Unreconstructed Unionism in Cookstown: Whither catholic outreach?
Whilst the unionist unity debate rages on, Mick’s thread linking to an article by Michael Shilliday, a vocal opponent within the UUP to the idea, is interesting for highlighting both the dangers of the aspiration for a unified communal voice and the gulf between the infrequently lofty rhetoric of the DUP’s Peter Robinson regarding his party’s [...] more »
David McNarry resigns from UUP Assembly Group after Tom Elliott cuts him out of education committee role
The News Letter and UTV’s Ken Reid have been tweeting tonight what looks like being the latest episode in the UUP-DUP united unionist soap opera. David McNarry has resigned from the UUP Assembly group after Tom Elliott withdrew him as vice-chair of education committee, though stopped short of taking away the party whip. The BBC [...] more »
Newt Gingrich: a space cadet with ideas that are out of this world?
By the end of my second term, we will have the first permanent base on the moon and it will be American. (Newt Gingrich) It certainly qualifies as a BHAG – Big Hairy Audacious Goal for anyone lucky enough to be steeped in management speak. An injection of ambition and cash into the state space [...] more »
Questions for Ulster Protestants
Assuming – for the sake of discussion – Scottish independence happens in the next 5-50 years: 1. What would be in the best interests of Ulster Protestants in a post-union (i.e. post-U.K) Northern Ireland and why? 2. For centuries most Ulster Protestants have had a series of reasons for being both a. pro-Union and b. [...] more »
Irish DPP to consider Garland case
Having dismissed, in December last year, the US application for the extradition of former Irish Workers’ Party president, Seán Garland, in the long-running saga of the counterfeit ‘super-dollars’, Dublin High Court has now referred the case to the Director of Public Prosecutions to examine whether he should be charged in Ireland. From the BBC report Giving his reasons [...] more »
Unionist unity is illogical, impractical and wrong
Michael Shilliday argues in today’s News Letter that competiting visions for Unionism is natural and required to push unionism onwards: If united unionism was the natural way of things, the DUP would never have existed in the first place. If it was good for unionism, it would have happened by now, and if it was [...] more »
Holocaust Memorial Day Belfast
The Holocaust Memorial Day Trust is promoting everyone to mark the occasion today with local activities as well as individual acts, such as signing a pledge. For me, a particular significance is remembering that Nazism was about state-sponsored, systematic discrimination against entire categories of people — whether Jewish, Polish, gypsies, homosexuals, the disabled, or anyone [...] more »
Unionist unity is a debate worth having rather than a ‘fate accompli’…
Nope, not Scottish Unionism. Lee Reynolds writes in the News Letter this morning laying out some keen, existential reasons for at least considering some form of Unionist unity: As we look forward to the centenary of Northern Ireland in 2021, would focusing our efforts on these challenges and changes not produce greater benefits for the [...] more »
You are not responsible for the crisis (Oh yes you are)
Whoever it was aimed at, Enda Kenny’s performance in Davos doesn’t seem to be going down well back home. The Irish Times reports that he said: “What happened in our country was that people simply went mad borrowing,” Mr Kenny told a meeting at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland. “The extent of [...] more »
The redress of major capitalism: the rebirth of small nations?
Tom Nairn has an interesting piece in the Scotsman today (H/T Peter), in which he places Scotland’s ‘struggle’ for greater autonomy in a wider world in which the classic nation state is reducing further down to its more constituent parts, parts always so dominated by the mercantile class upon which global capitalism: Little Scotland has [...] more »
“We would end up like West Pakistan-” Empey on the nightmare of Scottish Independence
The Scottish Independence debate has clearly unnerved our local unionist political leaders in recent days, leading to at times sensational and contradictory messages from the political elite (past and present.) But Reg Empey’s latest missive, delivered in the House of Lords, warrants special mention. From the BBC Report: The former Ulster Unionist Party leader said Northern Ireland had [...] more »
Is there an easy way out of Ireland’s debt crisis?
Interesting to watch Enda Kenny talk at Davos today. He seemed relaxed and reasonable, and indeed at one point one of the other speakers noted that others who were in the throws of a debt crisis needed to follow Ireland’s example (of being ‘good little boys’? – Ed). Though Denmark’s new PM Helle Thorning-Schmidt, was [...] more »
Lord Chief Justice: “it is difficult to regard the remarks as anything other than undermining and unhelpful to the administration of justice in Northern Ireland”
Apparently, I haven’t read it, former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Peter Hain, MP for Neath, devotes two pages of his recently published memoirs to an attack on Lord Justice Girvan. More specifically, an attack on the then Mr Justice Girvan for his 2006 High Court ruling that Peter Hain “acted for an improper motive” [...] more »
Lessons from Northern Ireland: Rise above the fatalism generated by your own “sui generis” conflict…
H/T Mary FitzGerald on Twitter… This is a fairly impressive array of academic, political and government voices which looks at what lessons might be drawn from our much feted Peace Process, recorded in May last year… Most worthy of note are Jonathan Powell (keep hard power on so the insurgents cannot get comfortable, but offer [...] more »
Maybe the referendum question is not so simple
I may have spoken too soon about the clarity of Alex Salmond’s preferred referendum question : do you agree that Scotland should be an independent country? The Today programme took the trouble to ask a professor in Arizona who had never heard of Big Eck if the wording was fair. Sure, it was completely loaded [...] more »
Whisper it quietly (someone’s buying Irish debt)…
Okay, the interest is not great, but it’s well below the 7% from just before Ireland was forced to take shelter in the not so loving arms of the Troika… Dan O’Brien: Yesterday’s bond sale served a dual purpose: to test market demand for Irish Government bonds and to reduce the size of the repayments [...] more »
Scottish unionist parties bogged down with a dysfunctional deficit model
Nice spot from Dewi has Gerry Hassan’s considered early response to Alex Salmond’s announcement yesterday, well not so much to Salmond as to the residual use of ‘the deficit model’ by what is now becoming fashionably known as the unionist parties: A strange switch has happened in which the SNP have become thoughtful, pragmatic nationalists [...] more »
“Opportunity on Mars – 8 years and counting!”
Nasa’s Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity landed in Eagle Crater on Mars on Jan. 25, 2004, Universal Time, three weeks after its rover twin, Spirit, had landed halfway around the planet. Opportunity completed its three-month prime mission in April that year, everything else has been bonus, extended missions. Spirit is no longer with us. But Opportunity carries [...] more »
SOTU – signs that transformation is finally on the way
Last night’s speech offered a realistic and encouraging vision of the future. It was delivered in a statesmanlike tone, was partisan in the best sense of the term – substantive, specific, based on conviction – yet its delivery addressed its primary opponent in a pointedly respectful, exemplary fashion. On substance, it was also a serious [...] more »
‘Do you agree that Scotland should be an independent country?’
Well, the essential question proposed by Alex Salmond in his consultation paper is surely good enough to satisfy the UK government’s requirement for a clear question on independence. That’s one stumbling block out of the way, I reckon. But Westminster ‘s rival paper is clearly opposed to a second question on anything like devo max. These [...] more »
“Recently the two Governments agreed to address issues relating to both Lough Foyle and Carlingford Lough in the round”
Here’s something that could develop into something quite interesting. It follows on from the “Memorandum of Understanding reached by the two Governments with the support of the Northern Ireland Executive… on marine jurisdictional issues.” As I said then If you were wondering why the lines stop at the entrances to the respective Loughs, that would be [...] more »
Who knew? (Sweet Afton is no more)
Well, with all this Scottish material invading the slumbering quietude that is Northern Irish politics, it’s as well to note that tonight is Rabbie Burns Night, which in turn put me in mind of one of his most famous poems. It opens: Flow gently, sweet Afton, amang thy green braes Flow gently, I’ll sing thee [...] more »
In a Scottish three way split the middle option is the likely winner….
In The Scotsman today, John Curtice notes that relying on anti English sentiment is providing Alex Salmond and the SNP with very limited agency in getting the ball the across the win line. In fact in some polls, Independence is scoring less than it did five years ago… Above all, the First Minister and his [...] more »
Advertise
-
Books
-
Have we Learned our own Lessons? Book Review of John Brewer’s Peace Processes
Northern Ireland’s peace process has been promoted as an international success story. The Republic’s Department of Foreign Affairs has its Conflict Resolution Unit, which aims to disseminate the ‘lessons’ of the Northern Ireland peace process. And some of the prominent players in our peace process have travelled abroad to other troubled spots to share their [...] read our review »
-
Stay out of Libya: counterinsurgency doesn’t work
A moment of some significance in journalism perhaps, as the New York Times reviews the current talked about book, The Wrong War: Grit, Strategy, and the Way Out of Afghanistan by Bing West. The author is no bleeding heart but a former assistant Defense Secretary from the Reagan era who stomped his way round the Afghan [...] read our review »
-
The Media Relations Department of Hizbollah Wishes You a Happy Birthday (Neil MacFarquhar)
With perhaps the longest title of any book I’ve read this year, The Media Relations Department of Hizbollah Wishes You a Happy Birthday: Unexpected Encounters in the Changing Middle East gives an insight into the lives of people living in Middle East through the eyes of journalist Neil MacFarquhar. MacFarquhar’s father was a chemical engineer [...] read our review »
-
