… is the catchphrase of politicians in the wake of each new crime headline. The ‘something’ which must be done generally involves creating ‘new’ crimes in legislation, imposing mandatory or minimum sentences for existing crimes, or some combination of the two. Unfortunately, the Left in Ireland all too often falls in with the [...]

To most Irish political and media commentators, the Republic is a capitalist economy without a capitalist class structure. They argue that its citizens are mostly middle class, with a working class rump that exists on the margins. The past fifteen years, in their eyes, has seen an expansion of that middle class, as well [...]

“We sought workers, and in their stead came people”. That remark – now absorbed into German political discourse – is attributed to former German President Gustav Heinemann in the 1960s, speaking at a time when Germany was addressing the consequences of large-scale Turkish immigration.
Fast forward 40 years to the German elections in 2002: media analysts [...]