Profile for Mick Fealty
Latest posts from Mick Fealty (see all)
Mick Fealty has posted 8,026 times (54 in the last month).
Fianna Fail will vote Yes in a referendum on Fiscal Compact…
Having made the point that calling a referendum on matters that don’t sort out the underlying problem is less than meaningful, Micheal Martin announced yesterday that he would be backing the Fiscal Compact in any forthcoming referendum… Hmmmm… not exactly shadowing Sinn Fein then Eoghan? more »
Red Squirrels of Prehen Woods: Under imminent threat from planners and developers?
During the 2005 Slugger live coverage of the Westminster elections, I overheard a fairly senior Sinn Fein representative being candid enough to admit that there were no votes in the Environment. That’s not to pick on that particular party any more than any of the others. It’s a fact of life in Northern Irish electoral [...] more »
Media, new media and the problems of regulation in a globalising media market…
On Monday I was at a conference on Media Diversity run and funded by Labour MEP Nessa Childers. It was probably one of the best roster of speakers I’ve heard on the subject on that side of the Irish Sea, even if there was barely time to talk, or ask questions. Then yesterday, Paul Staines, [...] more »
Carwyn Jones looking for a national senate to replace the Lords…
A couple of weeks ago, on the sidelines of the newly revitalised Scottish Question, Carwyn Jones, the Labour leader in the Welsh Assembly made some remarks that have created some ripples in his own back yard: Asked how Wales would fare if Scotland voted for independence, he said: “I think we need to start thinking [...] more »
UUP and the SDLP: Two parties in search of a script?
Very good column from Fionnuala O’Connor on Tuesday re what what’s happening to two parties in continuing decline. She starts with the semi public spat between Margaret Ritchie and her chosen successor, the retired school head, Sean Rogers: Surely between them a keen new player and a former leader could have avoided such a petty [...] more »
“Fianna Fail needs to stop playing stupid patriot games”
For my money, the Irish Independent’s editorial somewhat scales up the current German influence within the EU for effect, but it warns Fianna Fail it is currently playing the wrong game in calling for a referendum: It is a measure of how the European dream has soured that having joined with the clear intent of [...] more »
Michael Martin shadowing Sinn Fein positions in the Dail?
Something of a return to form for Eoghan Harris: Right now Sinn Fein rules the opposition roost. Like a rooster it makes a lot of noise. Fianna Fail has failed to point out it neither lays policy hens or economic eggs. Given these two gormless groups and a grim recession, Fianna Fail should be flying. [...] more »
“Failure to deal with the past is the Achilles’ Heel of the current arrangement”
Haunted is a good word for the core subject of Robin Wilson’s op ed in the Belfast Telegraph today. The past haunts all the players to one degree or another. He echoes DPP Barra McGrory’s concern that treating all matters via the judicial route is not the most desirable means of moving forward. As Tim [...] more »
Is Northern Ireland less innovative than the Republic?
It seems we in Northern Ireland aren’t doing so well when it comes to innovation, at least according to InterTrade Ireland. Simon Hamilton tweeted this announcement from one of his party’s ministers yesterday: “Arlene Foster reveals only 1 of 18 nominations in InterTradeIreland awards from NI & this is a trend. Does ROI have monopoly [...] more »
Better journalism: “We have to learn directly from news consumers through experiments”
There’s an interesting confluence of work on journalism in the digital age today. This morning I’m at conference in Dublin on the importance of Diversity in the Media (organised by the Labour MEP Nessa Childers), and at the same time Blair Jenkins’s Better Journalism in the Digital Age, is published by the Carnegie Foundation across [...] more »
Latest comments from Mick Fealty (see all)
Mick Fealty has commented 8,427 times (144 in the last month).
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Books
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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 » -
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 »
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Spare us a phoney row about racism, we’ve got enough on
A silly media row about racism just had to figure in the riots’ post mortem. Was the Tudor history expert David Starkey racist on Newsnight when he said: The whites have become black. A particular sort of violent, destructive, nihilistic, gangster culture has become the fashion. And black and white, boy and girl, operate in [...] read our review »
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Comment on Fianna Fail will vote Yes in a referendum on Fiscal Compact…
on 11 February 2012 at 10:09 pm
Indeed. Noel Whelan makes that very clear in the IT this morning.
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Comment on Red Squirrels of Prehen Woods: Under imminent threat from planners and developers?
on 11 February 2012 at 7:26 pm
Nevin, that’s not an excuse for refusing to give reasons for their decisions.
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Comment on raising an old issue like employment
on 10 February 2012 at 4:38 pm
I’m not sure there’s any certainty that they would Alias. But business works to certain post conflict rules that it seems the political parties are having some difficulty working out.
However, if there is a residual problem with distribution of employment then that is a ‘political’ issue.
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Comment on Red Squirrels of Prehen Woods: Under imminent threat from planners and developers?
on 10 February 2012 at 3:21 pm
All good, but it’s the issue of what’s be left unguarded and unwatched. Strangfird Lough any one?
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Comment on raising an old issue like employment
on 10 February 2012 at 1:51 pm
Sorry to come back with another question, but Is there really any kind of discriminatory case against Invest NI John? Or are you just speculating?
I think it’s a tad early to blame local polticians for what look like long term patterns too, since they’ve only just got a hold of the reigns of power.
I think we have to investigate a basket of why’s before deciding who’s fault it is.
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Comment on Red Squirrels of Prehen Woods: Under imminent threat from planners and developers?
on 10 February 2012 at 1:43 pm
One the scale of things this is not the biggest story, but it is a very telling one, not least because of the copious documenting in Eammon’s article, of the capacity of the planning service to listen to and take on board real community concerns.
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Comment on Red Squirrels of Prehen Woods: Under imminent threat from planners and developers?
on 10 February 2012 at 1:37 pm
I can ask.
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Comment on raising an old issue like employment
on 10 February 2012 at 11:33 am
Data here suggests stability in Protestant employment, and on the Catholic side growth from 2000-2007 then decline again:
http://www.poverty.org.uk/i47/index.shtml?2
Which suggests that the kinds of employment that began to fill the gap were more vulnerable to the recession, whereas Protestant employment rates have stayed the same.
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Comment on raising an old issue like employment
on 10 February 2012 at 10:53 am
Is there any data on the whys of it John?
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Comment on Carwyn Jones looking for a national senate to replace the Lords…
on 10 February 2012 at 10:46 am
Providing the Union continues to cohere, I don’t think the English would wear Carwyn’s model. That’s why the Unionist cause needs to go back to basics and rethink this stuff from basics.
Few in Yorkshire for instance want regional government, but places in a Senate would cost less and give some place for Yorkshire concerns currently being ignored by Westminster/London.
My one negative on this is that it may not be ‘man enough’ to deliver what it promises.
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