Samuel Thompson – Page 2 – Slugger O'Toole

Unfinished business – West Belfast Talked Back and I listened…

Samuel Thompson on August 10, 2017, 3:59 pm | Readers 4030

There was a time, not very long ago when the only reason people from unionist areas would have gone to West Belfast would have been to pick up their car after it had been stolen and abandoned. These days West Belfast is a far less frightening place which welcomes visitors, particularly those who would have formerly shunned it. Féile an Phobail has played an enormous part in changing the reputation of that part of the city and opening it up …

The Rocky Road to Dublin for Northern Nationalists…

Samuel Thompson on June 29, 2017, 8:47 am | Readers 4426

Back in March my article ‘Why Unionism Has a Problem’ seemed to strike a chord with the Slugger readership, so it is natural to follow the intrinsic problems of Unionism with another article that reflects the inherent problems facing Nationalism. There is little doubt that recent elections have reinvigorated the idea of Irish unity that had been in the doldrums for a few years. There is a widespread feeling, particularly among young nationalists that a united Ireland is not only …

The French Elections and the Macron phenomenon…

Samuel Thompson on June 21, 2017, 7:54 pm | Readers 625

‘Brenda from Bristol’ probably summed up the mood to this year’s general election when stopped in the street by a TV reporter. ‘Oh no, not another one!’ [i] In Northern Ireland we are used to annual or even bi-annual elections but even our electoral activity pales in comparison to the poor people of France who have been called to the polls four times in three months. The French system despite its demands on the electorate has its merits. For a …

Why Unionism has a problem…

Samuel Thompson on March 19, 2017, 7:13 pm | Readers 14349

Nothing in life is inevitable so the old saying goes, other than death and taxes and maybe Arsenal finishing fourth in the Premier League, so the recent old news that the Catholic population of Northern Ireland may soon reach a voting majority might cause sleepless nights. Of course, Unionists will be quick to point out that substantial numbers of Catholics, including a proportion of SF voters, would not vote for a United Ireland if a referendum were to be held …

Notional 90 seat 2016 Assembly Compared with 2017 results

Samuel Thompson on March 7, 2017, 2:58 pm | Readers 3316

*Whyte, Nicholas (22 December 2016). “If the 2016 Assembly election had had five seats per constituency…”. AE17 without the background noise As Northern Ireland’s turbulent history takes another turn there is a widespread feeling that AE17 has changed the local political situation profoundly. It was a good result for Sinn Féin, there is no doubt about that, and for Alliance too, but what about the others? The DUP admitted to a bad day at the office and Mike Nesbitt has …

President Trump – Welcome to the post-truth world

Samuel Thompson on November 23, 2016, 4:11 pm | Readers 1111

WARNING: the following article may contain elements of truth. The gongs of Big Ben that welcome 2017 will be greeted not but the clinking of glasses and a chorus of Auld Lang Sang, but rather a huge sigh of relief. 2016, the year from hell will finally be behind us. It brought a cull of beloved musicians and artists, Brexit, and now, the rise to power of the Donald. Yes, it’s true, the unthinkable has happened, a man who is …

Neither liberty, equality, nor fraternity

Samuel Thompson on August 24, 2016, 11:56 am | Readers 2032

Imagine a woman on a beach on a hot day, perhaps your mother, sister, girlfriend or wife. She doesn’t take the sun well so she doesn’t wear a bathing suit and covers her head with a cloth and her shoulders with a shawl while she sleeps. Imagine four police officers approach her, waken her up, demand she uncover her head and shoulders, then fine her for not exposing enough flesh. That’s close to what happened on a French beach yesterday. …

The past, present and future of Tony Blair

Samuel Thompson on July 8, 2016, 11:17 am | Readers 927

He could have gone down as one of the great Prime Ministers of all time, a man who took over a fractured and beaten political party, won three consecutive elections and as the Prime Minister that brought peace to Northern Ireland. These are enormous achievements for any politician but instead he will be damned as a man who led his country into an unnecessary and illegal war, some allege he is a unrepentant war criminal lacking only a trial and a cell. …

The Good Friday Agreement twenty years on – Why can’t we get over the Troubles?

Samuel Thompson on April 14, 2016, 7:00 am | Readers 3431

Sometimes an idea for an article just comes along. I was listening to the radio last week and Dermot Nesbitt, one of the Ulster Unionist negotiators of the Good Friday Agreement, was speaking on Nolan about its 18th anniversary. He pointed out that that when he was a young man, the Second World War had ended eighteen years previously and none of his generation thought about it. Young people were more interested in Beatlemania than the Battle of Britain and …

A day in the life of a Northern Ireland political junkie…

Samuel Thompson on April 1, 2016, 1:40 pm | Readers 1509

The radio alarm goes off – Sonny and Cher are singing, ‘I’ve Got You Babe’. I’ll have none of that cheery Frank Mitchell malarkey and switch the station to Radio Ulster. In Ormeau Avenue, Connor Bradford sits in bow tie and tails – reading the news for the BBC is a serious business after all – ready with some bon mots (en Français naturellement) and Latin dictums to let the Hoi Polloi know their place. With a voice full …

Fairness and Fear in the alternate universe of the Orange Order…

Samuel Thompson on March 25, 2016, 7:00 am | Readers 4921

I’ve heard some bizarre things on the Nolan show but the recent interview with Drew Nelson, Grand Secretary of the Orange Order, has got to be in the top five. The discussion centered round a recent Orange Order report, ‘Fairness and Fear’ that outlined the horrors Protestants face in the workplace. As an atheist I object to being called a Protestant’ but I suppose I could be termed part of the wider PUL community the Orange Order frequently claims to …

This time next year we could have Trump in the White House, Boris in Downing Street and be on our way out of the EU…

Samuel Thompson on March 17, 2016, 9:56 am | Readers 1368

Closer to home, the border could be reinvigorated providing a bonanza for ‘good’ Republicans to make fortunes out of fuel-smuggling and dumping toxic waste, while not-so good Republicans will celebrate the centenary of the Easter Rising by blowing up as many people as possible. Some of these nightmare scenarios may be the result of self-inflicted wounds. In America, Trump has made racism respectable again. He gets an endorsement from a Kl Klux Klan leader and goes UP (yes, up) in …

Unionists should be careful what they wish for with a Brexit…

Samuel Thompson on February 23, 2016, 7:19 am | Readers 4957

So it’s official. Turkeys do vote for an early Christmas. Without even waiting to see what David Cameron brought back from Brussels, the DUP and TUV nailed their colours to the Brexit mast. Both explain their position primarily in monetary terms – the UK pays far more into the EU than it gets back, so we’d be better off out of it. The tax payers of England of course could say that about the UK in general and Northern Ireland …

From giant rats to Noel Thompson: A Spotlight on democracy…

Samuel Thompson on February 19, 2016, 7:00 am | Readers 958

SPOTLIGHT ON SPOTLIGHT – The view from an audience member at the recording of Tuesday evening’s Spotlight debate. And a close encounter with two large rats on the way home!

A wry view of the US presidential candidates….

Samuel Thompson on January 16, 2016, 8:20 pm | Readers 1205

It seems to have been going on for ever but the truth is, it hasn’t even started yet. I am of course, referring to the greatest political show on earth, the US presidential election. This year’s crop of hopefuls contains demonstrates once again the diversity of America’s millionaire class. In addition to middle-aged white guys, there is an African-American, a Jew, a Latino and a Canadian, who is also a Latino. Why there is even a woman. Let’s take a …

From Bannisters To The Iron Harvest. 1916 and all that…

Samuel Thompson on January 3, 2016, 7:00 am | Readers 1368

I saw an unusual tweet a few weeks ago. Someone had posted a picture of a bannister. That seemed strange until I read the caption and discovered the bannister was in a house where James Connolly had once lived. The tweeter expressed pleasure, perhaps awe, at sliding his hand along an object his hero had once used and it got me thinking about our relationship with the past and how objects and places and can make it come to life …

The review of the review. A punter’s view of the Slugger end of year review show…

Samuel Thompson on December 15, 2015, 7:14 pm | Readers 918

It had been a while, maybe four or five years, since I was in Hill Street after dark and what a pleasant surprise it was; bustling bars and restaurants, some totally new to me, casting a warm glow and friendly noise onto the cobbled street. I pulled my collar over to fight off the drizzle and saw the dark empty yard of a bar/restaurant specializing in al fresco drinking and dining. Smoking ban or not, it probably wasn’t the soundest …