Platform for Change
Flags – Can we now have a sensible debate?
Tweet Last night at Platform for Change‘s Flags – Can we now have a sensible conversation? event, 120 or more people crammed into a room in the Holiday Inn to hear from nine local political representatives and to pose their questions. The two hour event, chaired by Robin Wilson, started with each panellist being given [...] more »
Another cross community event at a GAA club
Tweet I noted the event at Pomeroy GAA club to remember IRA terrorist Seamus Woods previously and Quincey has an analysis of the GAA below. The DUP Chair of the Assembly’s Culture, Arts & Leisure Committee Michelle McIlveen has now entered the debate. From the DUP website: It is simply not credible for the GAA [...] more »
Eames Bradley: if it is coming back; time to fight it again
Tweet When I went trekking in Africa one summer with my sister I remember meeting a game warden with a Kalashnikov assault rifle in the Masai Mara. I enquired whether it was to stop poachers. He said no it was really for crocodiles and explained that if one tries to attack you the only solution [...] more »
Forget about platforms. Why not just do it?
Tweet Eamonn McCann thinks talking about change will have limited appeal unless it comes with a proposal for material change that people will be motivated to vote for: History teaches that the only occasions when sizable numbers of Protestants and Catholics have detached themselves from communal allegiance to make common cause have been occasions when [...] more »
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Books
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A poem for the day – Launching the Whaler Juan Peron
Tweet A Belfast epic, and one of my oldest poems, the opener of my first collection, Grub. The gist of the story was found in Moss & Hume’s Shipbuilders to the World: 125 Years of Harland and Wolff, Belfast, 1861-1986, which tells how Eva Peron was due to launch a huge whaling vessel in Belfast, [...] read our review » -
Ian O’Riordan’s Miles to Run: An invitation to madness?
Tweet Ireland is in the middle of a boom – a running boom. Chances are, even if you have never run a step yourself (apart from some painful P.E. classes many moons ago), someone you know has taken up running over the last little while. Road races in Northern Ireland and in the Republic have [...] read our review »
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Do Words Matter?: Book Review of Political Discourse and Conflict Resolution – Debating Peace in Northern Ireland
Tweet I share many of the concerns of Andy Pollak, whose recent post ‘My Response to the Slugger Begrudgers’ zeroed in on the ‘relentless flow of negativity’ of some Slugger commentators. Pollak’s post was largely concerned with the medium of the blog. Indeed, I think the anonymity of the online world encourages extreme discourse and [...] read our review »
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