Ireland

Not much gets past the Garda Siochana… HE WAS one of Ireland’s most reckless drivers, a serial offender who crossed the country wantonly piling up dozens of speeding fines and parking tickets while somehow managing to elude the law. So effective was his modus operandi of giving a different address each time he was caught that by June 2007 there were more than 50 separate entries under his name, Prawo Jazdy, in the Garda Pulse system. And still not a single conviction. In the end, the vital clue to his identity lay not with Interpol or the fingerprint database but in the pages of a Polish-English dictionary. Prawo jazdy means

Responding to Stephen Walt’s hypothetical (What if Gaza were full of jews?), Megan McArdle compares the Israel lobby to the Irish-American lobby. Ross Douthat says, OK, but the IRA was still considered a terrorist organisation. Daniel Larison dives into the weeds of US attitudes towards Irish terrorism. He writes: The IRA was a genuine terrorist group, but it was listed as such by our government most of all because it was a sworn enemy of one of our closest allies. The record seems clear: terrorist groups that are useful to us or harmful to states we officially oppose are given a pass, while those that target us or our allies

Apart from a couple of pre-prepared items, there’s not likely to be too much blogging in these parts for the next couple of days. The reason? I’m off to Trinity College, Dublin to speak at the College Historical Society’s* US presidential debate on Wednesday. We shall be arguing the motion “This House Would Vote for Obama”. They were having some trouble finding folk who would argue for McCain so I may be on the opposition side – in which case I shall make the case for Bob Barr, not McCain. Actually, whichever side of the motion I’m on, I shall be making a case against McCain. Just possibly against Obama

Patrick Hillery, President of Ireland from 1976-1990, has died. From the Telegraph’s obituary: As president, Hillery’s main achievement was the restoration of stability to the office; this he accomplished largely through invisibility and silence. If only other Presidents – and especially ones with more power – could be persuaded to follow Paddy Hillery’s excellent example…

Daniel Larison points out an extraordinary passage from Bill Clinton’s appearance on The Charlie Rose Show on Friday. Bafflingly, Clinton seems to believe that the Northern Irish peace process qualifies his wife to be President: Clinton:…The only way to overcome our differences is not basically to try to erase the past, it’s to get used to working together. I mean it’s kind of a metaphor for the Hillary argument. If you look at last Monday, the… Charlie Rose: You are people are pushing me, so it’s not my — Bill Clinton: The new leaders of Northern Ireland came to Washington to see the president. They — it represents a stunning

Well, not always. From the New York Times, September 29th 1994, less than a month after the declaration of a (temporary as it proved) IRA ceasefire: Artfully casting off his old role as official outcast, Gerry Adams, the political spokesman for the Irish Republican Army, beamed from the steps of City Hall yesterday as New York politicians vied to be at his side and hail him as honored guest and newborn statesman… …A relatively small lunch-hour crowd of a few hundred cheered him, but the domestic political value of Mr. Adams’s official turnabout was demonstrated by the throng of local politicians who crowded about Mr. Adams. They pressed him to

This interesting story about jury duty in Baltimore brought to mind that old and favourite line from an Irish judge: You have been acquitted by a Limerick jury and may leave this court with no other stain upon your character.