Mick Fealty – Page 8 – Slugger O'Toole

A minimal case in favour of a constitutional monarchy…

Mick Fealty on June 4, 2022, 3:23 pm

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monarchy, monarch, britain

For the weekend that’s in it, here’s Phil Moorhouse with a mild defence of the British monarchy, and why he’d vote to retain it, even while not arguing strongly for it. See the second half where he contrasts the functionary nature of a constitutional monarch with the cagey politicking of even a weak President (like Ireland’s)… Mick FealtyMick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written papers on the impacts of the Internet on politics and the wider media and …

What exactly would a genuine Stormont reform process look like?

Mick Fealty on June 2, 2022, 1:46 pm

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20130410 GFA 15

Been meaning to share this from Jon Tonge in the Belfast Telegraph but the combination of shortage of time during mid term break and my hurry to get my Twitter valedictory finished meant I didn’t get around to it. Surely it is time to change the rules of the political institutions. Several parties say they are in favour. Alliance produced a treatise on reform for its election manifesto. But change never happens. As the lyrics of the UK number one …

Why I’m leaving Twitter fifteen years after I first jumped into an unending stream of news and tat…

Mick Fealty on June 1, 2022, 6:28 pm

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infinity, infinite, ecg

“You have to understand, most people are not ready to be unplugged…” -Morpheus, The Matrix I promised last week that I would explain why I’m leaving Twitter. Well, I’ve got my archives from them now so that I have a copy of everything I’ve shared with them over the years since 2007 and I’m ready to go. It’s not a case of personal frustration with the constant man playing. The mute and block functions that were invented do help you …

Our legacy story is little more than “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”.

Mick Fealty on May 27, 2022, 1:47 pm

| Readers 1699

fire, pot, historical

The most strident opponent of the UK government’s legacy proposals is Sinn Féin, even though members of their wider movement who (highest crime/lowest conviction ratio) stand to benefit most. Go figure? As Hamlet’s mother Queen Gertrude famously drily noted, “the lady doth protest too much, methinks”. It’s all a little bit too careful, too shrewd and too forceful to be entirely convincing. The same party has been porting concessions out of successive British administrations for years which pretty much amount to …

In the Planter debate madness, remember language has layers of meaning but it needs context if we are to breathe socially…

Mick Fealty on May 26, 2022, 2:30 pm

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bonfire, camping, people

It can’t be emphasised enough how Slugger as a holder of convivial space (all praise to the moderators), in a world of abundant information and scant wisdom, has been a key to a lot of useful learning. I’ll write about why I’m leaving Twitter after 15 years later. I could argue the latest controversy (the use of the word “Planter” by US Congressman Richard Neil) might have happened anyway. But the fast tracking of rage over slights (like Campbell’s “gobble …

Northern Irish population is growing and on average we’re getting older…

Mick Fealty on May 24, 2022, 1:01 pm

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word cloud, census, population

Today is the first day of releases from last year’s census, and the first thing to say is that the growth pattern from 2011 remains broadly in line for 2021, which is an increase of about 100k… The second thing is that our baby boom remains in line with UK rather than Irish norms (which didn’t really have one)… You can see how the younger cohort is shrinking as a proportion of the wider population and the older cohort rises …

How the ghosts of faith past haunt the future of Ireland’s new National Maternity Hospital

Mick Fealty on May 17, 2022, 12:11 pm

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doctor, op, medicine

“There are two kinds of light – the glow that illuminates and the glare that obscures.” -James Thurber One thing that’s puzzled me in the last three weeks has been what’s at the base of the controversy in the south over the terms of the lease for the building of a new National Maternity Hospital (NMH). Strong and genuine emotions have surfaced in the Catholic Church’s decision to retain ownership of the land that reflect how church dominated southern life …

SDLP will not renominate an Infrastructure Minister…

Mick Fealty on May 9, 2022, 3:10 pm

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SDLP leader @columeastwood confirms his party won’t replace Nichola Mallon as infrastructure minister – he says they don’t have a mandate but urges DUP to nominate a deputy FM right away — Jayne McCormack (@BBCJayneMcC) May 9, 2022 So who will? Mick FealtyMick 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

DUP will nominate Michelle O’Neill as First Minister, but only AFTER the Protocol is fixed

Mick Fealty on May 9, 2022, 12:10 pm

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This was my take on the election on Sky News on Saturday morning in terms of what the results means for Northern Ireland. The DUP have since made it clear they will take up the dFM post (in contravention to most the highly speculative media reporting to the contrary, but not until the protocol is sorted out. In a second appearance at 6.30 this morning, I also noted that the DUP would be in the forefront of questioning Number Ten …

Great Slugger Gathering of Turnout Numbers: Part Three (The Final Hour)…

Mick Fealty on May 5, 2022, 9:10 pm

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continental bulldog, dog, animal

So we’re getting close to the end. Please share what you’ve got at 9pm, but this is as much about sharing general impressions, can you see any patterns emerging yet (we’ll have definite figures in an hour). From the 5pm figures you’ve shared with us turnout appears to be up, and probably moreso in middle class areas and Sinn Fein heartland. That may indicate where the Alliance surge is, and how large. Final thoughts are with the candidates for the …

Great Slugger Gathering of Turnout Numbers: Part Two (5pm)…

Mick Fealty on May 5, 2022, 5:07 pm

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teacup, cup of tea, peppermint tea

So now, I’m going to close the earlier thread so we can use this for 5pm figures. Some of the projections from the morning look very large in some places. But it’s hard to know if home workers are skewing that. You can also look up past figures here. I’ll throw any figures I get in when I’m packed properly and settled on the train. I’ll join you all later. Mick FealtyMick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written …

Great Slugger Gathering of Turnout Numbers: Part One (12 noon)…

Mick Fealty on May 5, 2022, 11:47 am

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color, desktop, paper

In addition to the Open Thread, I’d like to reserve three others for gathering and discussion of turnout figures from polling stations across Northern Ireland. These figures are posted at 12 noon, 5pm and 9pm. These will give us an idea about turnout which is one of the vital factors in giving us a clue (if not definitively) how different parties are doing. We know where the dominant SF/DUP boxes are. As we near the next publishing time we will …

Whoever wears the FM ‘crown’ a rising middle may prize us off NI’s hamster wheel politics

Mick Fealty on May 4, 2022, 11:40 am

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hamster, syrian hamster, golden hamster

Brian O’Neill (I like to think of him as Slugger’s tabloid editor) has written a sharp and direct piece about how he thinks this has been a boring election campaign. He’s far from the only one. The sociologist, Alfred North Whitehead once wrote that “those societies which cannot combine reverence to their symbols with freedom of revision, must ultimately decay either from anarchy, or from the slow atrophy of a life stifled by useless shadows.” Useless shadows, indeed. I cannot …

#AE22 interview with Peadar Toibin leader of Aontú…

Mick Fealty on April 29, 2022, 3:09 pm

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I caught up with Aontú leader Peadar Toibin in between debates in the Dail the other day. It was an opportunity to ask him about the party, its values and why people should vote for them. So I started with an obvious place, that name in Irish… He’s by far the most direct of any of the northern nationalist leaders on the matter of Constitutional change, and how he plans to go about it. Maybe that’s because they’ve not been …

DUP to lose out as idiosyncratic North Down continues to sail its own course…

Mick Fealty on April 27, 2022, 10:19 am

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sailboat, sailing yacht, sailing ship

So today, I’m looking at my old home constituency of North Down. It’s an oddball place, which has begotten several oddball patterns in its results over the years. I’m just old enough to remember the election of Jim Kilfedder as MP there in 1970. Jim was born in Co Leitrim, but grew up in Fermanagh. In the 60s and 70s the Ulster Unionist party was the game in town. But in 1980 he set up his own political party, the …

In an election in which SF is likely to “beat the DUP”, they may also lose something in the process..

Mick Fealty on April 26, 2022, 10:35 am

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sunflower, yellow, flower

What an odd election. We know something is coming, but not sure what. Overseas journalists talk casually about Sinn Fein being on the verge of power when in fact what’s coming ought to be a levelling up of status between SF and the DUP. They’ve been in power for twenty years. But as I look around the constituencies the rise of the middle shows that losses are going to be very hard to avoid for both Sinn Féin and the …

An anti dystopian view of Elon Musk’s purchase of the west’s dominant political forum…

Mick Fealty on April 26, 2022, 9:49 am

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wormhole, space, time

Fascinating insight from John Naughton and Josh Simmons as they talk through Musk’s purchase of Twitter. It’s about who gets to control significant power over the public square (Twitter is privately owned with a dominant position in that square). It may seem a long way off from Northern Ireland, but Naughton’s description of two men who had an intuitive feel for the potentialities of Twitter, Musk himself and Donald Trump who for several years “led the mainstream media by the nose”. Also …

On the brink of the protocol and #AE22: Mick’s interview with Mick Clifford…

Mick Fealty on April 22, 2022, 4:03 pm

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democrats, america, vote

Thoughts shared on #AE22 campaign, Northern Ireland’s still new democracy, struggling to bear fruit, border polls and other political fantasies with Mick Clifford on this week’s podcast on the election… Mick FealtyMick 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

74% believe “next Executive should prioritise jobs, health and welfare over constitutional issues”

Mick Fealty on April 14, 2022, 8:50 am

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The oddest thing that happened last week was the sudden disappearance of a border poll as a talking point which happened almost just as the campaign began. It was an oddly precipitous shift in focus for Sinn Fein who had been fundraising like mad in New York on that theme just weeks before. I can’t be certain but I suspect that the sudden shift in campaign focus may have something to do with the very comprehensive polling on the current …

#AE22: Poll suggests that Unionist unrest could deliver an end to a DUP First Ministership

Mick Fealty on April 6, 2022, 12:05 pm

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https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Parliament_Buildings_Stormont.jpg

The first of a series of video reports. According to the University of Liverpool/Irish News poll ground appears to be shifting under the feet of the DUP in particular. See David’s IN report here. The two former parties of the extreme seem to be destined to hit a fork in the road if not a complete break up, but not because of tribal tensions. In the case of the DUP poor delivery may be a greater factor. In the past …