, back in the Commons with dozens of other SNP MPs, is "the ultimate nightmare scenario". Exactly, David.

In a recent Survation poll, 62% of Scots agreed that the more SNP MPs elected, the stronger Scotland's voice will be at Westminster. Only 16% disagreed. Even 47% of Labour voters thought that the SNP would provide a strong voice for Scotland. Only 29% disagreed.

Thirty five percent of Scottish voters want Labour and SNP to govern the UK in partnership. Just 19% want Labour to govern alone. Scots don't trust New Labour on its own to deliver what they want. They haven't forgotten it voting with the Tories for a further £30 billion of cuts.

So low is Labour's stock north of the border that Scots would prefer to have Cameron as Prime Minister than Miliband - even though only 15% of them plan to vote Tory.

Jim Murphy appeared to understand the huge damage suffered by his party from sharing platforms with the Tories during the referendum campaign. He's been trying to create some distance. This includes disappearing from his website any awkward evidence from the past - like his support for Tory austerity cuts whilst still backing Trident.

However, it seems Labour and the Tories are once again united in their electioneering strategies. Any party but the Scottish National Party.

It doesn't help that many of Murphy's colleagues keep giving the game away.

Robert McNeill, a member of Labour's Scottish Policy Forum, urges voters in 16 key seats to vote Tory or Lib Dem to keep the Nationalists out. Labour peer, Lewis Moonie, a former defence minister, says a governing pact with the Tories would be better than one with the SNP.

Ouch, Jim. Better Together rides again, eh?

Unlike his unreconstructed comrades, at least Murphy understands that Scots don't want New Labour - much as it sticks in his craw.

His problem is that his sudden conversion from London establishment, austerity-supporting Blairite to patriotic, public spending socialist lacks plausibility. The populist pitch for booze at football grounds can't paper over the cracks.

The hard fact for Scottish Labour is that 190,000 of their traditional supporters voted Yes last year. All opinion polls indicate they're not for changing their minds in May.

Even if the SNP were 10% ahead in the general election vote, Labour would salvage most of their Scottish seats. It seems though that Scottish electors, including those erstwhile Labour voters, prefer an electoral massacre.

There's a rumour Murphy may try to have his party designated on the ballot paper as "The Scottish Labour Party". I doubt that'll detach it from the toxic New Labour brand.

Most voting SNP in May simply want independence. I suspect for many Labour voters though, it's the nearest they'll get these days to voting for the old Labour values of social justice, equal opportunities and the common good.