“giddy zephyrs of the purest conjecture…”

In yesterday’s Irish News Newton Emerson poured cold water on some recent idle speculation – as noted by Alan.  From the Irish News

Speculation is mounting that Peter Robinson plans to step down as DUP leader.  It cannot be stressed enough that this is based on giddy zephyrs of the purest conjecture.  An attempt by nationalism to convince itself the Maze U-turn indicated weak leadership was debunked by a mild response from Sinn Féin, which sees exactly how Robinson has launched himself into the contested space programme.  All talk of a new leader that mentions Sammy Wilson is about as serious as a conference speech by Sammy Wilson.  In fact the only harm done is the likely loss of £18 million in EU funding, which is small beer by Stormont crisis standards, especially if a crisis has been averted.  Policing the first nine weeks of the flag protests cost £15m.

Well, it is still the silly season.  [Does it never end?! – Ed]  Good question.  And we have a relevant quote about that…


Discover more from Slugger O'Toole

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

We are reader supported. Donate to keep Slugger lit!

For over 20 years, Slugger has been an independent place for debate and new ideas. We have published over 40,000 posts and over one and a half million comments on the site. Each month we have over 70,000 readers. All this we have accomplished with only volunteers we have never had any paid staff.

Slugger does not receive any funding, and we respect our readers, so we will never run intrusive ads or sponsored posts. Instead, we are reader-supported. Help us keep Slugger independent by becoming a friend of Slugger. While we run a tight ship and no one gets paid to write, we need money to help us cover our costs.

If you like what we do, we are asking you to consider giving a monthly donation of any amount, or you can give a one-off donation. Any amount is appreciated.