September, 2025

Trump the Peacemaker: An Irish perspective Whilst we can’t say for certain of course, it seems likely, that if Donald Trump had not been elected President in his first term (2017-2021), the war in Afghanistan would still be raging away. Either way, Trump’s decision to make peace with the Taliban, even allowing for those final shambolic […]

                  The Genocide in Gaza Goes on by Joe McVeigh  During the last 22 months, at least 63,000 civilians have been killed in Gaza by the Israeli government. At least 240 journalists have been killed by the IDF. Of these 193 were Palestinians who were trying to […]

The Genocide in Gaza Goes on by Joe McVeigh  During the last 22 months, at least 63,000 civilians have been killed in Gaza by the Israeli government. At least 240 journalists have been killed by the IDF. Of these 193 were Palestinians who were trying to let the outside world know the truth about what […]

The charitable way to think of Gavin Robinson’s denunciations this morning is that he feels the hot breath of Jim Allister on his collar and is anxious to be just as anti-republican and anti-nationalist as Jim. The considerably less charitable way to think of what he said is that he actually believes it. So what […]

If you leaf through the digitised Long Kesh journals, freshly curated by the University of Galway, you might be tempted to sneer at them as the naïve doodlings of young men with too much time and too little sense. There’s a grain of truth in that — but it’s a lazy truth, the kind preferred […]

If you were to look through the digitized journals from Long Kesh, now being curated by the University of Galway, you might see them as the naïve hopes of idealistic young men. There’s some truth in that, but they tell us more. They show creativity under constraint. These were young men who used their time […]

So Mary Lou McDonald has made it clear she’s not running for President of Ireland. How will Sinn Féin now act ? If they don’t support Catherine Connolly, they’ll be damned for splintering the left in Irish politics; if they do support Connolly,  they’ll be maybe seen as acquiescing to a candidate choice made by […]

The Road to Now.By Randall Steohen Hall.Replacement track from 1983EXPRESS TO NOWHERE.By MUDS MUNTU 1983.Stephen Hall, Julian FowlerPeter Loughridge, guesr on fine trumpetListen to Express to Nowhere by Mudsi Muntu on #SoundCloudhttps://on.soundcloud.com/roKTOFWCHnFEBuW2l3Belfast. Back in 1980 I was an art studentin my final year, preparing for a degree show where the students would gather their work […]

  Angela Rayner’s downfall did not arrive in the blaze of oratory she might have imagined, nor in the thunder of the Tory benches she once relished skewering. No, it came courtesy of that most British of assassins: paperwork. Not a sword, not a scandal of the flesh, but the dreary, beige villainy of stamp […]

We’ve had a lot of positive feedback about our interview with Chris Donnelly last Wednesday, so today Pat and I look at what he said and the implications.    The weather woman Joanne Thompson has declared herself a candidate for President of Ireland. Is this a joke, or has she as much right to put […]