Paisley and Prospero
At the end of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Prospero turns to the audience and says “Now my charms are all o’erthrown And what strength I have’s mine own.”
Now at the end, it seems, of his political career (I believe he is going next Thursday, though I here his farewell bash is tomorrow, so I had better hurry to get my ticket) Dr. Paisley is lauded at the Boyne along with Ahern. Paisley has received numerous accolades since agreeing to enter power sharing with SF (admittedly none weirder than Oldie of the Year). Paisley has been celebrated by both Tony Blair and George Bush, yet amongst some hard line unionists and possibly even some in his party his “charms are all o’erthrown.”
A vast amount has been written about why Paisley went into the agreement. Some who support the agreement have seen him as wishing to have a “positive” legacy, it has even been suggested that he now feeling that he will soon meet his Maker wants to “redeem” himself. I would suggest that the first might be true but more likely betrays a failure to understand the world view of people like Paisley and latter shows a complete misunderstanding of fundamentalist Protestant theology.
More cynical voices have suggested that Paisley was interested in power for himself alone and as such opposed every agreement until there was one which would leave him as First Minister. One might even see the change in the voting arrangements for the First Minister’s post as an attempt to ensure that unionists would have to make the DUP the largest party within unionism and hence give Paisley the first minister-ship lest it fall to Sinn Fein.
Dr. Paisley himself seems at times to have veered between two alternative though not necessarily mutually exclusive reasons for going into power sharing with Sinn Fein. At times he has said that this was a great deal for unionism and that his pledge to “Smash Sinn Fein” has been effectively achieved with IRA decommissioning and SF now supporting the police. At other times the explanation has been somewhat less triumphant and he has raised the spectre of Plan B which, we were told, would result in defacto joint sovereignty.
Unionist opponents of the current agreement have tended to be most suspicious of these Paisley explanations; most anti agreement unionists would probably accept that St. Andrews is an advance over the Belfast Agreement. However, this advance is seen as a small incremental advance and nowhere near the renegotiation which the DUP appeared to be seeking when they became the majority party within unionism and effectively took over negotiations on behalf of the unionist community.
Equally anti agreement unionists have been most sceptical of Paisley’s explanation of the dreaded Plan B. Jim Allister has pointed out that Paisley never told him anything of the substance of this Plan B when he (Allister) was arguing against the agreement from within the DUP. Others have pointed out that Paisley has never been one to waver before threats and blackmail from anywhere, including from the British Government. As such anti agreement unionists (often once amongst Dr. Paisley’s most ardent supporters) tend to feel that he was bewitched by the lust of power and was happy with an agreement which would make him leader.
There might be one other partial explanation as well, however. Paisley denounced the previous compromises suggested by O’Neill, Faulkner after Sunningdale or Trimble after the Belfast Agreement. He even denounced Jim Molyneaux as “Judas.” On each of these occasions, however, Dr. Paisley was on the outside. On each occasion the leader or leaders of unionism (but not Paisley) had felt the full weight of the persuasion of the British government, often backed up by the weight of Irish, and United States governments’ opinion along with the international pressure for a “solution”. On each of those occasions according to hard line unionists the leader of unionism had buckled and given ground, ground which should not have been given. On each occasion amongst the first to cry “Lundy” was Paisley himself. Each time when a unionist leader seemed like the defeated Shylock to say “Send the deed after me, And I will sign it” (Merchant of Venice IV, i) there was Paisley; seen by many as a rock, indeed a place of refuge. As once of my more lyrical friends once (almost blasphemously) put it “We are safe beneath Paisley’s wings.”
This time, however, it was different. It was Paisley who felt the weight of all the flattery combined with threats of Plan B. Jonathan Powell and others have recounted how Paisley was flattered by Blair, how Paisley gave Blair bible tracts for Euan Blair, how pleased Paisley was when the likes of George Bush telephoned him at the British government’s behest. It is also recounted that Paisley had numerous meetings with Blair without other DUP leaders. This was the very error I can remember Trimble saying that Jim Molyneaux committed with John Major and at least at the start of Trimble’s negotiations he always took the likes of John Taylor with him. It seems maybe that under this combination of flattery, charm and threats the old man buckled and bowed the knee to the agreement.
Certainly many previous unionist leaders have done much the same but it is hard to imagine Dr. Paisley in what rejectionist unionists would regard as his pomp being as receptive to that combination of flattery, bribery and bullying. Maybe age has wearied him and the years condemned: either that or he just wanted a place in history or the power or some combination of all these. I suspect no one other than Paisley (if even he) knows why he did his political somersault.
I will leave you with Prospero’s final words “As you from crimes would pardoned be, Let your indulgence set me free.” At the end of the play Prospero waits for the audience’s applause. Dr. Paisley has had much applause during his prolonged departure and I have no doubt he will get even more applause in the days to come but not always from the people who helped him in times past and not all of those who stood there when he boomed “Never, Never, Never, never.”
[i]“Dr. Paisley himself seems at times to have veered between two alternative though not necessarily mutually exclusive reasons for going into power sharing with Sinn Fein. At times he has said that this was a great deal for unionism and that his pledge to “Smash Sinn Fein” has been effectively achieved with IRA decommissioning and SF now supporting the police. At other times the explanation has been somewhat less triumphant and he has raised the spectre of Plan B which, we were told, would result in defacto joint sovereignty.”[/i]
To explain St Andrews and all that followed you need to totally mix these two alternative viewpoints. In every decision people make in life, there is the carrott and the stick. Paisley signing up to St Andrews was no different.
Nobody can argue against the premise that the republican movement were well advanced down the path of politics from the point in 1999 when the UUP invited them into government. Policing was a step which was a deal maker for many people who previously opposed SF in government. The changes negotiated to the running of the executive and assembly was also something that the DUP could point to as an improvement on the Trimble years. Even the decommissioning question had been resolved although the methodologies were not to the liking of unionists.
Ironically, it is the events surrounding the decommissioning question in the summer of 2005 that illustrate the stick that must have played just as much a part in the minds of the DUP as the gains that they had made on policing and the assembly.
The fundamental reality of the peace process is that the broad parameters of how peace could be achieved was already decided. In my opinion it took people like Paisley to ascend to the leadership of unionism to realise the substance of what was going on. To all intents and purposes, until 2003, the DUP were on the outside. It is probably fair enough and human nature for those on the outside to feel that they can do a far better job than those on the inside. Historically, that had been the UUP and its leadership. When anti-agreement unionists looked at the political process before 2003, they saw 3 variables.
1. An IRA pushing for peace on its own terms
2. A government who seemed to be happy to accomodate that
3. A UUP leadership who didn’t seem up to the job and only too happy to go along with 1 & 2 for an easy life.
For me as an anti agreeement unionist, the change in the 3rd variable in autumn 2003 did make a difference but the course of events proved that it was variables 1 & 2 that would determine the general high level direction of the process. Whilst a change in the leadership of unionism was necessary, the events of 2004 and 2005 showed that even it could not change the broad thrust of the process.
The “big picture” was decided between an IRA and a sovereign government who were only too happy to play along.
Those in unionism who still hold to the attitude of “bring on Plan B” and believe that Brown couldn’t put down rebellious Prods would do well to remember the huge changes in this country in the last 10 years. Where were the crowds when the RUC were destroyed, when Sinn Fein went into government? The changes of the last 10 years have changed the outlook of a huge section of society who have been conditioned to accept those changes.
One only has to look at support for Drumcree before and after the 1998 Agreement. The Drumcree protest post Belfast Agreement was a mere shadow of the mass unionist movement that had effectively staged a successful coup d’etat in 1996. Enough unionists are not prepared to engage in civil disobedience and risk arrest and imprisonment with all the disruption that would bring to lives that are now so dependent on stable incomes, careers, paying mortgages. They have no appetite for defeating a Plan B on the streets.
So the only alternative is to do what the DUP did. Try to change the system but once you realise that you have failed, then you tweak the system as best you can.
I’m not a Paisleyite but I think this little prayer sums things up nicely
“God, grant me
The serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference”.
And after one final march down the hill the Grand Old Duke of York took a bow and left the stage.
Greagoir O Frainclin,
“The continent of Europe is not our Fatherland, and never can be. Our nationalities cannot be changed, for they are the creation of God.’
And God said let there be French and there were French and God said let there be Germans and there were Germans and God said let there be Orangemen but thranners that they are/were -said no can do for first you must create William of Orange and then you must ensure that he wins the Battle of the Boyne and only then can you let orangemen be created –are you listening to me God ?
.
‘No matter what sinful man may do, God has enthroned His Son King of kings and Lord of lords. He is the King of the whole earth, and He shall reign and rule for evermore.”
Even though these may be Paisley’s words they could just as easily have emanated from the Spanish Inquisition’s Holy Office
Are there people out there who believes this stuff?
Yes -gobshites – alas some of them even well meaning gobshites
‘An independance has been achieved yet we remain a close and loyal neighbour to Old Blighty! ‘
Well yes in one sense but Ireland can be no more equal to England than Denmark can be equal to Germany . Size matters when push comes to shove regardless of whether both countries share the same basic values , rights etc . Iraq is not equal to China and neither is Tibet.
Greagoir, it’s been my pleasure and privilege to work with decent folks from across the social, political and religious spectrum in building up what some might call social capital; the two Governments, sadly, pander to the demands of the paramilitary godfathers.
Nevin ,
‘Greenflag, perhaps you could outline those occasions from the 1880s onwards when Irish nationalism, in its various manifestations and alliances—- ‘
The failure to win Home Rule in 1886 sent Irish nationalism down the separation path . The vast majority of people in Ireland at that time mid 1880′s would have accepted Home Rule as ‘satisfaction’ of their national demands . Given the probable continuation over the next few decades of social and administrative reforms by a Home Rule Government in conjunction with Westminster then it is not unreasonable to believe that extreme separatist nationalism would have lost out and that Home Rule would have kept Ireland a part of the UK.
Whether or not Home Rule in the end would have led to complete ‘separation’ is impossible to say but we do know in retrospect that the refusal to grant it (Home Rule ) over the 30 year period 1880 to 1910 certainly did push the vast majority of Irish people down the separatist path leading to the present Republic .
‘ Are you an irredentist Irish nationalist? ‘
Are you an irredentist Unionist ?
For the 30 years ? 1880 to 1910 in which Home Rule remained the Irish national demand the majority of Unionists allowed themselves to be terrified (shades of 1920 to 1969 to present) of the nameless fears of what would happen if Home Rule were granted ( Replace Home Rule by Power Sharing and you should as an irredentist Unionist get the picture) . Unionists in the 19th century consistently underestimated the demands of the common people of Ireland and we saw a repeat of the same phenomenon in Northern Ireland in the period 1920 to 1972 and later . Even now the TUV element is trying to convince Unionists that a return to 1920 or pre 1969 Unionist majority rule is somehow possible ?
BTW Greenflag is an Irish Nationalist /Republican of the moderate school who has no desire to live under Westminster rule in Ireland ( but could happily do so were he resident in England ) because deep down he’s actually very well disposed towards England and the English also Scots and Welsh and believes that the best service we Irish can provide England is if we rule ourselves in such a manner so as not to be a burden on the English taxpayer . We IRISH nationalists in the Republic have achieved this much at least in our short of ‘ruling ‘ ourselves . Northern Ireland’s ‘Unionist ‘ administrations ‘ not once in 50 years of one party rule ever came close to not being a ‘burden ‘ on the English taxpayer .
Oh I’m anti Unionist ( politically) as well in case you haven’t noticed
. However should Unionists favour a fair ‘repartition’ of NI, I would not oppose their wish for ‘ national ‘ independence . I’m also anti monarchist and I’m not at all impressed by the credentials of the religious clerics of any of the major denominations and all of the minor ones 
I have no great confidence in the present Assembly but realistically accept that it’s about the best that both Northern Unionist and Nationalist /Republican can aspire to for the forseeable future. They have both ‘lost’ out to the Republic over the past 30 years, and I expect a repeat of the same for the next 30 yrs or for at least as long as the present Assembly lasts . But there will be peace in Northern Ireland and Paisley’s request for the IRA Army Council to dissolve will I’m sure happen soon if it has’nt already..
Dave,
‘Ireland would be reunited but reunited under British Rule. Effectively, the nationalists would become unionists while still (wrongly) believing that they are nationalists ‘
Come on Dave -you can do better than that . There will be no ‘monarchy’ in the Republic or in any prospective UI . Commonwealth membership is neither here nor there and may even have some benefits in sports , cultural contacts and educational exchanges .
The Irish have ‘wised’ up a bit in the past 25 years
We’ve stopped burnign everything english except their coal . We enjoy their TV sometimes and their sports and their ‘humour ‘ which is not dissimilar from our own .
Nevin, none of us like the paramilitary godfather element in the NI equation, but the fact of the matter is it brought the peace to the country. Things are better now, are’nt they? despite SF & Co etc… strutting their stuff in the NI government! There is dialogue and ‘reason’ now; ‘Jaw Jaw’ instead of ‘War War’, and sweet Jesus is’nt that better than he last 30 odd years of violence?
Greenflag, well read in Irish history, has cited and highlighted crucial factors of Irish Nationalism in the course of Irish history. Yet if the chips were down today in the light of any unfairness or inequality etc…,if there was ever an individual who would stand for Unionist folk in the context of Ireland, Greenflag like myself would voice their concerns! The Protestant faith and British identity in NI is safe and the GFA/SAA guarantees it.
BTW, ah jesus, us ‘Irish Nationalists’ are not all bad folk, are we? Are we really that bad? Do we appear that bad to Unionist folk? Unionists can be Irish Nationalists too, given context. Think about it! Let’s all cheer for IRELAND, our home and country!
“stand for Unionist folk in the context of Ireland,”
Greagoir, why not stand for Nationalist folk in the context of the UK?
None of this takes away from the Irish state’s nimbyism at the first time of trouble from a ‘commie revolution’ that was designed to sweep away the ‘conservative’ administrations in Belfast and Dublin. What craven cowardice, not to say hypocrisy.
Greagoir O Frainclin,
‘but the fact of the matter is it brought the peace to the country.”
Eh ?? What has that got to do with anything . There are some in NI who would rather have 100,000 corpses and a razed to the ground landscape that have an ex ‘terrorist godfather’ in Government . They call themselves as usual ‘men of principle’.
‘Let’s all cheer for IRELAND, our home and country! ‘
It may be your home and country but Ireland is not Nevin’s home and country . The oul lad’s even prone to choking on his tonsils if the term Ireland is used ‘mistakenly ‘ for Republic of Ireland
.
‘Unionists can be Irish Nationalists too, given context.’
Perhaps on the planet Mars . Here on Earth the moment one becomes an Irish ‘nationalist ‘ one ceases to be a Unionist – one may be an ex unionist -former unionist or even a demised unionist but Irish nationalist and unionist at the same time ? simply not possible within the realms of practical political feasability and could indicate the possible presence of a schizoid political personality ? . On the other hand considering the types of personalities that NI Unionism has thrown onto the political stage perhaps you have a – no – better not go down that road
Unionists generally do not want to understand Irish nationalism for to do so means coming face to face with being the inheritors of a political ideology i.e ‘unionism’ which has been REJECTED by the vast majority of people on this island and only survives in the north east corner by virtue of financial life support from Westminster and by having a small declining local electoral majority.
“choking on his tonsils”
Greenflag, I merely pointed out the varying and confusing uses of terms like Britain, Ireland and Ulster. There’s no need to get your knickers in a twist
Has ‘bugger’ Biffo a greater grasp of language than his predecessor, Bumbling ‘Bobby Burns’ Bertie?
‘merely pointing out confusing uses of terms like Britain, Ireland and Ulster. ‘
Greagoir’s postings imo indicate a mind and viewpoint that is not confused in the least. He is probably much more optimistic re the unionist leopard changinging it’s outdated spots for the more fashionable shiny new nationalist stripes than I could or would ever be’
If you are still confused here’s some help
.
Britain : An island off the North coast of France includes three ‘countries’ England , Scotland and Wales .
Ireland : Another island to the west of Britain composed of the Irish Republic (80% of the island) and Northern Ireland .
Ulster : A province of Ireland which is divided for purposes of political jurisdiction between Northern Ireland and the Republic with six counties of the province included in Northern Ireland and three counties administered by the Republic .
BTW – We don’t care about Biffo’s grasp of language . As long as he delivers good government . Midlanders are normally not noted for their verbal skills being in the main dour ‘****ers however as always the exception proves the rule.
“If you are still confused here’s some help
.”
Greenflag, Greagoir appears to think you’re well read in Irish history. Reading and understanding are different things
Here’s a wee bit more reading from the political domain for you:
Britain: shorthand for the United Kingdom of GB & NI.
Ireland: 26-county state aka the Republic, RoI and Eire fka the Free State.
Ulster: 6-county state aka NI.
PS I thought ‘i’ stood for ‘ignorant’ – in the cafone sense of that word:
“Cafone” is an Italian word that originally meant a peasant,but its meaning evolved to refer to rude, ignorant, uncouth people, particularly from the south. ..
They can be found in the north too, Greenflag …
Ah lads, lads, pistols at dawn!
Pardon my contribution @ 04:56 AM, but I had a few jars. A man is entitled to a few sups of the black stuff!
But I am more optimistic regarding NI. The old establishment is gone forever, can’t bring it back, so can really only look forward to the future. Why hark on about the good old bad old days?
(Remember those days when a plethora of UTV newsreaders had combovers; Brian Baird & co etc.. and when RTE newsreaders spoke the ‘Queens English’; Charles Mitchell, etc…)
‘Unionists can be Irish Nationalists too, given context.’
Yep sounds outlandish alright, but Unionists within the context of the UK fight for their corner of Ireland; Northern Ireland, ie funding, jobs etc…and their role within the island of Ireland is becoming more proactive too.
“Greagoir, why not stand for Nationalist folk in the context of the UK?
”
Unionist folk are doing that for us, not directly but rather indirectly!
Greagoir, that must have been bad poteen you slaked your thirst with
The new establishment is no barrel of laughs and it looks as if organised crime has got strong roots.
Nevin ,
You asked earlier if I could
‘outline those occasions from the 1880s onwards when Irish nationalism, in its various manifestations and alliances, was up for compromise.’
I answered your ‘request’ as best I could . So far your comments amount to
a) Nimbyism in the 1960′s
b) Semantics on nomenclature of the states /regions/countries in these islands
c) Something about Southern Italy and cafes
d) Biffo’s use of language
And finally in a flash of revelation the remark that
they (ignorant people )can be found in the north too, without making it clear whether you meant the North of Italy or Northern Ireland .
?
Mr WindsorRocker above makes a lot more sense in his analysis of the political realities and options with which ‘unionism’ is faced at this time . He omits the ‘repartition’ option but then for him/her that may be a road down which he /she might prefer not to travel.
‘The new establishment is no barrel of laughs and it looks as if organised crime has got strong roots. ‘
The old NI politcial establishment was as per numerous investigative reports carried out by HMG – no comedy act either.
So far this new ‘regime’ may provide a lot more laughs longer term.
Thank you for your efforts, Greenflag. I’ve got some other distractions at the moment over on the NALIL blog!!