Picture by Alan Cardwell
There are days when you struggle to believe that politicians are quite right in the head and this is one of them.
Try David Cameron for starters. He’s announced that Britain will take in 20,000 refugees/immigrants. That’s because he’s a compassionate man. He’s also announced that he’s given orders which have resulted in the death of two British citizens, Ruhul Amin and Reyaard Khan. That’s because the two young men were a thousand or so miles away threatening the security of the UK…EH? Cameron figures these two were such a threat to the UK, he sent British forces and their weapons all that way to blow them to pieces? Compassionate Mr Cameron? You bet. Also judge, jury and executioner Mr Cameron. And to think: only the other day we were talking about the British system of justice.
Or take Mike Nesbitt. He’s been pouring scorn on the DUP for doing the hokey-kokey. One minute they’re withdrawing from Stormont, the next they’re in there talking – how irrational can you get? The DUP are clearly a party that doesn’t know its own mind, Mike says.
That’s Mike, whose party the UUP have walked away from Stormont…well, not quite. They’ve pulled Danny Kennedy out of the Executive and…Well, really, that’s it. The UUP will still be up at Stormont. They’ll be involved in talks, just like the DUP. Physician, hokey-kokey thyself.
And what was it brought all this walk-out/semi-walk-out about? Why, the words of the Chief Constable, who declared that the IRA is alive and well and killing people…Well, that is to say, the IRA is completely committed to peaceful means of achieving its goal. Got that? That’s why Mike walked out. Sort of.
Did I say you struggle to believe politicians are right in the head? Maybe expand that list to include Chief Constables.
But do keep this in mind: there’s an election early next year. And really that’s what all this flap-doodle is about in the end. Crazy? Crazy like a fox, maybe.
My favourite words of the week are “feigned indignation”. The “feigned indignation” of Mike and Peter at the death of Kevin McGuigan. The “feigned indignation” of your good self and others wringing their hands at the strikes against those nice British boys Ruhul and Reyaard. You make it sound like they were tourists on a beach somewhere (on no – hang on a minute – that was ISIS).
Make no mistake, these boys would chop yer head off as quick as look at you. These are the lads that, along with Assad, are forcing Syrian children out of their country and onto blow-up dinghies in the middle of the night. Shed not a tear Jude and be thankful that Cameron has the cajones to take them out BEFORE they do unto others what they have had done unto them.
Ah George. Cameron may (or may not) have cajones, but the rest of us (the males, or some of us) have cojones. The nice British boys may be the blood-thirsty chaps you say – I don’t have evidence either way. But would you say if I thought they looked as if they were going to do something nasty, they should be blown up? I’ll have to make sure I don’t look at people in a funny manner or they may want to do that to me as well. It may be that Britain was under serious attack, or about to be, from these two chaps. But then, sure wasn’t Britain under serious threat of attack from WMD a while back? Final point: how is it that the great percentage of the killing that American and British forces are doing is miles and miles away from either Britain or America? And yet America and Britain are under threat? Shome mishtake shurely…
Cajones, cojones, cojones, cajones – lets chop the whole things off (if your ISIS!)
You really don’t trust the Brits one little bit Jude do you? (why am I even saying that?) You don’t think that they just might know something that the rest of us don’t on this one? Call me a trusting fool but I’m prepared to believe that Cameron wouldn’t have undertaken that action without a very good reason. He would have known he would have faced all kinds of trouble when he authorised it yet still he made the tough call.
Ahh your probably right Jude, maybe I should be a bit more sceptical of Cameron. Roll on the election of Jeremy Corbyn I say – he will sort them out. (by the way, am I the only one that has noticed that his initials are the same as another messiah?)
In thinking about this one, I am reminded of the opening scene in that film, American Sniper, where the dad says to his young boys in a deep Texan accent “Boys, there are three types of people in the world. The sheep – these are the people that believe that there is no evil in the world. The wolf – they prey on the sheep. And the sheepdog. Now these people are a rare breed. They exist to protect the sheep. What are you going to be boys?”
Well, anyway, it was a good film – futility of war and all that – you would love it.
Problem is George, that judicial process was circumvented in these assassinations. Yes, difficult to bring these young men to account, indeed assess if they were a threat to Britain, given their proximity? What clearly is the policy of the State in Assassination? Here, the State were involved in many hundreds of assassinations. Many of these assassinations in Ireland involved innocent people who the State involved itself in setting up for Murder most foul. Where is the line George? ISIS are sadly the product of the failed puppet State the Brits helped produce. Sectarianism fomented, does it bear any resemblance to what occurred here? Of course it does. If the British State can violate a sovereign country to assassinate its own Citizens in Syria, when will they draw the line? Maybe a drone strike in Dundalk against Dissident suspects? ISIS are certainly an evil in their fundamentalist Islamic fanaticism, but War begets War, and there is a cause and effect in the scramble to secure control of the region’s Oil, and the mess Iraq and other parts of the near East and North Africa, being in the total mess they are in now because of the West. Extrajudicial Assassinations of these Suspects, may blow up in the States face as it is then perceived as an attack on their Religion itself. Extrajudicial Murder is a thing any so called Liberal Democracy should hold up to Scrutiny by all Citizens”, whether under the jurisdiction of the State, or unwillingly Subjects of it. I hope Sincerely Jeremy Corbyn gets enough votes to secure the Labour leadership, and Joined to Vote for him myself, that Austerity be binned, and Social Justice, Equity and Sanity prevail to temper all War Mongering dispositions for resource control.
The state of the body politic was exposed in Dublin last week as a banker publicly beat his breast given the need for ‘a dig out’ from the gnomes of Zurich. The gentleman concerned took the expression, “laughing all the way to the bank” to greater heights. In a separate development, it is being reported that employers in England are scaling back recruitment in order to avoid paying a living wage.
Politicians here will prevaricate, posture and grind their respective axes, enabling Ms Villiers to wield her financial axe on some of the most vulnerable groups in society as expensive submarines continue to pose a threat to fishermen. The abominable no men wait like Micawber hoping something will turn up or that Mr Cameron and Ms Villiers will do all the dirty work associated with welfare cuts. Pontius Pilate remains a role model for some on the hill.
Curiously enough, Esteemed Blogmeister, we listeners down here in the Free Southern Stateen were treated to a Physician this very morning.
And not only that but to a hyphenated, pontificatory Physician-Politician. Talk about being twice blessed !
Dr. Alastair McDonnell, L’Eminence Grise of the SDLP (for it was he !) was a guest on a very impressed progamme on RTE. Not that he was called upon to hokey-kokey himself, mind. More like, to Paddywhack himself. (see below).
Now, this programme, Yawning Ireland (for it is it !) is renowned for its star performer, The Woodman, whose trademark sound it is which wakes the Free Southern Stateen out of its nocturnal slumbers: whack ! whack ! whack ! Truly is he the The Alarm Clock which continues to give. A true instance of give and tock.
Surprisingly, Cathal Mac Coille (for it is he !) was not the one to woo, oops, to interview the blessed guest this morning, but rather one of The Woodman’s numerous interchangeable little helpers whose name, sadly,a bleary-eared Perkie failed to catch.
Call her, maybe, The Lady in Black.
One chooses that sobriquet for Perkie’s inner fillum buff was reminded of a crucial scene in the eponymous movie. The scene in which the character played by Daniel Radcliffe flails around the darkened drawing room of the uber-spooky, rickety house with an axe in his hand.
He looked, for all the world, as if he was auditioning for a position on Yawning Ireland. Not least because his whack, whack, whacking was all in vain, as his intended,inanimate targets, abandoned Victorian dolls of a bygone era, remained both unimpressed and unscathed.
Alas, ditto with The Lady in Black.
For, the interview turned out to be not so much a question of whack as Paddywhackery sans whack.
Listen up, you unlucky listeners who failed to catch an earful of the good Physician-Politician delivering this dollop of the purest Paddywhackery on to the breakfast tables of the FSS.
To the diffident question about the ‘evidence’ that the IRA still exists, Doc Mack with that fruit-salad bass baritone of his, chose to adopt a specifically peachy tone of preachy voice which must had resulted in even the most sleepyheaded among the listenership to vacate Blanket Street in one bold bound. To stumble down the old alastairs to meet the day.
We’re talking serious bedside manner here, folks.
Listen up:
-Ah, yes. Evidence. It’s generally very well known what’s going on here, perhaps there isn’t the evidence to take something into court. But you know, we have a funny way here in Ireland, north and south, of knowing what’s going on’.
Hmmm.
-And what’s going on here is that people who are well connected to the Republican movement and people who would be doubling up as Sinn Fein election workers and advisers can somehow or other double up after dark, as having guns and taking action to do something’.
Wonder was it a toss of the coin which decided the educated, sophisticated and oh, so renumerated Dr. McDonnell from plonking for medicine over the law?
Hmmmm and Herself.
Moving swiftly on, meanwhile, leaving the above prize exhibit of Paddywhackery from the guest to dangle in the morning air without a whack, the Lady in Black turned to other less horrific matters more suited to Hammer Fillums.
Maybe, on mature recollection, the impressed intereviewer might equally be termed the Lady in White.
Norneverland, being clearly a plain matter of Black and White and shur, we have a way of knowing here in Ireland, north and south, who the boys in the black berets maybe are.
Her mentor, the Woodman, must have been mighty proud of his protege’s prize winning performance.this morning, in Ireland, both n. and s.
Douze points / Dosaen cuilini.
Ar a laghad/ At the very least.
“Dr. Alastair McDonnell, L’Eminence Grise of the SDLP (for it was he !) was a guest on a very impressed progamme on RTE. Not that he was called upon to hokey-kokey himself, mind. More like, to Paddywhack himself.” – Perkin, you really should have a wider audience: can I FB/tweet this little gem?
Feel free, A Mhaistir Ionuin Blog,feel free.
Re.a wider audience?
As long as An Bainisteoir Blog is happy to pick one to function as a sort of Southern Discomfort with brio to the Neo-Unionists in the Free Southern Stateen one will continue to consider it both a hon and priv to tog out with Team Collins.
Quality, not quantity has always been a key element in the escutcheon of the Warbecks. Call it sniffy, but what can one do about one’s DNA?
As the Great Shakes once put it into the mouth of Hamlet when addressing the Strolling Players: ‘the censure of the which one must in your allowance o’erweigh a whole theatre of others’.
(Apologies for this rather bockety original quote; alas, the new, improved DruidShakepeare versh is not yet to hand).
Btw, do you know that Bashar Assad is also a member of Team Collins?
Relax. A different member of the Clan Collins. In an interview the Syrian boss gave some years ago he (gasp) admitted to listening to Phil Collins for relaxation.
Look no further for the Genesis of the civil strife in his country.
Ath mor !
Astute and class Perkin as ever. Your posts are an illumination delivered with verve,- non parel(sp. The Eminent Doctor in Question is a Charlatan and a political opportunist jumping on the Smash SF Bandwagon. History will forget ol Doc Tom(uncle).
History could be harsher, Francis, and remember him…
Hope and History may be forged in Rhyme for human betterment, Jude,
But Alistair and Integrity don’t methinks….the electorate seem to agree.
GRMA, Francis.
We must never go away. Too much gas.
Beir bua !
By George…. George it’s not feigned surprise to know that British Forces were able to ,without hindrance or bother , obliterate Ruhul and Reyaard from the face of Planet Earth ! Now why did they not remove Saddam Hussein and Muammar Gaddafi with the same murderous efficiency if they posed such a gargantuan threat to freedom and democracy…..they have , without the slightest compunction , in their own inimitable psychopathic way murdered millions of innocent men ,women and children since all on the pretext of bringing THEM that same freedom and democracy (Brtiish style). They have left the whole Middle East a cesspool of destruction tribalism and political mayhem ,but then we know all about that strategy in this neck of the woods ,don’t we !
By Seamus….Seamus – I’m sure your right. It would undoubtedly have been better to let Saddam and Muammar carry on running their own affairs – those boys certainly knew how to keep a country under control, I can tell you!
As to the means for their removal, I’m pretty certain that if they could have been removed by “the same murderous efficiency”, they would have been. I’m struggling to see what’s in it for the British and Americans to have their troops being sent home in body bags if the same objective could have been achieved by a drone operator playing war games on his Xbox.
You seem to be adopting the stance of “the enemies of my enemies are my friends” when considering the fate of Ruhul and Reyaard. Whilst that logic might have worked for some when the IRA were snuggling up to Muammar and he was supplying them with weapons, I don’t think the same logic quite applies to the jihadists.
Because to the ISIS jihadists, as far as I know, anyone who isn’t a Muslim is a Kafir. And if you’re a Kafir (and this means you too Seamus) you’re the enemy and you deserve to die in the most horrific way they can dream up. And on TV too (yay for the age of celebrity!).
As far as I know, Britain/Cameron used drones to kill the two British citizens.
Some years ago we discovered that there were a bunch of ‘terrorists’ called the Taleban, who seemed to be superseded by Al Quaeda who then morphed into ISIS.
But where did they come from or how and why did they spring up?
Simple, they were originally Afghans who were being invaded and terrorised by Russia, and surprise, surprise, they decided to fight back (supported by the US) as best they could to defend their country, and finally the Russians withdrew.
Then we had the Americans moving into Afghanistan, then blasting Iraq to smithereens and Al Quaeda appeared as defenders in these areas.
But the Americans weren’t finished and, with the help of the Brits, and claiming they were bringing democracy to the Middle East, they bombed any country which seemed to have a plentiful supply of oil (except Saudi Arabia, good mates of the US), and eventually ISIS started to wage their type of warfare, making claims almost as incredulous as those of the US and UK.
So all these so-called terrorists took up arms in reaction to the bombing of their countries, and now Cameron says he has the solution to conquer these disparate groups . . . and that wonderful solution is . . . more bombing!
How come all the crazies of the world get to be rulers in their own countries?
I was listening to that fair minded, thoughtful man Jim Allister this morning on Nolan. If there is one politician who is not quite right in the head its Jim Allister. Jim literally believes that majority rule can come back here. He believes that vast numbers of people (Nationalists/Catholics to be precise) can simply be ignored. Jim must have been in a coma for the past 4 decades. Jim then went on his usual rant about the PIRA. It was when Stephen Nolan brought up Jim sharing the stage with the UPRG/UDA and PUP/UVF at Twaddell that Jim got very flustered and kept dodging the point made by Stephen Nolan. If only Stephen had the wit about him at the time to mention how the DUP made up its own paramilitary force (Ulster Resistance) at a time when Jim was a DUP member then Jim would’ve REALLY been put on the spot.
But the history of the DUP (and the UUP too) seems to be lost on the media but yet Sinn Fein’s history is always close at hand. How strange. Very, VERY rarely is ever the DUP’s “Ulster Resistance” ever brought up or their cosying up to Loyalist terrorists, even going as far as to represent jailed Loyalists and insisting they are “counter terrorists” while they are in the amidst of murdering hundreds of Catholic civilians. UVF Leader Gusty Spence said the Unionist Stormont (under the UUP) even PAID him to start a “sectarian war”. No, the media, on both sides of the border, seem to have amnesia when it comes to these facts.
Is it possible that hypocrisy is an infectious disease? because it seems to spread like wildfire amongst Unionism.
George ,if you do enough research , you’ll find that ISIS were formed , and are armed by the CIA…..what I have previously stated has absolutely nothing to do with ““the enemies of my enemies “….I’m not in denial about the IRA procuring weapons from Libya ,just as Unionism obtained similar from South Africa ,Israel etc etc…..what I was stating is the undeniable truth that ,behind that cloak of supposed fair-play and respectability , lies an insidious monstrous murder machine responsible for more death and destruction on this planet than any in history…..” Murder and Mayhem incorporated “…..yes that is Britain…
As Queen Elizabeth II tomorrow becomes the longest reigning British Monarch in History (beating Queen Victoria, yes the same Victoria that oversaw the Irish “Famine” aka Genocide) its important to remember when you see Elizabeth Windsor in glamorous photographs, wearing sweeping majestic robes and be decked in Gold jewellery, that the Diamonds in the Crown she’s wearing were dug out of the Earth by slaves of the British Empire and stolen from Africa and India and are withheld to this very day.
What of force of good the British Empire was…