Has Micheál Martin gone mad? The answer is definitely Yes, if you mean has he gone ballistic. But if you mean has he gone insane…well, maybe you should judge for yourself.
The leader of Fianna Fail (Soldiers of Destiny) was speaking at the Fianna Fail commemoration of 1916 at Arbour Hill yesterday. He claims the Shinners are trying to rewrite history and are claiming continuity with the men and women of 1916. He says Sinn Féin came into being in 1970 to support a violent campaign which “the Irish people” rejected for quarter of a century.
Ah here, Micheál. The IRA as self-starting psychopaths – if only things were that simple. Has word not filtered through to you yet about the burning of Bombay Street? Or Bloody Sunday? Surely someone has mentioned to you the Dublin and Monaghan bombs? And I know you were a bit young at the time, but somebody must have spoken to you of your fellow-countyman Jack Lynch’s famous TV broadcast, where he expressed outrage at the assault on the Bogside by loyalists, B men and the RUC?
OK, let’s look at some other stuff you say. “Unable to achieve the electoral breakthrough they long claimed was inevitable, they (republicans) are now using more underhand methods to legitimize themselves.”
To borrow a word, Micheál: wow. Did you know that Sinn Féin are the biggest non-unionist party in the north? That their number of TDs jumped from 14 to 23 in February? And that they’re now the biggest political party in Ireland? And it does seem – brace yourself for this one, Micheál – as if they’re not done yet.
But this exhibition of theirs has really got to you, I can see that. The Shinners, you say are “twisting history”. Eh? And what’s more, “They claim that to honour Pearse, Clarke and Plunkett, you must honour a sinister organization which tried to destroy this State and continues to refuse to subject its members to the laws enacted by the Irish people”.
No, seriously, Micheál. I’m wracking my brains but I honestly can’t remember the IRA (that is the sinister organization you’re talking about, isn’t it? Because there were a number of such organisations up here for several decades) – I can’t remember the IRA engaging in a campaign of violence against the twenty-six counties. If they were, they showed a shocking ignorance of geography, since 99% of their campaign was waged outside the twenty-six counties.
You end your impassioned speech by saying the IRA from the early part of the century “joined parties which embraced other ways of promoting the cause of Ireland” (that’s code for Fianna Fail and Fine Gael). True enough. But then the IRA from the more recent Troubles became a party which embraced other ways of promoting the cause of Ireland. Looks like a reasonable parallel to me.
Please don’t misunderstand, Micheál: I feel your pain. Naturally you’re intent on getting your retaliation in first, before the Shinners have their commemoration of the Rising this coming weekend. You’re worried that people might see parallels between the two Troubles, might see the sacrifice of the seven signatories in 1916 echoed by the sacrifice of the ten hunger-strikers in 1981.
In short, you’re in a wee bit of a spluttering funk that somehow, the Irish people might notice that the cause for which the men and women of 1916 fought – a 32-county Irish republic – was the same cause for which the IRA of the 1970s and 1980s fought. If you’re horrified by the violence, that’s understandable – conflict is indeed a brutal, bloody business. But you’ll have to be horrified by the republican violence of both periods, or else embrace the republican violence of both periods. For you to do anything else would be a pretty bare-faced attempt at..what was it?.. Ah yes. Twisting history.
Well written Jude, Mr Martin like alot of other ‘establishment’ figures in the 26 counties have a collective amnesia with matters concerning to our troubled period in the 6 counties, they are just basically lackies for the british establishment and have been singing from the same hymn sheet and it is continually being recycled by their organs in the press!
grma, Paul…
“recycled by their organs in the press”, now that would be a sight for sore eyes.
In among his commentary was his demand that the Irish and British governments must intervene to end the dominance of Sinn Fein and the DUP in the North. A barely veiled call for the dismantling of the partnership government enshrined in the GFA and a return to majoritarian rule. His bedfellows in the SDLP who are pondering establishing an official opposition with elements of unionism will welcome that.
Has nobody told Micheál that the troubles ended almost 20 years. Or perhaps he forgot that a Government led by his party helped put Sinn Féin in power. At that time, indeed, Sinn Féin had only one TD in Dáil Éireann, Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin in Cavan. 20 years later they are the second largest party in the northern assembly and as you pointed out their vote in the south has increased exponentially. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael from their foundation to the present day have sought to bolster and maintain partition. They have introduced no legislation to extend voting rights to Irish citizens in the northern counties. They have stood over policies which makes it almost impossible to exercise your rights as an Irish citizen and which makes Irish citizens subject to a hostile foreign government. To paraphrase Shakespeare the gentleman ‘doth protest too much, methinks.’
“…And I know you were a bit young at the time, but somebody must have spoken to you of your fellow-countyman Jack Lynch’s famous TV broadcast, where he expressed outrage at the assault on the Bogside by loyalists, B men and the RUC?”
The outrage goes on given a recent decision by the Victims and Survivors Service to award “The Specials” £13,000 on top of two separate awards of £9,630 and £3,200 respectively. Perhaps someone ought to advise the Commissioner that the British Government accepted the recommendations of the Hunt committee (1969) on policing in Northern Ireland which included the abolition of the Ulster Special Constabulary, know as the ‘B Specials’, seen by many as a Protestant army.
There has been no comment from the Victims and Survivors Service, no doubt in the interests of National Security. Some of the files about 1969 will remain under lock and key until 2022.
Didn’t the Bard also say,
“There is no legacy so rich as honesty”
Micheál Martin and his party fiddled whilst Northern Catholic homes burned..took their usual stance, that of The three monkeys. what an endearing bunch they are.
Micheal and Unionists have one thing in common: they have a liking for trying to rewrite history. But to be fair to Micheal he is very good at it compared to Unionism but not good enough….
I would honestly say that the majority of the Irish people, North and South, do see parallels between what the men/women of 1916 did and what the men/women of 1970 did in the North, though both situations were different in some aspects too. The men/women of 1916 eventually got the support of the vast majority of the people in Ireland. Whereas the IRA of 1970 was in a gerrymandered, Unionist majority state which got support from the minority. I believe the main reason why the IRA continually received support was due to the murders carried out by the British Army and Unionist paramilitaries, who foolishly thought by murdering Catholics that would WEAKEN support for the IRA, instead it did the opposite. The aftermath of Bloody Sunday is a prime example, where young people flocked to join the IRA in Derry. Ivan Cooper, I believe, said Bloody Sunday was “a Victory for the IRA”. Unionist paramilitaries didn’t wage war against the IRA, they waged a murder campaign against the Catholic community, they openly admit that.
The support for the IRA wasn’t officially seen until the Hunger Strikes. Bobby Sands was elected to Westminster. He got 30,000 votes, 10,000 more than Margaret Thatcher received. Other hunger strikers were elected to the Dail. It’s been wrote that the Hunger Strikers success was a “hammer blow” to political Unionism and it utterly defeated Thatchers criminalization tactics. When Bobby Sands died his funeral was attended by over 100,000 people. These facts alone show that Micheal’s assertion that the IRA had “no support” from the Irish people is utterly false. Indeed after Bloody Sunday the British embassy in Dublin was burnt down and British businesses were boycott, many of them going out of business.
I cant help but detect frustration from Micheal, frustration I’m sure comes from the fact Fianna Fail cant ride two horses at once and that Sinn Fein is very likely to be the official Opposition in the South. We heard Dolores Kelly from the SDLP saying SF “just” got 9 TD’s in the South’s election. We heard the same from Arlene Foster. There is a determined effort to downplay SF’s success in the South. I must admit its the first time I ever heard of anyone describing a political party increasing its seats in parliament by around 75% as “disappointing”, that’s how the likes of the DUP/SDLP described SF’s success. An image of an Ostrich with its head in the ground comes to mind…..
Perhaps Micheál would inform us what exactly ,this pseudo republican party, “The Soldiers of Destiny”, have done in the last 100 years to promote Irish unity. He rants ,less than eloquently ,about the stranglehold that a two major party government is having on the six occupied counties without noticing the irony involving two major pro unionist parties in the 26. Perhaps he could explain why ,under FF’s watch , two British spies could effortlessly escape from custody….one of whom went on to reside with Thomas Watt….the man who framed ” The Birmingham six “. Perhaps he could explain why FF has been less than vocal about justice for the families of the Dublin and Monaghan bombings , about British state collusion and their involvement in countless murders including many women and children ,about the murder of lawyers etc. Perhaps he could explain why they bother with Arbour Hill or Bodenstown when they obviously abhor everything Republicanism stands for (including the re-unification of our country ). Micheál , this may be a beautiful verdant country but the people are most certainly not green….history will not look kindly on you and your cronies !
Scarcely have you ever written a truer phrase, Esteemed Blogmeister: ‘I feel your pain’.
It cannot be easy being the House-trained Martin aka the biggest puppet of the feathered variety since Emu. Just imagine having the right hand of the Rod Hull of Hibernia stuck up one’s back-passage to its very elbow every time one makes an oh !-shaped oration in public.
(Pause to wipe the tears from one’s eyes).
Emu, of course, was the mute, highly aggressive puppet based on the Australian flightless bird, who famously turned on his host Michael Parkinson and turned this seemingly smooth and allegedly sophisticated talk show host into (gasp) Narky Parky.
Although this legendary moment in the Back Story of Broadcasting (taking its glorious place fittingly beside another fabulous moment in the same BS –the walking off the set by the Bee Gees from the oily, jive-talking Clive Anderson Show) took place in 1976 the same Parkinson featured as recently as last month on the (gulp) obsequious Mimsy O’Call-again Show.
Where, for the (yawn) umpteenth time, Parkie opted to park his Nark, not.
Ireland’s own Harris (for it is he !) has obviously chosen to make his own feathered puppet emulate Emu. Having noted that this is the 40TH Anniversary of that memorable moment in medialand the Rod Hull of Hibernia’s inner historian chose Arbour Hill to park his narky barking puppet, oops, the Patriotic Patriarch of the Real Republican Party, actually.
The choral wing of this party of pockmarked oligarchs and other mohaired loan-sharks suitably brought the solemn occasion to a fitting end, choosing as they did to trace their party’s origins back to – for starters, in song, to;
( All together now )
-Bould Robert Emu, the daaaaaaarling of Erin !
“He claims the Shinners are trying to rewrite history and are claiming continuity with the men and women of 1916. He says Sinn Féin came into being in 1970 to support a violent campaign which “the Irish people” rejected for quarter of a century. Ah here, Micheál. The IRA as self-starting psychopaths – if only things were that simple. Has word not filtered through to you yet about the burning of Bombay Street? Or Bloody Sunday? Surely someone has mentioned to you the Dublin and Monaghan bombs? And I know you were a bit young at the time, but somebody must have spoken to you of your fellow-countyman Jack Lynch’s famous TV broadcast, where he expressed outrage at the assault on the Bogside by loyalists, B men and the RUC?”
Bombay Street, Bloody Sunday and Dublin/Monaghan don’t alter the fact that the Irish people rejected the Provo campaign. And the latter two happened after the Provos had been formed.
“If you’re horrified by the violence, that’s understandable – conflict is indeed a brutal, bloody business. But you’ll have to be horrified by the republican violence of both periods, or else embrace the republican violence of both periods”
Does that apply to you, too, Jude? You embrace the republican violence of 1916, so does that mean you embrace the Provo campaign?
Answer him the way he answers every question posed to him, jude. With a throwaway”So what”.
If the violence of the Troubles is morally wrong, and it is, then the fault lies at the feet of those that started it – the Unionist state.
It certainly wasn’t the PIRA – they did not exist when the Unionist state burned out, battered and murdered citizens of the state.
If they hadn’t started anything, there wouldn’t have been anything.
“If the violence of the Troubles is morally wrong, and it is, then the fault lies at the feet of those that started it – the Unionist state.”
Responsibility for violence lies with those who comitted the violence.
“It certainly wasn’t the PIRA – they did not exist when the Unionist state burned out, battered and murdered citizens of the state.”
They did exist from December 1969 and for the next 30 and more years during which they murdered nearly 2000 people, maimed countless more, and destroyed thousands of families.
I remember the decades of Unionists and their fellow travellers mocking those murdered on Bloody Sunday as being terrorists and deserving what they got. A group of people so obviously innocent, with a judicial investigation so obviously a whitewash.
The Unionist and British state denied civil rights to a nationality. The Unionist and then the British states murdered people of that nationality. They both protected the murderers of members of that nationality. The Unionist and British states declared war on that nationality.
The PIRA are responsible, culpable and face many valid criticisms. In the very same way you refuse to hold the British army to account either in Ireland or Iraq.
John Lennon put it best – Between peace and war I choose peace. Between the IRA and the British Army, I choose the IRA.
Every single criticism that can be levelled at any of the IRAs, also applies to the British army, and on a far larger scale. Kenya.
“The PIRA are responsible, culpable and face many valid criticisms.”
I’m glad you agree.
“In the very same way you refuse to hold the British army to account either in Ireland or Iraq.”
When was this?
“When was this?”
Why it was right now.
If you can point to where I’ve done so, please do.
Regarding the re-writing of history Micheál is no amateur. Some years back he unveiled a monument in Wexford to Francis Drake. Drake massacred the entire population, men women and children, hundreds of them. But then he did it in the name of Queen Elizabeth. And they were northerners. So that’s all right.
2 mistakes on my part. First the Drake monument unveiling was in Carraigaline Co. Cork, not Wexford. Secondly I omitted to mention that the slaughter of Innocents took place on Rathlin Island. But since it was done in the name of Elizabeth Regina and the victims were northerners that makes it ok.
Martin’s feeble efforts at electioneering in Arbour Hill also included the line –
“…we need direct engagement by both the British and Irish governments to end the stranglehold in Stormont by two parties.”
This is just mealy mouthed bullshit until such point as FF start contesting elections in the north. Actions speak louder than words and all that. We saw more than a few mentions of the north by FG, FF and Labour in the election process, but suprise surprise! They don’t actually give a shit! The dreadful co-opting of M**** C***** into the Seanad was the most cynical piece of politicking I can remember for a long time.
Until FF and FG start to meaningfully engage in politics within the north, it’s pretty clear what there motivations are. If I was any good with Photoshop, I might even be inclined to stick a sledgehammer wielding Martin and Kenny in front of poster reading ‘Smash Sinn Féin’.