Thursday, December 06, 2007
Sinn Fein and the Quinn killing…
I was in Westminster, briefly, on Tuesday were there was some feverish speculation amongst lobby journalists about the Paul Quinn killing and including some interesting lines about who actually was there. It may all turn out to be just that, speculation. And for that reason, I’m not about to repeat any of it in the public domain. But, at the very least, there are some questions arising from Sinn Fein’s treatment of the family by getting its revenge in first and tarring the victim with the ‘criminality’ tag, without, it would seem, any proof being offered one way or the other.
And there is a pattern in Sinn Fein’s behaviour towards grieving families who ask awkward questions that matches past events. Apart from any moral questions, it looks pretty bad from the outside. We can see the pattern most publicly in the aftermath of the Robert McCartney killing.
On that occasion Alex Maskey came out fairly rapidly and blamed ‘a knife culture’: a line that fitted a fairly vigorous news story in England at the time. As it turned out that, according a statement that eventually made by the IRA after a lengthy news investigation had uncovered a substantial Sinn Fein presence in the bar where the fracas began, three of those involved had serving IRA volunteers at the time.
In the immediate wake of Quinn murder, Gerry Adams referred to accounts emerging from the family and others that Republicans were involved as ‘tittle tattle’. He then suggested this was the result of a dispute between diesel smugglers. His source: a few phone calls to some people in the area.
Whatever Adams’ senior status as President of his party, it is not a statement that can be traded upon with any confidence.
As to the overall situation, there are several levels to this.
One relates to any future individual prosecutions. Apart from John Laird’s use of parliamentary privilege, I’ve not heard anyone mention individuals. Nor should there be, at least not without serious proof, or at the very least a police charge.
A second rests on the issue highlighted in a letter send out to local residents by the Quinn support group: i.e. public safety in the area.
And then there is the political aspect of this. At the time of the McCartney murder I consistently argued that the party’s coldness towards the interests of the dead man’s family was inimicable to the party’s longer term electoral interests. SF activists commenting on Slugger were fairly gung ho and saying that the Westminster elections would not be affected.
In the event the party took Mallon’s old seat that same year with relative ease. But they missed their other targets by an Irish mile. A good rally this March got them another net gain, but the election in the south was, by Chris’s own searingly honest account a complete disaster.
Incidents like this, and more importantly, the party’s vicious public reaction to it are messing with the party’s brand. The association is less with radical politics and increasingly with a callous disregard for the lives of anyone who disagrees with them.
In short it is in danger of becoming the ‘nasty party’, an image that the party’s behaviour, at various levels, in the face of public disasters like this does nothing to allay.
The thing that prevents any of this being serious politically damaging at the moment is that its nationalist opposition in Northern Ireland at the moment is a shambles. The senior parties in the Executive at the moment have a virtual autocracy that even President Chavez might have settled for. Sinn Fein and the DUP will seek to use their majority powers inside the Executive to dig in and settle down as the ‘natural parties of government’ for the long term.
But to make an analogy with ‘another place’, the Tories looked like they could walk on water with British Labour in 80s and 90s and seemed to have dumped the ‘nasty’ tag when they got rid of Thatcher, until Black Wednesday and Tony Blair, between them, finally buried them for a good ten years.
The lesson, I would suggest, is that brand corrosion happens over a long time, but it takes a decent opposition knock over any political project. So long as there is no effective opposition (and there is no sign of one) the party is safe enough in Northern Ireland. But they have already had a recent taste of brand failure in the Republic.
In the meantime, whoever is right or wrong, some of the party’s treatment of the Quinn family in the wake of their son’s killing has been downright nasty. In terms of its brand, this is fairly viscous stuff. And like tar, it sticks.
Mick Fealty @ 08:01 AM
This is pathetic, Mick.
It is even more irresponsible than what those Unionists said under the protection of parliamentary privilege - just a vague tarring of SF/PIRA for their alleged murder of Paul Quinn.
You provide no evidence or even a whim of any in making your case - only that they have not been either too sympathetic or helpful in the Quinn family’s efforts to prove that they did - who would under these circumstances? - and the fact the SF didn’t do well recently in the Republic’s election.
Also, when is the site going to provide a thread about coroner Lecky’s inquests into the Shoot-to-Kill murders during the emergency in South Armagh in 1982 - what he has finally been given access to John Stalker’s incomplete inquiry into them?
He was removed from it because he was allegedly connected to Captain Simon Hayward, the BA leader of the RUC squads in revenge for the nail bombings in London the previous July, through the drug-smuggling activities of his brother Christopher.
These inquests could, if fairly conducted, blow Simon Hayward’s covert activities in Northern Ireland and beyond completely sky-high.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:03 AMTrow,
I would encourage you to read the piece again. In fact, I’ve argued that the ‘tarring’ has been in the other direction. There is a lot of gossip flying about, but I have quite deliberately not repeated any of it.
Everything I have put in the piece above is falsifiably in the public domain.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:14 AM‘But, at the very least, there are some questions arising from Sinn Fein’s treatment of the family by getting its revenge in first and tarring the victim with the ‘criminality’ tag, without, it would seem, any proof being offered one way or the other.’ - Mick Fealty
Revenge? rather unfortunate use of that word their mick, it seems you want the public to think Sinn Fein have some sort of vendetta against the Quinn family. it is precisely journalism like this with puts Sinn Fein on the defensive, which then only exacerbates the situation.
a re-wording is needed methinks.Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:26 AMI have already read it twice, and it is tarring in spaces IMHO, despite your refraining from providing the details of what Lord Laird claimed - as if everyone doesn’t know what he said, and anyone who repeats it certainly runs the risk of being sued by people like Treanor.
You are just exploiting what has happened since the bank heist - the MacCartney affair, the murder of Denis Donald, Quinn, etc., - for which no one, as far as I know, has been convicted, though that Davison guy stands to be so after that Devine character instigated the brawl.
And to talk about brand corrosion in this context just adds to proving the effectiveness of continuing tarrring of SF/PIRA in a most irresponsible way.
In addition, any chance of a thread on the inquests into the Shoot-to-Kill murders?
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:27 AMRepublicanStones-
“it is precisely journalism like this with puts Sinn Fein on the defensive, which then only exacerbates the situation.”
I think you’ll find that Sinn Féin were on the offensive from the word ‘go’. If you’re trying to write-off Sinn Féin’s appalling performance since this brutal murder as a natural and justifible reaction to journalistic coverage, then you’re going way beyond the realms of credibility. This spinning would drive one mad.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:34 AMTrowbridge,
what evidence did Gerry Adams have before tarring Paul Quinn as a diesel smuggler on Talkback at the earliest available opportunity? Do you really want to start a bidding war about who tars people’s names around here? If so, we could discuss what Sinn Féin did to the McCartney family over the past three years, the lies and slander pushed out down through the ranks, the graffiti machine, whatever it took to get people to believe that McCartney was a scumbag and his sisters a shower of whingers in the pay of the Brits.
Laird Laird being a bigoted twit abusing his powers does not actually justify Sinn Féin slandering anyone rumoured to have been killed by members of the IRA.
All the Quinn family want is for the killers of their son to be brought to justice, and for anyone with information to co-operate with police on either side of the border. I don’t see how any responsible representative could fail to want the perpetrators of such a brutal murder taken off the streets. So why hasn’t the rumour mill been decommissioned?
Sinn Féin are talking out of both sides of their mouth here, with Conor Murphy’s public line being absolutely correct, but other members from Gerry Adams down behaving like a group of corner boys.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:38 AMT.H. Ford:Whataboutery is a futile exercise. One can acknowledge state wrong (eg shoot to kill and lack of proper investigation), yet speak out on Slugger against paramilitary style ‘justice’demonstrated in the Quinn murder.
Mick:I think it is responsible of you not to name names but reasonable when you make assumptions about who were involved in the Quinn murder.At the same time, in general I think Laird plays a dangerous game with Parliamentary privilege. In the Quinn murder why did he not go to the PSNI with information?
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:41 AMhang on el matador, so its fine to use loaded words like ‘revenge’, when your supposed to be impartial, as is expected of journalists. is that your idea of impartial reporting?
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:43 AMGuys,
The phrasing may be unfortunate, but the base matter of this is in the first paragraph. Gerry Adams tarred Quinn with the term criminal, before any information was in the public domain. That is a matter of public record.
How the party chose to play it that way has little to do with journalism, and more to do with factors that are largely unknown.
I might wrong about the brand corrosion, I don’t claim omniscience in such matters. But to imagine that such events and more importantly such intemperate reactions will have no effect on the brand is hardly sustainable.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:46 AMMick,
There were several media reports of the Gardai seeking information on a lorry full of diesel set on fire outside Lisburn. You might want to check when that broke before saying Adams was first out of the blocks.
Though I agree some of the responses from SF supporters, particulalrly that Balrog entry, have been bang out of order.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:50 AMRS-
I said nothing about journalism. I merely pointed out how ridiculous your contention was that Sinn Féin’s vicious performance was simply and solely a response to media reporting of the killing.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:55 AMGranni trixie: “I think Laird plays a dangerous game with Parliamentary privilege. In the Quinn murder why did he not go to the PSNI with information? “
Because he has the strategic ability of a furry cat turd. His only interest in the whole saga is how it can be used to drive publicity for himself.
Conor Murphy and SF have a problem here - the tactics that would have been used in the past to hush up something like this in S Armagh are no longer available. This is going to simmer away for a while yet I think.
As long as the family continue to hold their nerve, stay in the driving seat and demand justice, the efforts of SF to drive the story out of the media will continue to drive publicity. The u-turn by Cross Rangers on allowing the hall is a case in point.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:57 AMMick is just following what hacks in the press, especially in The Independent and The Observer, immediately claimed right after Paul was murdered - i.e., it was just like what the Provos did to Eamon Collins, etc., and lied about, etc. And this isn’t tarring SF/PIRA?
Anything one chooses to blame on them is true whether they did it or not or deny it or not???
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 10:59 AMFrank,
If I had made a leap of that nature, I would rightly have the house pulled down on my shoulders.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:03 AMTHF-
“Mick is just following what hacks in the press, especially in The Independent and The Observer, immediately claimed right after Paul was murdered - i.e., it was just like what the Provos did to Eamon Collins, etc., and lied about, etc. And this isn’t tarring SF/PIRA?”
That’s a new line of attack, claiming that the whole thing was concocted by journalists. Surely you can do better than that. Perhaps aliens came down and carried out this crime just to land the provos in it.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:06 AMTrow,
You are clearly making your own leap of faith there. I have said no such thing and no amount of ‘guilt by false association’ makes it so. But if you have an issue with what I have actually written, let’s hear it?
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:08 AMAliens in the pay of Brit securocrats?
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:12 AMI just base my case of your reversing who was instigating the tarring sf/pira and its brand corrosion, MIck, on what these links, thanks to continuing wild charges from the Quinn family, claimed:
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article3104602.ece
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/sf-denials-on-savage-killing-fall-on-deaf-ears-1206678.html
http://www.newslettter.co.uk/news/Family-blames-IRA-for-murder.3399301.jp
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:30 AMTHF-
Keep it coming. The more you flounder, the more it looks like there’s something to hide.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:36 AM‘Sinn Féin’s vicious performance’ - El Matador
it seems your fond of using loaded words yourself Mat. Once republicans are implicated in anything, the media immediately assume that the leadership had prior knowledge it was going to happen, or sanctioned it, or are trying to cover it up, compare it to other events involving republicans, before a representative of Sinn Fein has even commented on the matter. In so doing, anything Sinn Fein say on the matter is construed to fit into one of the aforementioned slots.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:36 AMRS-
“it seems your fond of using loaded words yourself Mat.”
Yes, loaded with fact. Sinn Féin’s behaviour has been nothing short of shameful since this attack. Conor Murphy said he talked to the IRA in south Armagh and was satisfied that they weren’t behind it- who appointed him as chief of police? Surely he should pass the details of these people to the PSNI and let them decide if these denials are valid. Or does Conor’s support for policing not stretch to passing on details of members of illegal organisations to the PSNI? And then we had SF saying that they back the Quinn family but not the Quinn Support Group- the family has decided that forming the group is the best way to achieve justice- who are Sinn Féin to dictate how they should conduct themselves or who they should associate with? And of course we have the accusations by SF that this killing was merely the result of some sort of criminal feud- once that had been rejected as nothing more than a joke of a claim, they moved on to making personal attacks on people involved in the Quinn Support Group and the way it is operating. Indeed the BBC was forced to issue a retraction of claims made on air by Conor Murphy in relation to the group.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:46 AMOne of the differences between the response to Paul Quinn’s murder and Robert McCartney’s is that the campaign is being fronted by a pretty media savvy group of people.
They already have a website and are booking meeting centres throughout South Armagh.The campaign appears well organised, and politically aware of the “chess moves” being played, and likely to be played by SF.
They are ahead of the game.Indeed SF can hardly complain at being attacked, when they made the first move in “criminalising” Paul Quinn.
In political terms SF have got themselves into this mess, and its incumbent on them to extricate themselves from the drama; or at least change roles from panto villain to prince.
One would think that with all their problems: resignations/ poor showing in the South/ death threats from dissidents ..the last thing they need is a war on another front.
The walls of silence must come down; assisting in that would really be revolutionary thinking Gerry Adams !
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:49 AMThanks for the links Trow. Very helpful.
The focus of the post relates to the party’s reaction to the family and the likely effects to the party, rather than any speculation over what may or may not actually happened or any question of who was responsible.
So the point is not who was first in with the boot, but that however you cut it, the party’s reaction is politically damaging for Sinn Fein.
If Adams’ statement is tit for tat rather than a pre-emptive strike, it is also an abandonment of the higher ground.
As head of an organisation that has serious and important democratic ambitions that has to cost both him and his party something important. How important, only time will tell.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:52 AMOf course the reaction of PSF - blackening not only the lad’s name but the intentions of his family through their association with Jim McAllister - has been damaging, and it is perfectly reasonable of Mick to flag that up.
What is less reasonable, is the new banner at the top of the page, which is giving me a serious headache.
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:58 AMAnd this isn’t tarring SF/PIRA?
And Gerry Adams wasn’t tarring Paul Quinn?
Do you ever respond to posts you don’t have a credible answer for?
Posted by on Dec 06, 2007 @ 11:59 AM
