I remember October 5th 1968 well. I was 14. I wrote an essay on the events in Derry in school. I wish I had kept it. No, on second thought maybe I don't. In my boy's mind events in Derry in October 1968 are always connected to the assassination of Bobby Kennedy in America three … Continue reading Educated ignorance
Tag: unionism
Who and what are the DUP?
If you accept that we increasingly live in a topsy-turvy world where many things are inverted - injustice is rewarded, might is right, good is bad and incompetence is competence - then you will also understand that we mistake words for actions. Politicians and spin merchants of all creeds use these twisted illusions of … Continue reading Who and what are the DUP?
The Matrix and the Story-tellers
Under the Good Friday Agreement Northern Ireland politics became like a football match where neither team was sure which goal they should attack and which to defend. Now that particular game is over, the teams are wondering why they did not see things more clearly. The answer is they were spellbound by a master story-teller.
Northern Ireland: The Emperor has no clothes
Northern Ireland - a region of the United Kingdom which it has until now largely been run as a colony - is publicly exposed as highly dysfunctional. Not only is its political class, or at least one half of it, seen to be highly incompetent, negligent and corrupt, abusing the system of devolved government; but more significantly, the local civil service has shown itself to be equally unsound. What do the British Government do?
Peter Robinson and Disaster Unionism
Peter Robinson comes out of retirement to re-write history and his part in it. Are moves afoot for a comeback?