“Wife, mother, Councillor, MLA, and Minister of a Department?”

Notwithstanding Peter Robinson’s remarks in my interview with him for Total Politics about the reluctance of members of his political party to give up their double and triple mandates whilst there are serious questions about why a government minister thinks she should run for the office of a humble councillor. By local UUP man (and former Environment Minister, Sam Foster seems have walked into a Palin trap of his own, when he wrote to the Fermanagh Herald this week. He counts Arlene’s mandates up to five, it would seem. Mark Devenport:

in his letter, the UUP man describes the late DUP Councillor Joe Dodds as “a man’s man.” He goes on to describe the UUP candidate Basil Johnston as “a single person”, and then he continues “Seriously, I have to ask the question: how does Arlene expect to contend with the number of responsible roles she wants to carry and to do each one well, but not to neglect any, e.g. wife, mother, Councillor, MLA, and Minister of a Department?”

Now the American right has effected a late (very late – ed) conversion to feminism, I doubt that one is going to be left to lie…

Mick Fealty

Mick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written papers on the impacts of the Internet on politics and the wider media and is a regular guest and speaking events across Ireland, the UK and Europe. Twitter: @MickFealty