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Isn’t it remarkable in this decade of remembrance, how dependent citizens of Ireland’s independent state are on British political, military and academic authorities and on Irish-based agencies and individuals enjoying British patronage and support, for informed, balanced and unbiased instruction on the origins of the Irish state?
Think of Michael Portillo, the hard nosed Conservative Minister for War who, in office ,posed as a British Bovver Boy of the Norman Tebbit school, and, when booted out by the electorate adopted the persona of a cultured European, and is welcomed in Ireland to explained how the 1916 Insurgents were a bunch of bunglers.
As the blue-eyed boy of Tory Central Office, Portillo was parachuted into one of the safest Tory seats in Parliament. By neglecting the concerns of his constituents he lost the seat and the prospect of becoming Prime Minister. By contrast the 1916 “Bunglers” created an independent state and ran its affairs for fifty years without British supervision or condescension.
But, lo! all has been changed, changed utterly, and a terrible abortion inflicted on the Irish Body Politicking!
Think of THE IRISH TIMES, under the direction of a Trust first controlled by the Monocled MI5 Spook, Major McDowell, a Titus Oates-bound Secret Society, set up by Harold Wilson’s shadiest fixer, Lord Goodman. (Another Noble Lord publicly accused Goodman of fiddling him out of millions of pounds over a number of years. ) But where can an intelligent citizen find regular,trustworthy guidance on their own communities and affairs of the outside world, except in the sacred columns of THE IRISH TIMES? Certainly not in THE IRISH INDEPENDENT a regurgitated BRITISH BULLDOG’S DINNER!
An example of the British vocation for instructing the lesser breeds in how to run their affairs is well illustrated by an account in the New Statesman (sometime in the 1930s) of an “interview” conducted by H.G. Wells with Josef Stalin. It appears as the kind of lecture an omniscient teacher might give to a slow-witted pupil. Wells was the teacher and did about 90% of the talking. I don’t know if the pupil was allowed to smoke, but I imagine he pulled patiently on his pipe, for his short replies were well informed, and remarkably polite when faced by such a condescending ninny. Not only did Stalin display a better grasp of world history than Wells, but a more thorough and more nuanced appreciation of British history.
The piece is reproduced in an anthology printed in 1963 to celebrate the “Staggers’ ” 50th year. It is followed by a commentary. by Bernard Shaw, but even I could see what an Ass Wells made of himself. I’d love to know what Stalin said to his cronies about the encounter.
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