March, 2021

B Sarah Creighton, a commentator of a unionist background, recently asked a perhaps tongue in cheek, but nevertheless interesting question for those of us in the south who seek a united Ireland. The writer simply asked, are we were prepared to knock our house down and work with others to build a new and better […]

Jim O’Callaghan may not know it, but like The Skibereen Eagle with Russia, Newton Emerson has his eye on him. Emerson, as you probably know, is The Irish Times’s champion of unionism, and this morning he once again proudly unfurls his banner. So what does the pride of Portadown tell us this morning? Well, that […]

The chiefs in RTÉ and their masters in government have always had a hostile attitude to northern nationalists who sought to speak the truth about the situation here. You have only to think of the hostile way they treated Gerry Adams and the late Martin McGuinness all through the years. I remember a highly paid […]

Given the chasm between those favouring the union with Britain and those favouring a reunited Ireland – as shown on the Claire Byrne Show a couple of nights back – I decided to do some brain Spring-cleaning and clarify why It is I favour a reunited Ireland.  On a personal level, I’m from Tyrone and […]

I consider myself to be politically educated to some degree or other on the machinations of imperialism as it presents itself throughout the world. The colonisation of Palestine and Kashmir.The sanctions on Venezuela, Iran, Russia, China, North Korea. The military adventurism of the West in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria and Yemen on behalf of the […]

It was the stand-out moment in Claire Byrne’s ‘Unifying Ireland’ programme last night.  Claire, with her new grown-up glasses, was the firm and even furious schoolmarm, insisting that Joe Brolly put down that metre stick and go back to his desk. Joe of course ignored her and kept on listing the qualities he believes the […]

  The south of Ireland at present has an impressive line-up of tech giants – Google, Amazon, Apple, etc. A software company called Workday has its EU headquarters in Dublin and employs 1,300 and will be hiring 400 more. Stripe, a massive company created by two young Irish guys,  employs over 1000 people. Is there […]

Arising from my blog on  the biography of Winston Churchill by Roy Jenkins (March 19), it occurred to me that a good book might be written on the strange lives of liberal Britons to rival the excellent STRANGE DEATH OF LIBERAL ENGLAND by George Dangerfield. I’m not the person to do it. But I could […]

A couple of weeks ago I got the very rare chance to engage with a “moderate unionist” on what he thought he, as a unionist, would require to take the leap for a united Ireland.  Granted, this was on Twitter but the man was genuine in his attempt to reach out.  “Throw your shopping list […]

Brexit has ensured that the issue of the Partition of Ireland now the first item on the political agenda. The British border in Ireland has hardly been out of the news for the past five years. The Partition of Ireland in 1920 was a refusal by the imperial British government led by the man from […]