The RTE presenter couldn’t resist it, on Sunday afternoon. It might have been nearly six months after the incident, and it might have been in the shadow of several much bigger stories, but this was the opportunity she had been waiting for. “I hear you did well in the Oughterard boxes” was the opening line […]
All fifteen of the TDS who voted against legalising abortion in 2018 have retained their Dáil seats in Election 2020. Many of them defied the predictions of pundits and pollsters who forecast their seats would be in trouble. Some had to deal with constituencies that had been redrawn, or their previous party pouring huge resources into the […]
It would not be an exaggeration to describe this general election as one of the most extraordinary in the history of the state. The only comparable one I can think of is the 1948 election which led to the participation of Clann na Phoblacta in government but their advance was nothing compared to that of […]
A Donegal man aroused anger online after he claimed to have destroyed his grandmother’s polling card and hid her walking frame to prevent her from voting for her preferred candidate. My granny was going to vote for Peter Casey or that other racist guy so I ripped up her polling card and hid her walking […]
It’s been an extraordinary election in many ways, but one thing is very clear from the initial results: Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil were not rewarded by the electorate for adopting the most woke positions possible in legalising abortion in Ireland. In fact, the opposite seems to have happened. Many of the most strident voices […]
This morning, many people in the political class are in shock. You could see it happening in real time yesterday, on the television, as Fine Gael politicians came on, one after another, to talk about how the party would now try to negotiate a new Government. It was as if the world was changing around […]
Leo Varadkar has suffered a humiliating defeat. That is being largely forgotten, this morning, with all the talk about the Sinn Fein surge. The Taoiseach was elected by Fine Gael because they believed him best placed to win a general election. He is young. He is based in Dublin. He is metropolitan, and liberal, and […]
Philip Schofield is bravely facing the applause of the UK, with many commentators commending the ITV presenter yesterday for no longer “living a lie”, supposedly.
And so, at last, the silliest day in Irish politics has dawned again. Across the country this afternoon, candidates and canvassers will be making a final push for votes. Partisans on the internet will be wearing out their keyboards, furiously tweeting out last minute arguments designed ostensibly to persuade others, but in reality, to keep […]
There are two main aspects to the climate change phenomenon. The first is the political movement variously represented by Greta Thunberg and Extinction Rebellion and factions of the Green and left parties. The second is how governments exploit the fear of a threatened global catastrophe to impose new taxes and other restrictions on their citizens. […]
No-one likes to think of a child in pain. It’s why we turn away from it, sometimes even to the point of refusing to acknowledge it. But new evidence shows that many children killed by abortion feel pain, and the scientists who’ve shone a spotlight on this have also forced us to examine something else about […]
Last night’s leaders debate between the three people vying to be the next Taoiseach has earned high praise from some of the UK journalists visiting our shores to find out how Ireland conducts its politics. For all that Irish people might think that our politicians are sub-standard, at least some of those observing from abroad […]