Advertise
-
Books
-
Total Politics: Top 20 NI Blogs…
Fair play to Iain, he managed to get over 2,200 people voting in his poll for the top Northern Irish blogs this year… We (just, I imagine) retained our top spot, with Splintered coming straight in at number 2, no doubt his pet subject du jour will have garnered him a lot of fans… I’ve [...] read our review »
-
Debating the Churches’ Role in the Peace in Northern Ireland
This morning’s Sunday Sequence featured a substantial debate (about 35 minutes into the recorded programme) on a new book,Religion, Civil Society and Peace in Northern Ireland (Oxford University Press 2011), written by sociologists John Brewer, Gareth Higgins and Francis Teeney. The debate was framed in an opening vignette by presenter William Crawley in uncompromising terms, [...] read our review » -
“It was a trivial problem that… occurs every year”
Just your average family gathering at Christmas, with a bit of an argument about the seating cleaning arrangements… Scuffles have broken out between rival groups of Greek Orthodox and Armenian clerics over a turf war in Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity. Bemused tourists looked on as about 100 priests fought with brooms while cleaning the [...] read our review »
-
Comment on Beijing accounts for just 1% of FDI in Europe so Ireland will have to wait…
on 24 May 2012 at 7:08 am
Trucks and roll on roll off ferries make logistics less of a problem, and it can be quicker for executives to fly ex Dublin and hire a car than drive within Europe.
The Chinese can do their low cost manufacturing at home, they would come here to add value in sales and marketing, which is their weak point.
We may not need mass employment factories when so many other jobs spill out of investment, and spending spreads our tax base.
If the Chinese remember the boxer wars they will come to Carlow, not Warminster.
Go to comment
Comment on Beijing accounts for just 1% of FDI in Europe so Ireland will have to wait…
on 23 May 2012 at 11:25 pm
China is loaded with hard currency, Ireland is not.
They know English better than the other Euro-langues
And they only get taxed if they make a profit, and then not by too much. No bribes to pay worth speaking of.
There are already plenty of Chinese speakers here already to give them the low-down.
No reason for the Chinese not to make the republic a base for any European operation.
Its not as if we do not have the spare houses!
Go to comment
Comment on Grammar schools and social mobility: a Northern Ireland contribution to the debate
on 21 May 2012 at 9:03 pm
Q1 “The highest ratio of acceptances to applications at Cambridge is from Northern Ireland.”
ANS: Because very few applied, and those that do have been ubergroomed by a class ridden and unjust system.
Discuss: Is it really OK that well off middle class parents can pay tutors thousands of pounds to have their children jump the educational queue?
Or is there nothing new under the sun? Parents used to pay fees to get their kids who failed the ’11 plus’ into Grammar School for the first year with the prospect of resitting their ‘Quali’ the following year and the state paying from then on.
TRANSLATE: Plus ca change mais plus s’est la meme chose.
CHOSE ONE ANSWER
Competition increases economic productivity when:
1 Producers become less efficient
2 Poverty is the destruction of the rich
3 Our own children get a heat start
Go to comment
Comment on “The link between taxing and spending is basic to democracy…”
on 18 May 2012 at 6:45 pm
The Tories are all for reducing income tax here, but Sammy does not want to. Spending other people’s money is a lot easier than negotiating detailed tax and benefits changes with British treasury officials.
The price we pay is a smaller economy.
Go to comment
Comment on #EUREF: Souveraineté ou survie du déluge?
on 17 May 2012 at 9:15 am
Ireland’s economy depends on being a Euro area base for multinational companies, so it may just have to be yes.
Knowing that if it all falls apart it can still be a European base for these companies.
Maybe even as part of a Sterling currency area!
Or Sinn Fein can have us grow our own potatoes, or else.
Go to comment
Comment on Paisley: I have nothing to apologise for…
on 16 May 2012 at 11:50 pm
£10k is a lot when electoral expenses are limited by law.
‘Themmuns were doing it too so it is OK’ is just a recipe for permanent SFDUP rule, by hook or by crook.
Go to comment
Comment on Obama endorses gay marriage
on 10 May 2012 at 8:37 am
Focussing on marriage is unlikely to be what Romney and the Mormon polygamists want.
Maybe Obama could mention the age of consent to turn the heat up some more.
And Barak should mention blood and sweat, as Romney does not look as if he has either.
And maybe mention fear, naming the republican dragon before slaying it in full view.
Go to comment
Comment on Community silence starting to break over abuse in Lancashire?
on 9 May 2012 at 10:31 pm
Why ‘honour killings’ when it is daughters that are being killed?
Go to comment
Comment on A drafting error in the Fiscal Compact?
on 7 May 2012 at 7:08 pm
‘must reduce it at an AVERAGE rate of…’
So we can have bad years and good years, with lots of bad ones first.
Go to comment
Comment on “are you serious?” – redux
on 6 May 2012 at 6:45 pm
Maybe it makes more sense to ship eggs than ship many times more tonnes of chickenfeed here to make ‘irish’ eggs, thought I’m sure the eggs would taste that much better coming from white chickens with gold heads and green tails.
How is Sinn Fein’s economic strategy coming along anyhow?
Maybe Kim Sung Il would share a few glorious ideas.
Go to comment