I wonder will Jeffrey Donaldson ever meet up with Volodymyr Zelensky? Perhaps they already have: there was Jeffrey in that packed room of British MPs, clapping along with all the other MPs as the man who played the role of President of Ukraine in a hugely popular Ukrainian TV series appealed to the British MPs to give him wings.
Just like Zelensky, Donaldson has smoothly morphed from one career to another. For quite some time he was a UUP politician, now he’s a DUP politician. Yes, Virginia, for real. And as Zelensky has appealed to the British to supply him with fighter jets (sorry, Volod, Boris Johnson is no longer in charge), so Donaldson has appealed to the British parliament to accept that the DUP are the real NEI, not all those other pro-protocol parties.
God gives us whatever kind of body He chooses, but as everybody knows, Jeffrey is (i) quite small; and (ii) inordinately proud of his service in the late lamented UDR. Likewise, Volodymyr is less than a towering figure – you probably noticed that even Rishi Sunak was taller than him, and while not actually having been in the Ukrainian army, Volod makes a point of always appearing in military gear. He has one other military link, if a slightly awkward one – his grandfather was a colonel in the Red Army.
So will Volod get fighter jets from the British government? It depends on how stupid the British prime minister is. Rishi may be many things but I don’t think he’s totally dense.
And will Jeffrey get his nuclear strike on the hated protocol? Despite Ben Habib and Jeffrey trying to magic yesterday’s judgement of the Supreme Court that the protocol was perfectly legal into a victory for his side, on the grounds that the Supreme Court ruling showed the protocol was the problem, most of us know a total defeat when we see one.
So a word of advice to Volod and Jeffrey. Volod, go home and start changing into civvies. Pretending to be the Ukrainian president in a TV series is quite different from being president in real life, so maybe give Martin Sheen a ring, then put out feelers and get a ceasefire together before more thousands of young Ukrainian and Russian men are massacred.
Jeffrey, you remind me of the sheep in Orwell’s Animal Farm. They had been taught to chant “Four legs good, two legs bad!” but overnight were re-educated into “Four legs good, two legs better!” You’ve done a grand job of presenting the total defeat of your argument in the British Supreme Court, so maybe it’s time to buckle down and allow the other elected MLAs to get on with their job. Being a good Christian, you’ll know that going back into Stormont, apart from bringing some sort of order to life in NEI, will allow Dáithí’s Law to be passed and overnight transform the transplant scene here. Put bluntly, Jeffrey, every day your party stays out of Stormont, God knows how many people, young and old, are dying because there aren’t enough organs for transplant. Re-assembling the Assembly, Jeffrey, would give wings to those who are currently ill, instead of leaving them to die through your pig-headed inaction.
First off, Zelensky does wear civvies. They are military colored to show his solidarity with his armed forces. It is better than wearing a uniform with a chest full of self-awarded medals like the pudgy guy in North Korea.
But more importantly, I cannot understand for the life of me how Irish nationalists line up behind Putin. Ukraine is a smaller country being attacked by a larger aggressive neighbor. Does this sound familiar?