November brought the demise of Trump but major global challenges remained. Andrew Linnane issued a stark warning: The idea that our response to the Covid-19 pandemic might be moving us in the direction of the authoritarian horrors of the last century is one that a great many are resistant to. They may feel, for example, … Read more
As summer gave way to a season of mist and mellow fruitfulness in September Covid-19 returned with a vengeance, but by now there was considerable disagreement over elusive facts. Frank Armstrong interrogated unreliable accounts in the Irish media, and the doomsday scenarios of a number of scientists. The main go-to-man among Irish scientists for the … Read more
Our Posh Liberal Friends for Susan Whenever I show them the Future, they refuse it; say: this future has bad hair, waves its arms around too much, is too Jewish, or not Jewish enough, too not-a-woman, or the wrong sort of woman. This Future has a face that one day might raise the corporate tax … Read more
When Henry Kissinger again fails to die Another tree in the Central Highlands loses all its leaves A girl sits on a visiting diplomat’s lap Someone organises a Nelson Rockefeller look-alike party which Henry Kissinger attends An election result somewhere is declared null and void for its own good An interrogating officer switches on the … Read more
Advisory Epistle From Literature Quangocrat after Alexander Pope About my person, I at all times carry a bowl of re-heated cocktail sausages and a completed application form asking that I be better funded next year. I only read novels which interrogate the relationship between gout and Islamist terrorism, translated from the obligatory French; and poets … Read more