February, 2020

What is there left to say? Fianna Fail and Fine Gael ran over 80 election candidates, Sinn Féin ran 42 candidates.  Final result: Fianna Fail 38, Sinn Fén 37, Fine Gael 35. Eyes dim with grief, the anti-Shinner propagandists lob any old piece of scrap at the Sinn Féin party: the Quinn case,  David Cullinane […]

What is there left to say? Fianna Fail and Fine Gael ran over 80 election candidates, Sinn Féin ran 42 candidates.  Final result: Fianna Fail 38, Sinn Fén 37, Fine Gael 35. Eyes dim with grief, the anti-Shinner propagandists lob any old piece of scrap at the Sinn Féin party: the Quinn case,  David Cullinane […]

James Joyce was born in Dublin in 1882, left Ireland in 1904,  died in Switzerland in 1941, retained a United Kingdom passport and never cast a vote in an election. Eamon de Valera, born in New York in 1882, died in Ireland in 1975, led Sinn Fein to victory in General Elections in 1918 and […]

Maurice Dobson was a towering figure, literally and metaphorically, in the annals of Stirling and District Camera Club. At various points, during his thirty something years of membership, he held each of the major offices and was noted for his commitment and efficiency in each of them.  Maurice and Ellen were both fine photographers and […]

At the age of eight a child is still  a child and cannot be expected to have much of an appreciation of history or public affairs. If, at the age of thirty- five a citizen is woefully ignorant of those matters, he/she has not grown up. I believe that is the gist of remarks made  […]

Sinn Féin supporters, I’d guess, are feeling a bit hungover this morning. Not necessarily from an excessive intake of alcohol,  although there may have been some of that too. The hangover more likely relates to the sense of elation that started on Saturday night with the news of the neck-and-neck-and-neck exit poll, and powered its […]

In the old silent movie Safety Last, there’s a famous scene where Harold Lloyd is shown, twelve storeys  up,  hanging  from the arms of a clock.  Leo Varadkar and Micheál Martin, emerging this morning from a feverish sleep, must be feeling a bit like Lloyd. They did everything possible to slow the progress of Sinn […]

        Belfast Protestant and Catholic priest to expose British collusion and cover-up CAPITOL HILL. Washington, DC. Saturday, February 9, 2020— Too often the media in both the United States, Britain and Ireland wrongly present the problem in Northern Ireland in merely sectarian terms—as just a problem of Catholics and Protestants being unable to get […]

Candles mean different things to different folk; women like smelly ones, or those in fancy colours with sparkles, glitter and wee mysterious speckles on the surface. Some of us light candles in churches, perhaps particularly abroad on holidays or pilgrimage, in special or hallowed places when we take time to remember those who have gone […]

FEBRUARY 5 1920 Armed RIC raided upwards of eighty private houses in the County Galway. At Youghal, Co,Cork RIC and British military raided six private houses. At Dundalk,County Louth, ten private houses were raided by RIC and British Military Armed RIC raided a house at Blarney, Co.Cork. A Waterford city house was similarly raided. Arrests […]