October, 2018

It’s interesting to observe the reaction of James McClean to poppy-wearing. It’s strikingly different from the reaction of, to the best of my knowledge, all the other footballers in the Premier League, all the TV presenters of BBC and all the TV presenters of UTV. How could McClean get it so wrong? But before we jump […]

  To The Editor IRISH POST LONDON 25 October 2018   I read with interest the letters of James Casement and Michael Smith (October 27). Most of the information (20 Oct) on Frank Foley and Guy Liddell I got from THE LONDON REVIEW  BOOKS of 9 April 2015. The piece was headlined “Stuck on the Flypaper – […]

You’ve probably heard comparisons drawn between Peter Casey, the recent Presidential candidate, and Donald Trump. Both becoming popular suddenly and dramatically against all the odds, both zooming up the polls on the back of an attack on a minority group, both tapping into something in the population that other politicians or would-be politicians have avoided, […]

         As recently as last Tuesday, just four days before Chooseday, the result of the Mid-Term Presidential Election was in the mere Laptop of the Gods. For four nailbiting weeks before that fateful and faithful Tuesday Intervention the result of the wee six-horse race in the Twenty Six was neck and neck, […]

OK, now that the debates are over and the names of the also-rains begin to fade from our memory and Michael D girds his loins for another seven years in the Phoenix Park, are there any outstanding questions?  Dozens, I expect. But here’s five of mine. Michael D Higgins clearly has the support of the majority who voted. […]

  “When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions”. Twenty-five years ago this week, Shakespeare’s words were truly appropriate. The horror of the Shankill bomb was followed by the bloodbath at Greysteel. Many of us could recite the names of those killed in both incidents; in contrast if I said the names […]

Pics 1-4 are by Jude Collins   Pic 1:  Moving words from Philadelphia monument to An Gorta Mór   Pic 2: Two grandparents, one parent, two grandchildren                     Pic 3                                  […]

So off with the old, on with the old. We’ve had Michael D Higgins as President of Ireland, we will have Michael D Higgins as President of Ireland. Plus ca change, etc. You could talk all morning about the result of yesterday’s election – that’s exactly what they’re doing on RTÉ Radio One at this […]

Letter sent, and I believe published, in THE IRISH POST (LONDON) in the 1980s. Dear Sir, Although it is not generally rated a “fun” paper, THE TIMES unconsciously pursues that designation. Lately it praised Karl Marx, who, if we are to believe it, would have disownedthe striking miners and branded Mr Scargill a heretic.This is […]

OK – so now we’re back in December of last year. Or Theresa May appears to be, finally. You’ll remember that in December 2017, she committed to the backstop for Ireland, and again in March 2018, but since then she has been hopping like a hen on a hot stove to somehow get out of […]