June, 2017

Photo by Hannah McKay /Reuters The attack on London Bridge yesterday and on a market nearby has immediately raised a number of questions, the most immediate one being, will this affect the outcome of the British general election? Well, it’s unlikely to affect the outcome in Fermanagh/South Tyrone or in North Belfast, but it could […]

  When Mr Trump was elected President of the US a friend from America wrote ‘We live in dark times.’ Little did I realise just how dark they were going to be. When Trump pulled the US out of the historic Paris Climate Agreement of 2015, it shows that we live in dark times. After all the US is the world’s largest carbon […]

Pics 1-3 are by Antrim Lens   Pic 1 Pic 2 Pic 3  “Only one outing with the camera this week and it was to Castle Ward. First photo is of a young girl standing in the walled garden as the heavens opened. As I was taking the tour of the house this group of […]

  Hindus have welcomed Hindu descent Dr. Leo Varadkar, 38, on being in line for being the youngest and 13th Prime Minister (Taoiseach) of Ireland.   Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, said that Hindu community world over was pleased at his elevation to this position and was hoping that […]

Schadenfreude, as you probably know, is that dancing, hidden delight you feel when someone you know bashes their shins and falls in the mud. It doesn’t have to be literally shins and mud, of course. It can happen in a TV interview, especially during an election campaign. In Britain last week, it happened to Michael […]

  For at least the last twenty years now, parents, who are committed Catholics, often worry that their children, especially in their teenage years are losing their religion and rejecting the religious practices that they still hold dear. They are thinking especially of weekly attendance at Mass, supporting the parish, keeping the commandments etc. Many […]

Every so often in life you meet people who leave a real and lasting impression. Last year, I travelled to the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon with Norway’s largest trade union – Fagforbundet – and Norwegian Peoples Aid. There we met Ahed Baar. Ahed’s first memories are from the narrow alleyways of Shatila refugee camp in […]

Below are two short videos chopped ( no, I DON’T know why they chopped, Virginia, but I assure you it was technological incompetence, not hawk-eyed censorship) from my interview with John Finucane yesterday. John is an immensely important acquisition by Sinn Féin, and I would rate his campaign in North Belfast up there with the […]

It’s never a good thing to get into a bout of whataboutery live on television when debating the current state of affairs in Norneverland.Mark Carruthers had set up a panel of party representatives currently about to joust the coming election. All the usual suspects were there ,prepared to have their say .Sinn Fein, the DUP, […]

I always think it’s right to be respectful in politics, particularly towards women, who are our sisters, mothers, aunts, daughters and grandparents. As a child, I remember a grey era in politics, which was dominated by figures like Anne Widdecombe and Edwina Currie; where women could only go far in political parties if they towed […]