The ever readable Slugger O’Toole points out the glaring flaw in UNITE’s call for a No vote to Lisbon here.
Whatever your opinion on it, you have to admit that NAMA has gotten the political juices flowing again. The threat of a government collapse, a snap general election, and an issue of massive national importance which has cleft the republic in twain. What has surprised me is how engaged many people are in it, and in a rational way. Sure, you’ve the usual Richard Boyd Barrett “No to Everything!” crowd, but they’d be against orbitting the sun if they could (“It’s an imperialist sun! Forcing the rest of the solar system to take its rays whether they like it or not! It’s the George W. Bush of gassy masses!”) but there is a lot of genuine debate about what is the best way to fix this mess, from both right and left.
I know I’m talking at a tangent here, but have a look at the following link. It’s from a British Tory website commenting on the death of Senator Ted Kennedy. To all those people who claim it is patriotic to oppose the EU and the Lisbon Treaty, have a look at what Tory Eurosceptics say about a man who most of us, from former PD to Sinn Fein, regard as a great friend to Ireland.
Former independent MEP for Munster, Kathy Sinnott is quoted in today’s Irish Times criticising the IFA for supporting Lisbon: “It is very, very sad to see the head of the IFA . . . now advocating that Europe have more and more control, and the [European] Parliament – which he was fighting all the time, a largely-urban parliament – to have more and more decision-making on farming.”
The Irish Times’s Pricewatch guy Conor Pope has an interesting blog about booking seats on Irish trains here. What I find fascinatiing is the way Iarnrod Eireann have effectively accepted that once you are on the train, you’re on your own.
The No to Lisbon campaign has insisted that voters are being “bullied” by the Yes campaign by being “looked at in a funny way”. A spokesperson for the Youth Defence/Socialist Party/Sinn Fein/British Tory No campaign alleged that the Yes campaign has been muttering under its breath and raising an eyebrow at what voters have been wearing, and sniggering that voters need to lose weight. The No campaign also alleges that the Yes campaign thinks that voters smell.
You’ll know Ray Wise for having hair so perfect that it looks like it might break if handled roughly. With his finely coiffed follicles, Ray Wise has made a career in television, from Laura Palmer’s father in Twin Peaks through, well, everything, up to currently playing The Devil in Reaper, as the smarmy oily executive/politician guy with the shit eating grin and a tan that looks just too “glowy”. Funnily enough, although he has been typecast as a certain type of slimeball, he can actually act when he wants to. Just watch him playing a depressed news anchor in Good Night And Good Luck with David Strathairn and George Clooney with touching sensitivity.
“Ultimatum” by Matthew Glass is very much a book for The West Wing fans. Set in 2032, it takes the reader on a journey from the night of the election of a reforming liberal Democratic president through the decisions he has to take to deal with global warming, as it becomes apparent that the effects of climate change are beginning to become impossible to ignore.