Author Jude Collins

The British people are celebrating their queen’s 70th anniversary – and why wouldn’t they? Surely every country has a right to choose its head of state? Or are there aspects of monarchy that clash with the notion of democracy? As you may imagine, Pat and I really get our teeth into this one. There are […]

    Nearly all of the European countries ganging up on Russia today promoted fascism abroad, established it at home or were liberated from it by the Soviet Union.   First into the field was Great Britain which had Mussolini on its payroll since 1917 and made him a Knight of the Bath  in 1923. Churchill […]

Got your bunting out? And your hat? And flags? Good, good, good. I hear the weather in London is perfect – as it should be, given this is the platinum anniversary of the coronation of H M Queen Elizabeth. (Never mind asking ‘What is platinum’, Victoria. Platinum is beside the point.) Other countries envy the […]

    What do these four separate events have in common? The Nakba as many people are already aware refers to the mass expulsion of ethnic Palestinians from their homes towns and villages in 1948. Over 750 000 old men, young women, mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, fled for the lives ,under the threat […]

    On April 1st  1919 the second session of the First Dail Eireann met privately in Dublin. Sinn Fein’s President. Eamon de Valera, who had recently been sprung from Lincoln Prison was elected “Priomh-Aire” or First Minister but this was translated as President (of  Dail Eireann0, He appointed Ministers for   Home Affairs, Foreign Affairs,Defence,  […]

Let’s imagine you’re thinking of setting up a bucket business. You want your bucket firm to be the best there is, benefiting you and everyone in the bucket world. Who would you turn to for guidance? If I suggested Joe Bloggs, whose bucket factory went out of business some fifteen years ago, would you think […]

  Last  night (Sunday) I accidentally turned on Sky News. And briefly stepped into a  dirty piece of propaganda calculated to persuade its viewers that President Putin was a deluded clown obsessed with personal power. A few days ago I watched a video of the Russian addressing an international security conference in Munich 15 years ago in […]

That big Orange march on Saturday – was it threatening violence?  You ‘ d say no – it all passed off peacefully. But if the Rev Mervyn Gibson says “We are British and British we’ll stay – No Surrender!” – is that not putting the finger up to what the GFA has promised? Dublin Airport […]

  Dear Cousin Trevor, Aw boys, you missed it, Trevor… I know, I know – when a kicking heifer kicks you in your reproductive areas, the only thing for it is the bed. I know that. But boys a boys, you missed it. It was powerful. The whole shebang was organised by the Orange Order, […]

Are you familiar with Politico? No, nor me, until I noted that Suzanne Lynch, who was The Irish Times correspondent in Washington, left that paper and joined Politico as one of their staff in Brussels. I like Suzanne and not just because she chaired the launch of my book Martin McGuinness: the man I knew […]