Wednesday, Feb 8th 2012
A system in crisis
There were two remarkable things about the Lisbon Treaty referendum that have been almost completely ignored by the men and women whose job it is to chew over Irish politics on a daily basis. First of all, the result showed that Irish citizens have no confidence in the people they vote for. [...]
Some on the Left are trying to put a brave face on the Irish Times poll today. ‘Consolidating’ support at 14 percent is one rationalisation. Another is that the Labour leader has the highest satisfaction rating of any party leader (or rather the least dissatisfied); yet Pat Rabbitte outpolled Enda Kenny in every MRBI poll. [...]
During the unkind years of the neo-liberal consensus, which were dominated by the free-market/small-government/low-tax/eat-what-you-kill/greed-is-good mentality that pretty well everyone now recognises to have been a failure, it was exceptionally difficult for the Labour party in Ireland to promote itself as anything more than ever-so-slightly left-of-centre without fear of electoral annihilation. Though it battled away manfully, [...]
Preheat the oven to Gas Mark 5. Put it in a roasting tray, season with salt and pepper and place on the middle rack. Cook for 20 minutes per pound and when finished take it out and let it rest for a few minutes. Slice and soak in gravy. There you have it - Fianna Fail’s recipe [...]
Well, it’s been a busy few weeks trying to keep up with the US Presidential election campaign and the global economic crisis, to say nothing of trying to do some work occasionally.So, inevitably, the campaign is taking place in the shadow of ‘events’ and has been affected by them. As we move into the final [...]
Castro comes to visit
In 1971, Fidel Castro went to Chile as a guest of its new president Salvador Allende. The Cuban leader left with a gloomy view of the prospects for the first democratically-elected Marxist government in the Americas. Confiding to associates in private, Castro predicted the tragic defeat of Allende’s Popular Unity experiment two [...]
Venezuela faced renewed criticism after the expulsion last month of two members of Human Rights Watch (HRW) from the country, including HRW’s Americas director Jose Miguel Vivanco, after they had published a report accusing the Chavez government of undermining democracy. The expulsion was a foolish and paranoid over-reaction which should not be supported by those [...]
“If BS were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself.”
- Kathleen Parker, a National Review online columnist and a former Sarah Palin supporter.
Bullshit is big at the moment. And the ubiquity and effects of this anti-science and anti-logic form of fallacious rhetoric or argumentum verbosium (proof by verbosity) are beginning to be taken [...]
Towards the end of Tuesday night’s edition of TV3 current affairs programme ‘Nightly News with Vincent Browne’ the host asked one of his guests, almost rhetorically, whether the media have some responsibility for the artificial inflation of property prices in their promotion of the market through property supplements and advertising. His guest agreed that to [...]
Night is gone, a dawn
comes up in birds and sounds of the city.
There will be light
to live by, things
to see: my eyes will lift
to where the sun in vermilion sits,
and I will love thee and have pity. (Michael Hartnett)
I’m sitting on the small fenced stone wall that surrounds the central bank on Dame Street, [...]
