Ireland's political and cultural magazine
Close analysis suggests Leo Varadkar (not for hanging out in Phoenix Park), Micheál Martin and (perhaps) Dominic Cummings should all resign, for basic and flagrant breach of lockdown rules. By Michael Smith. We are all fed up with plague restrictions. Some of them were disproportionate; some of them are needed and will continue to be […]
A gunrunner in the family. By David Burke. Haughey’s father Seán (on the right) who was one of Michael Collins’ most trusted officers. Collins chose him for one of his most sensitive secret operations. THE HAUGHEY FAMILY AND THE WAR OF INDEPENDENCE Haughey’s parents, Seán and Sarah (nee McWilliams), were born and reared almost next […]
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Once upon a time the US produced lacerating protest singers. Not any more. It has fallen to the Irish to fill the gap. Paddy Goodwin and the Holy Ghosts’ new song, ‘Jesus Is My Vaccine’, was written in anger at the treatment meted out by the knuckle-dragging neanderthals who abused nurses during the recent anti-lockdown […]
By Michael Smith. The danger: farce When Napoleon III, nephew of the dictator Napoleon Bonaparte became dictator of France himself in 1851, Karl Marx wrote: “Hegel remarks somewhere that all great world-historic facts and personages appear, so to speak, twice. He forgot to add: the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce”. The problem: last marriage […]
The Assistant Editor of the Irish Times distorted the truth about the Arms Crisis. He was a friend of both the chief of staff of the Official IRA and the Taoiseach, ‘Honest’ Jack Lynch. The Official IRA had a vested interest in manipulating the story. Over time, the journalist portrayed Lynch as the hapless victim […]
By Dr Peter Doran, Katherine Trebeck and Dr Tony Shannon. WELLBEING ECONOMY AGENDA FOR PEOPLE AND PLANET “Country marks a commons of earth and elements: a shared ecology of lands and waters”. (Richard Kearney and Sheila Gallagher, 2017) The Green Party may be lining up as relatively junior partners in the new government formation but […]
Named one of Time’s ‘100 Most Influential People’ in both 2004 and 2015, Irish-American Samantha Power served as US President Obama’s human rights advisor for four years and a further four as US UN Ambassador. She is famed for her achievements but also for her conscience. Samantha Power was born in 1970 to Dubliner Jim Power, […]
Two recent hearings of the Independent Investigation Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) in London heard arguments for and against abandoning its investigation into the allegation of sexual abuse made against the late Greville Janner. Now the Chair of the IICSA has determined that this module will go ahead but that the majority of its evidence will […]
An Indian woman’s experience of isolation downs and ups on Irish shores. By Mehar Luthra I was about to leave and take the bus to the university when I got a call from one of my classmates. An older Irishwoman, she asked me if I needed her help with anything and implored me to give her […]
Séamas Ó Tuathail was the first journalist to discover details of what was to become known as the Arms Crisis but chose not to report it. Unbeknownst to him, some of the information he dug up was relayed to a British journalist by a talkative senior member of the IRA. The resulting British newspaper article […]
Smithwick Tribunal found Garda collusion in murder of RUC officers, but couldn’t name the colluder. This was partly because it allowed a motley band of FRU operatives, informants and agents like the serial ‘intelligence nuisance’ Fulton and elusive thug Scappaticci endlessly to mislead it on who the colluder was so that, when MI5 conduit Drew Harris […]
As of a few weeks ago Kourtney has quit Keeping Up With The Kardashians. I do not keep up with the Kardashians but could not avoid the news. I’m embarrassed to say it. I couldn’t escape her fame. Fame, then. Norah FitzMaurice in Anne Enright’s latest novel Actress (Jonathan Cape), is not a media celebrity […]
By Peter Emerson Democracy The word ‘democracy’ is used with abandon, even to describe that from which it has long since been abandoned. Take for example the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. They have elections, but it’s all “Candidate X, yes-or-no?” And with turnouts of 100%, the answer is always ‘yes’. What a nonsense. There should be lots of candidates, and […]
By Michael Smith. Green Party leader Eamon Ryan has set out a ‘Green New Deal’ and 17 questions in a six-page letter sent to Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael on Wednesday in response to their framework coalition document The 17 “questions” are: Will you commit to an average annual reduction in greenhouse gas emissions of […]
By Bryan Wall. Ireland does not export heavy armaments or guns. Beyond that there seems to be extraordinary flexibility and naivety as to the military significance of exports that are neither heavy armaments nor guns but nevertheless can wreak devastation. In May last year the Sunday Business Post revealed that Irish employees of Google in Dublin were working on […]
Those who predicted swamped ICUs, scandalous shortages of equipment and overflowing morgues in Ireland were utterly wrong. If you haven’t realised that, you’re not following. The Irish Times, Irish Independent, RTE and other media in Ireland have failed their democratic duty to keep the public aware of the significance of the evolving pattern of Coronavirus cases in […]
By David Burke Fifty years ago this month armed members of the Special Branch dropped a ring of steel around Dublin Airport as part of a plan to seize a consignment of arms which was due to land from the Continent. This marked the start of the Arms Crisis. Within a few weeks, ministers Charles […]
31 January Metaphorically, if not yet literally, coronavirus is on everybody’s lips in John Cabot, an American university in Rome where I teach. Most of our conversations revolve around the autocratic might shown by the Chinese government in shutting down an entire city of 11 million people, two and a half times the population of the Republic of Ireland, […]
One would have to have to be stonehearted not to have pity for any author releasing a book this year and, in particular, one which deals with the Israeli-Palestinian struggle, now bogged down in disputes as to how to handle coronavirus with justice. Events have rapidly overtaken Colum McCann’s latest novel, ‘Apeirogon’ (Bloomsbury), which he […]
MI5, MI6, Buckingham Palace, The Royal Ulster Constabulary and the exploitation of children in care by a VIP Anglo-Irish Vice Ring. By Joseph de Burca. Introduction: This online book draws together the main strands of Village’s three year investigation into the Anglo-Irish Vice Ring, a network that exploited children in care on both sides of the Irish […]
