There are two traditional schools of thought – OK, two blinkered positions – about the reunification of Ireland.
The first of these argues that reunification is the Holy Grail, and that when you’re seeking the Holy Grail, you don’t get into long discussions about what a Grail is or what shape it should take in a reunited Ireland. Just plough ahead, get the Brits out, and then we’ll sort it.
The second argues that reunification is a distraction, a blood tradition that has claimed far too many lives down the centuries, and that we must devote ourselves to the things of every-day life – the bread-and-butter issues. And don’t forget, you can’t eat a flag.
We are living in a time which is poised on the brink of great change. There are the millions of displaced people desperately seeking a home somewhere, anywhere. There is the brutal pounding of Aleppo, including the deliberate bombing of hospitals, all in the name of countering the threat of ISIS. But another change factor is not just on our doorstep, it’s inside the house threatening to do everything from rearrange the furniture to knocking the walls down. Right, Virginia. We’re talking Brexit.
Uniquely, Brexit has managed to bring together the Irish constitutional question and the bread-and-butter question. As was once the case with love and marriage, you can’t have one without the other.
If you’re a small or medium business in, say, Newry, you may be pleased with the plummeting pound. All those people from the south coming north to spend their enhanced-value euro. Alternatively, if you live in Dundalk and a great proportion of your sales are to clients in the north, you’re reeling under a financial hammer-blow. Suddenly, your income may have dropped 10, 20, 30%. Very few businesses can take that kind of punishment for long.
Woven into the financial issues are pressing questions. Would Ireland be better off financially if it was an economic unit from Derry to Dingle? There have always been those who believed this was the case. They are now being joined by others who, seeing the sudden and frightening effects of the drop in the value of sterling, and faced with a very messy divorce from the EU, are beginning to think again about a flag as a major part of their diet.
Yesterday I put up a hilarious video by Fascinating Aida, where three English women begged the forgiveness of Scotland for having made a bone-stupid decision on the EU. “Save us, Scotland!” they cried.
But Scotland will be intent on saving Scotland, just as Ireland north and south will be intent on saving Ireland. The fact that both Scotland and the north of Ireland will be allowed ‘input’ before Theresa May, in magnificent isolation, goes to bargain over an exit from Europe she has already committed to, means diddly-squat.
Better Together: that was the mantra of the pro-union forces in the Scottish independence referendum. It could be applied to Ireland north and south today. Arlene Foster may toss her head at the idea of an all-Ireland forum to seek routes to financial survival. But God and Allah be praised, there are few in the north or south who agree with her.
Brexit is coming. And when it arrives, all of the old certainties will be swept away. No need to choose between food on the table and the flag on the pole. The constitutional position will decide the quality of our nutrition. With Britain headed down a very rocky road for the foreseeable future, the fear is that she’ll take the rest of us with her.
Wherever you are shopping, bring a currency basket. It might do no harm to have a few farthings, sixpences, florins and 10 shilling notes if heading to the ‘mainland’. There is also a run on half-crowns throughout the country as pounds sterling languish on life support systems surrounded with, ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ signs. Tourists report sightings of the invisible hand of the market and money still talks. At present, it is fond of saying, “Goodbye.” Given the road to Dublin is no longer rocky, financial consultants continue to advocate investment funds, others prefer to squander money on food and clothing.
Fitting in a literary way, Esteemed Blogmeister, that you should mention Aleppo and Scotland in your blog today.
The first time one ever heard tell of Aleppo was in the first act of the first play by The Great Shakes that one encountered on the school curriculum. That was The Scottish Play, aka Macbeth in which the First Witch croaks:
-A sailor’s wife had chestnuts in her lap
And munched and munched and munched;
Her husband’s to Aleppo gone, master of the Tiger.
Indeed, not only was it the first time one heard of Aleppo but it was also the last time for the longest time, till recent years when it became a cold household name. A depot for contending forces each intent of gaining repo in the manner of a Zeppelin rigid aircraft dropping heavy metal barrel bombs with a marksman called, perhaps, Zeppo, at the helm.
With, just maybe, a version of Stairway to Hell in the background.
But, back to Brexit.
Not the least enjoyable collateral gammon and spinach caused by the Big B has been the sight and sound of the hackitariat of the Morsupial media on Liffeyside hopping this way and that in the outback of Downunder the Dyke of the Black Sow.
Morsupial, of course, is derived from the welding together of relevant portions of Moral and Superiority. Ever since the theme tune of the Troubles bubbled over in the Wee Sax.
If Australia has its Ayers Rock then the Free Southern Stateen has its own, erm, Nay-Sayers Rock.
Chief among the nay-saying cobbers is J. Augustine Murphy, Emeritus Prof of Detritus Studies in the Queens’ College, Cork who likes to howl like a dingo in de lingo of Leeside and in the letter columns of The Unionist Times and its broadcasting wing, RTE too.
Not unlike de Bould Thady Quill, a fellow Re-bel County man of his own, J.A.M. is a great man entirely for de ramblin’ and de sportin’.
– Dat de only ting, like, which unites de Re-bel County of Cork and de Re-bel County of Armagh is de odd game of road bowling, like. But dat is a paltry hunch in favour of a United Ireland and hardly deserves to be munched, like.
Little surprise then that dis Ultimate 26 County Man (and proud of it, like) is known as :
-The Rhombo of Rhombicuboctahedron Republic of Ireland.
(For those who could never claim to be the Geronimo of Geometry, btw, the long R-word there has, erm, 26 faces).
But now Brexit has suddenly and thoughtlessly rendered the Morsupial stance redundant. The only thing less reprehensible than unearned Moral Superiority is inherited unearned Moral Superiority.
Time for the wannabe Wallabies and other wallies of West Britiannia to do a little thinking for a change (of climatic proportions). For starters, they could ditch this already beginning to shred and almost dead new chestnut:
-The Rhombicuboctahedron Republic of Ireland is now the only English-speaking in the EU !
Too much time already spent by Eurocrats listening in vain to that product of the Bad Grammar School System, Ber T de Tee Shock, Master of the Celtic Tiger, for to buy that particular Red Ahearn.
– I done, I seen, automatic teller machine.
Time, perhaps, for Des Carty , the Gaelic man in the street equivalent of the Gallic Descartes, to let his own mind, if he still has one, to think on its own two tweets and come up with his distinctive versh in Erse of :
-Cogito, ergo sum.
Say:
-Smaoinim, mar sin taim.
Is this likely to happen? In the word of Davidson, har’ly. After all , in that chart which The Perkin’s inner sane scientist periodically likes to look at, the number for iron and the Republic of Irony alike is:
-26.
To conclude as one started, with (yawn, stretch but no trouser cough) with The Great Shakes: the 26th and last letter in the German Q’s alphabet is:
-Z.
The same letter which The Bard described as:
-That unnecessary letter.
Alas, the real winner from yesterday’s Budget, according to Con Sensus, the spokesperson for the monominded and Morsupial Media in DOBland, was the Lesbian Minister for Children, Ms. Katerine Zapone, aka
-Z.
Many chestnuts to munch upon here in the long nights and soundbytes after Sow and so on, ochone.