irish

Podcast: Ward Bosses and Alligator Bishops: Irish Americans and Tammany Hall with Terry Golway

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For this Saint Patrick’s Day episode, Luke Sheehan asked Irish-American historian and New York history expert Terry Golway to help create an overview of the Irish American experience, with a focus on post-famine migration and the infamous Tammany Hall. Episode Credits: Host: Luke Sheehan Music: Loafing Heroes – ​​https://theloafingheroes.bandcamp.com Produced by Massimiliano Galli – https://www.massimilianogalli.com … Read more

Ireland and Palestine: A Crucial Vote Awaits

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Around Ireland and in its online expressions, there is vocal and colourful support for the cause of Palestine. Its flag is draped from windows, hung from gate posts and serves as WhatsApp profile pictures. PLO scarves are again in vogue, while watermelon t-shirts are worn when the weather allows, and charitable fund-raisers on behalf of … Read more

Judge the Strength of a Democracy by its Treatment of Whistleblowers

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In light of recent developments, not least, the announcement of Michael McGrath as the next EU Commissioner, it is timely to look again at the infernal plight of workers of conscience – those noble people who blow the whistle on wrongdoing, and who strive to keep a corroded system from descending further into the abyss. … Read more

Anatomy of Disgust – Northern Irish Style

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This piece is not intended to provoke. It is more a look at the way people’s minds are shaped, how people think, and how that is articulated towards others. I realized something was ‘ratten’ in the state of ‘Norn Ireland’ when I was about four. My half-brother of about six or so and I were … Read more

Local Government Falls Short

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Long ago I read a wry assertion that local government in Ireland is ‘central government locally organised’. The writer lamented that local authorities, especially county councils, have limited financial and other powers to provide local services and depend heavily on the financial largesse of central funds allocated by different government departments. It is different in … Read more

Being Irish

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This Ireland exists. And should one travel there and not find it, then they have not looked closely enough.. Hugo Hamilton: The Island of Talking – In the footsteps of Heinrich Boll #IrelandisFull: the migration of this phrase from the far-right into the mainstream is an awful feature of our woe-begotten times. It begs the … Read more

White Riot in Dublin

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When David Irving, the mad fascist historian imprisoned in Austria for Holocaust denial, was asked to speak by The University Philosophical Society in Dublin in the late 1980’s, the Student Union – involving the current Labour leader Ivana Bacik – instigated a protest that led to a minor riot to prevent him from speaking. Given … Read more

When will Micheál Martin’s epitaph be written?

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Last November, in one of his final outings as Taoiseach, Micheál Martin delivered the annual Romanes Lecture at Oxford University. It’s unusual to find a senior Irish politician laying out a political philosophy, and for this he deserves credit, even if I take issue with his claim to occupying a ‘liberal’ middle ground. It reveals … Read more

Requiem for a Profession

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We are sodden with fake news, hyped-up and incomplete information, and false assertions delivered non-stop by our daily newspapers, our televisions, our online news agencies, our social media, and our President. Seymour M. Hersh, Reporter: A Memoir, New York (2018) I doubt there are many career guidance counsellors now advising school leavers to become journalists. … Read more

OPLA: An Oireachtas within the Oireachtas

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Since my last article detailing the manner in which the Office of Parliamentary Legal Advisor (OPLA) has been eroding Irish democracy, I have become acquainted with the Dunning Report (Capacity Review of the Office of the Parliamentary Legal Advisor (OPLA) of the Houses of the Oireachtas) of December 2016. This recommends a very modest expansion … Read more