Monday, March 10, 2008
Paisley has had the last laugh on Republicans…
It’s hard to know what Gerry Adams really thinks about Ian Paisley. Last week, he refered to the First Minister as a fascinating and respectful in his dealings. Yesterday, at a Republican commemoration in Milltown Cemetary, he suggested in his address that the DUP had been ‘careless’ to lose, not one but two Paisleys. Anthony McIntyre thinks the Big Man has had the last laugh:
Ultimately, history might be unkind to Ian Paisley, judging him as the man who abandoned all his beliefs for a slice of power, only to fall on the extremist sword he had fashioned to perfection. A more astute assessment might well conclude that, in essence, the old theocrat never really changed. In government, he secured what had long eluded him outside of it—Sinn Fein’s acceptance of second-class citizenship. His perpetual dismissal of Martin McGuinness as ‘the deputy’ was par for the Paisley course. That the Derry Catholic should prove so deferential to the ‘big man’ negated a lifetime spent insisting that God made Catholics but the armalite rifle made them equal.
Ian Paisley can step into retirement chuckling at his achievements: partition into perpetuity and the union with Britain as secure as it has ever been. His has been one political odyssey that defies Enoch Powell’s dictum “all political careers end in failure”.
Mick Fealty @ 09:39 AM
On Turgon’s point about the uniting Protestant, Catholic and Dissenter. I consider myself a republican in the tradition of Tone. That is precisely why I reject the narrow sectarian politics offered by unionism and nationalism.
In the hands of the Provos and their offshoots and supporters, that is a trite phrase that means nothing when stacked against their actions.
But the vision of an Ireland where sectarianism has been left behind and a politics of common interest has replaced it remains the only solution to our problems.
Posted by on Mar 10, 2008 @ 09:20 PMI bet your wife is a prettier upper middle class unionist than you.But it is not inaccurate. The natives have to be portrayed as dirty, promiscuous,heathen,drink ridden etc if the colonisation is to work.That’s the way of the world. You don’t fight your equals and steal their land. You try to civilise the untermensch and to do this you have to take their land. Sure they were only grazing a few cows on it, anyway - savages! But now, you and people like you, have met the natives and found some of them quite likeable - not trustworthy - but likeable rogues. The fact that some are better off than you and may even have bought farms that the pioneers have been driven off (by their raggle taggle comrades). Remember John Taylor’s remark that unionists must remember that 1 in 2 Catholics vote Sinn Fein. Your class of people will prosper in any society and no form of government is a threat to you. You can be forever the ‘hurlers on the ditch’ - with nobody and agin nobody. Forgive the rant and the stereotyping and I hope Mr Willowfield doesn’t read this.
Posted by on Mar 10, 2008 @ 09:29 PMLets admit the possibility that Paisley has destroyed the Union in the sense of any real shared political relationship with Britain. Sinn Fein may be as comfortable as Paisley is with the image of protestantism alternately beleaguered and defiant, held at bay by the IRA, but then assertive in government. For the DUP are Irishmen in government in Ireland. Britain is delighted to leave them to it, and can be counted on to lift no finger to defend proud proddy privileges should things get sticky later. All his own work, his one extravagance his choice of enemies.
And what of the tidy suburban hordes who suspended their critical faculties and tolerance to follow him for a bit?
Led into the wilderness.
SO biblical, but as father Dougal says, and without the death, sure its only a bit of a laugh really.
Posted by on Mar 10, 2008 @ 11:06 PMSinn Fein knew after 9/11 that political violence has no future in Ireland so it was external events, not Paisley or any Unionist, who put Sinn Fein into Stormont in the medium term.
Ordinary UUP people would settle into in UI easily. They clearly don’t want it but that doesn’t mean if/when there’s a nationalist majority they won’t participate and help shape a new, equal and fair unified Irish state for all our citizens of whatever background.
It’s the DUP disparate group of followers who maintain the colonial mindset that would cause problems in any modern society. Many of these are either religious fundamentalists or intellectually defunct Loyalists. A democratic majority in the North won’t matter to these type of people. Thus Ireland will need a well trained Police Force or the UN will be invited to Belfast and Ballymena to calm the colonial nutjobs.
Posted by on Mar 10, 2008 @ 11:14 PM“You don’t fight your equals and steal their land. You try to civilise the untermensch and to do this you have to take their land.”
How can this unsettling thought rest in the consciousness of astute upright devout Bible observing Christians of the Reformed Churches today. “Very easily,” I hear them say? Surely the sin of covetness should be recognized and corrected here!
Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 08:23 AMDid’nt martin sf say on spotlight a few weeks ago that they where not considering a united ireland anymore? what has happened to him, my thoughts are he’s been britishised…
Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 10:10 AMI am an Anglican educated agnostic,who probably might swing to deism. I am tempted to the Bahai faith. I am Bitish,a resident of Northern Ireland and I remain steadfasly firm in my belief that total integration of The UK is the only answer; with secular politics. Liechenstein, Andorra, Monaco, Gibraltar, The British Dependencies,San Marino, Malta etc. all coexist with their larger neighbours,So what,s the problem with the Irish Republicans, can they not be mature?. We do lots of surgical procedures up here for them, remember the hypocatic oath.Women can only be seduced voluntarily by love and persuasion,not by threats and megaphone diplomacy and lawyers never sort out anything its bad for ongoing fees. Whats happened, happened; and no more commissions or Eames Bradleys will solve anything.
The IRA were defeated by superior forces and anything Sein Fein says will not stop me knowing that and its the likes of me they’ve got to win over in this argument not that crowd in Milltown Cemetary. Could’nt they kick Adams upstairs and give my head some peace.Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 02:07 PMYes indeed you can co-exist with your larger “neighbour” Llamedos - the 26 counties.
Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 02:59 PM“I am Bitish,a resident of Northern Ireland and I remain steadfasly firm in my belief that total integration of The UK is the only answer”
Well good for you Llamedos!
I’d say you’d be all on for a UK soccer team then, and sure why not rugby as well, etc…
Give the UK a big cheer in the Eurovision too! Andy Abraham will represent you well this year, as I’m sure you have a lot more in common with himself (and Scooch last year) than the folk you live among in northen Ireland! As a UK citizen maybe you will give your neighbours in Ireland the “douze points” pleeze!
Go raibh maith agat, sir!
Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 03:16 PM“For as long as the Established Church ruled supreme and Presbyterians were discriminated against, or perceived themselves as such, many among their ranks took an interest in revolutionary politics.”
Quite true, but many more became fervent Unionists. Don’t overestimate Presbyterian republicanism.
Many United irishmen became supporters of the Union as a means to break the Protestant Ascendancy. Presbyterians were in the Orange Order from the very start, and were arguably numerically stronger than Episcopalians in many counties by the mid 18th century. Henry Cooke’s analysis chimed far more accurately with us than Montgomery’s or O’Connell’s.When the orange leadership tried to defend the establishment of the Cof I there was widespread dissent from Presbyterian members.
Even people like Rev W B Armour were more interested in opposing what they saw as anti-presbyterian discrimination right in to the 1920s than in supporting Home Rule. The radicalism of the Route was the old Liberal non-conformism, but it was fundamentally Unionist.They didn’t like Carson the Tory, but they liked Collins and De Valera even less.
Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 03:21 PM“A democratic majority in the North won’t matter to these type of people.”
...er, you mean in the way that it mattered to nationalists when Unionists won every election from 1921 and counting?
Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 03:25 PMIs it just me or does anyone else just switch off these days when Misty-Eyed Nationalists start up with any of the following phrases : Motherland, Serf, Colonial mindset, Untying of apronstrings,
Native, Planter, Indigenous, Garrison, Croppies and the inevitable stolen land spiel…...Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 03:30 PMJesus, what’s that luking in the dark? Don’t look under the bed, for the fear of Home Rule and a United Ireland!
“Home Rule” seems to be the bogeyman of Unionists.
“Women can only be seduced voluntarily by love and persuasion,not by threats and megaphone diplomacy and lawyers never sort out anything its bad for ongoing fees.”So you want to be wooed into a United Ireland then, Llamedos. Kinky!
Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 03:31 PM...“The Curse of the Home Rule Papists”
ha ha….A horror flick set in Stormont….Starring Karloff, Lugosi and Chaney!
Posted by on Mar 11, 2008 @ 03:42 PM
