June, 2016

It’s nearly fifty three years since Martin Luther King stood by the Lincoln Memorial in Washington and gave a brilliant, classically constructed and incontrovertible speech ending with the rousing “I have a Dream” .  To read just the ending is as childish as eating the icing of a cake and ignoring the cake itself. In […]

 I was rather impressed by Mr. Gove’s recent performance on the debate about the EU and why states should exit from it. A friend asked me if I found it ”distasteful” to be on the ”same side” as Michael Gove – to which I asserted that, one never finds it distasteful to have allies, especially […]

  Sometimes it’s the small things.  I’ve been peeking into a library book called Ever the Diplomat that’s found its way onto our coffee table.  It’s the memoirs of a man called  Sherard Cowper-Coles, who worked in the British Foreign Office all his life. The writing style is dull and I have no ambition to plough through […]

  Muhammed Ali and I were not exact contemporaries. I was 20 days his senior. He only got into boxing at the age of 12 whereas I was involved somewhat earlier. With Ali, at 12, it started when his bike was nicked and a policeman suggested that the noble art of self-defence might lessen the chances of […]

I am not really a sports fan, but can appreciate a good competitive contest especially when there is an element of Irish or home county interest. It may be some years before Armagh football can reach the heady levels of the 2000s what with the rising quality of so many teams throughout the country, in […]

Niall’s remarks at the launch of the Maguire Report http://krw-law.ie/poni-loughinisland/ Link to the Maguire Report:  www.policeombudsman.org/getmedia/2952cfb0-4403-4e31-a349-e0a2b632e089/Loughinisland-Report.pdf?ext=.pdf<https://www.policeombudsman.org/getmedia/2952cfb0-4403-4e31-a349-e0a2b632e089/Loughinisland-Report.pdf?ext=.pdf> My interview with Niall Murphy yesterday, Saturday 11 June 2016  

“It is important that students bring a certain ragamuffin, barefoot irreverence to their studies; they are not here to worship what is known, but to question it.” Jacob Bronoski, author of “The Ascent of Man” put it just like that. Some ideas and books can shape your understanding of reality and have a profound effect […]

As a teenager growing up in a republican community that experienced so many British army and RUC raids, you can imagine my surprise when a friend called me over into their home to listen to a record he had bought called ‘God Save The Queen’ by the Sex Pistols.  My initial reaction was shock and […]

Well, blow me over!  No sooner do I relate an ancient story of a farmer’s visit to Lisdoonvarna than I see a story in THE IRISH TIMES of a farmer being recommended such a visit by a District Court and the shock and horror arising. The 60 year old bachelor farmer from an isolated part of […]

I had an interesting exchange of tweets with Mick Fealty of sluggerotoole yesterday. The topic was state agents and the extent to which they could be given the go-ahead in breaking the law. Mick seemed keen to use Freddie Scappaticci as the sole example. Was it right that Scappaticci should have been allowed to proceed […]