It’s fascinating to see the dynamic of the critique of Brian Lenihan that has been offered over the last few days.
We started early over on the CLR, granted, though neither Garibaldy or myself in the day of and after Lenihan’s death did more than note firstly that this was a tragedy for him and his [...]

I’m working on an article for The Citizen at the moment, on the general theme of ‘Is Fianna Fáil Dead?’
It’s more of a reflective piece on the development of the party since its inception 85 years ago this week, and on the contradictions between its position as a populist party with a strong working-class base, [...]

Introduction
The University College Cork Chairman of Ógra Fianna Fáil, the tiny youth wing of one of the smaller parties in Ireland, has apologised for his remarks on the adoption of children by gay couples. His remarks came in a post to his blog which has now been deleted. However, fortunately for scholarship, the Google caché [...]

(This article was first published in Crisisjam on politico.ie on 21/1/11. This is an updated version 24/1/11)
Is there anything left to say about the spectacle of the last week? How do you sketch out that place beyond absurdity, the ‘are’ in ‘we are where we are’? Unluckily, others have been here before.
In The Emperor, Ryszard [...]

The final photo is one of only two photos known to exist from inside the GPO during the rising.

I was never a fan of social partnership. It was based on a flawed economic premise - limiting wage increases in return for income tax cuts; it was hardly a partnership (employers had the legal right to refuse to bargain with workers’ collectively); and it wasn’t terribly social (the social wage never featured - universal [...]

Recent political performances require a new verb. Imagine, if you will, a talk given to an audience where the speaker is discussing an object sitting between him and the audience. The object is clearly black but the speaker refers to it throughout his talk as white. He does this without irony giving no hint that he [...]

Poblacht na h ÉireannTM
The Temporary Government
To the people of Anglo-IrelandTM.
IRISHMEN AND IRISHWOMEN: In the name of Mammon and of the dead generations from which she receives her old tradition of subservience, we declare the name of this country to be Anglo-IrelandTM, and through us, Anglo-IrelandTM summons her children to aid her banks and abandon their [...]

Last month former European Commissioner Charles McCreevy joined the board of NBNK Investments PLC, a new investment vehicle which according to media reports aims to “buy banking assets that are being sold off by banks for regulatory reasons”. McCreevy’s salary will be between 61,000 and 122,000 euro per year depending on “NBNK achieving a major [...]

Sacrifice

“I’d be a bit more cautious about that aspect of how
I conduct my social life.” Brian Cowen

Though the world no longer permits,
for the King’s pleasure,
the Saturday night offering up
of girls on the altar at the Acropolis;
on a good day we’d allow you
anything short of being found on top
of a live boy or a [...]