April, 2016

(Note: apologies for the garbled version of this blog which appeared earlier.And thanksto Eddie Whyte for alerting me to its garbledness…) OK – let’s keep one thing firmly in mind: it’s the election, stupid. All and any words issuing from the mouth of any politician, north or south, for the next couple of weeks, will […]

  On 12th February 2011 I read an article in THE IRISH TIMES which I believed needed challenging and on the same day I emailed the following to that paper. My letter was not published, nor was any other challenging that article.Here’s my letter- “Madam, Harman Murtagh (Weekend Review 12 Feb) ends his critique of Peter […]

        Remember Peter Robinson, anyone? He was First Minister of Norneverland only a few months ago, providing much mirth to satirists with his supposedly Machiavellian machinations and madcap schemes of Hokey Cokey Pokey politics and the like. He was a man who enjoyed republicplaying daft games and let’s face it , politics […]

Back around the turn of the century I was on a TV panel with Ed Moloney. Ed, for younger readers, was a journalist in this tormented little corner of Ireland. “The SDLP will shortly be consigned to the dust-bin of history” Ed said on that occasion. “But that’s OK, because Sinn Féin will shortly turn […]

If you believe Dr.Johnson, I’m a Blockhead. But I think I’m in good company. I’m generally inclined to believe Johnson. He noted that the Americans most vocal in the cause of “Liberty” were slaveholders. More than two centuries later his observation is still true. The people  of Indonesia and the Philippines, for instance have been […]

  http://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/04/the-return-of-eugenics/?utm_source=Adestra&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20160331_Weekly_Highlights_13_non_subs

Snookered. Between a rock and a hard place. Damned if you do and damned if you don’t. Take any of these three statements and they fit Fianna Fail like a well-tailored hair-shirt. The problem for Fianna Fail is that they had an astonishingly good election. Lazarus coming blinking from the tomb was nothing compared to […]

This weekend, Gerry Adams will annoy a lot of people by being re-elected President of Sinn Féin for the 33rd successive time. Some of these will be Sinn Féin members who think it’s time Gerry stood aside and allowed Mary Lou McDonald or Pearse Doherty a go at leading the party. The overwhelming majority of […]

After a couple of drinks in London’s West End recently I made my way to Piccadilly Tube Station in the early afternoon where I was much inconvenienced to find that the toilets had been closed and a notice attached to them saying they belonged to Westminster Council. The Council was considerate enough to attach a telephone number […]