J. D. Vance fired a warning shot not so much across Europe’s bows as deep amidships in Munich last Friday. A comparably brutal honesty might well greet the mass-safari of our politicians to the US for the St Patrick’s Holiday. This will probably be more of a bloodbath than a celebration, as both the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste meet an unprecedentedly explicit hostility.
The old days of drowning the shamrock in cliches and green beer belong to Darby O’Gill and the Little People. Elon Musk has been looking at the books. Ireland’s most famous human export to the US, Samantha Power, Washington’s former Ambassador at the UN, is at the centre of an enquiry into her allegedly unexpected wealth. So, expect a comparable inquisition into Ireland, per capita the wealthiest country in the EU, and per capita, easily the most parasitic. Cunning freeloading really should not flaunt itself, whereas Ireland Inc. has done little else since Brexit. Not content with endlessly deriding the British, Official Ireland has also ridiculed Trump as well as vilifying Israel.
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