October, 2016

In terms of Brexit, I think it’s fair to say we’ve left the realm of rational discussion. You can probably think of half a dozen instances yourself but here are three that’ve hooked my attention.   The UK votes to leave the EU and then prepares to negotiate the terms under which it leaves. That’s […]

The people in the northern six counties voted last June to stay in the EU. That democratic vote must be respected. The people in the north have spoken. We should not be dragged out of the EU by English votes. It is in the best interests of the people of the north and of the […]

  By now the world has witnessed the horrific footage of the verbal bile and abuse which Fr. Gary Donegan experienced on Saturday, led by none other than dissident republicanism’s very own Colonel Custer – Damian ‘Dee’ Fennell. Everyone I have spoken to has said how they feel shocked and outraged at this episode, culminating […]

  Does the name Maurice Oldfield mean anything to you? For me it rang a faint bell but I couldn’t have said why until I was sent a newspaper article announcing a new book titled The Life of Britain’s Most-decorated Cold War Spy and head of MI6, Sir Maurice Oldfield. Oldfield in some ways was quite […]

  There is Cardinal in the United States called Cardinal Raymond L. Burke and every chance he gets he attacks Pope Francis because of what he perceives to be the Pope’s progressive and liberal attitude. This cardinal seems to be above censure. If I said what he has said about the Pope I think I […]

Last Saturday I spent an afternoon in Omagh – always a pleasurable experience in itself – at the Dún Uladh Cultural Heritage Centre. They were having a day of lectures on matters relating to Easter 1916. It was loads of fun and wonderfully thought-provoking. Dr Liam Campbell spoke first. He’s Heritage Officer for the Foyle […]

Theodre Adorno was fascinated with how fascism and communism were shaping the world in which he lived. In his research he concluded one important finding, that fascists and communists have in fact the same psyche – an authoritarian personality, which is full of hostility, opposed to compromise, distrusting of others and immune to the disregard […]

  ‘The next six years could set us back a century.’ So says Eoghan Harris, in his column in the right wing Sunday newspaper a few weeks ago. He was not referring to Brexit but to the threat from republicans. Harris is the man from West Cork who thinks he is the greatest republican since Michael Collins. […]

Looking out at the soft caressing mizzle, coddling and be-dewing everything in the garden this glum Saturday, it’s difficult to believe that on this same day a week ago it was so bright and clement that I was sweating profusely inside my bee-suit as I re-organised my honeybees and my beehives for the coming cooler […]

There’s an old saying that you can keep some people happy some of the time, but not everyone happy all of the time. Whoever coined that obviously had in mind the same sort of characters which make up that great bastion of revolutionary thoughts and action – the Greater Ardoyne Residents Collective. These individuals have […]