A strangely self-destructive streak endlessly runs through Irish life. Never mind all the 1916/Civil War/Isolationism/Condolences to Hitler malarkey, there is another tradition, of pursuing Massively Unmanageable Projects. Its inspiration presumably comes from the Easter Islanders, who felled all their trees to roll their moai monuments into place, leaving a treeless unpeopled island with countless moai staring sightlessly over unwatched seas.
The Irish Fiscal Advisory Council recently declared that Ireland needs another 80,000 immigrants to build new homes for the existing population. They probably won’t arrive with their own homes, so other people (ie, more immigrants) will have to build homes for them. And schools. Oh yes, and hospitals and stuff.
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