Lost: one RUC moral compass

Fianna Fáil Foreign Affairs Minister Dermot Ahern reacted to the Nuala O’Loan exposé of the RUC’s running of UVF units and sectarian death squads by saying:

“Clearly, elements of the RUC Special Branch had lost all moral compass at that time.”

At that time?!!!!

When did the RUC ever have a moral compass, Dermot?

Where was it in the anti-Catholic pogroms of the 1920s and 1930s and successive decades right up until the brutal, Alabama-style suppression of our own civil rights movement and the RUC/loyalist pogroms against nationalist areas from the 1960s on?

 

Wondering Enda

Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny went over the top in trying to instill some excitement in his flagging Blueshirt/Labour election drive by describing, á la Saddam, the upcoming election as “the mother of all battles”. Comical Kenny’s response to the O’Loan report was more measured.

“Given its findings of RUC complicity in at least 10 murders by just one UVF gang alone, one can wonder what other unacceptable practices remain hidden from the public.”

We can wonder, Deputy Kenny, because Fine Gael/Labour governments (and Fianna Fáil) rarely asked the hard questions as they too turned a blind eye when the dogs in the street knew what the RUC Special Branch and MI5 were up to.

 

Upstairs, downstairs

Interesting to see what “neutral” means to the heads behind the fund-raising drive for the Ballinlea Orange Hall in County Antrim, who are trying to rope in their Catholic neighbours.

The Ballinlea Community Association contacted the 180 Catholic parishioners of St Mary’s Hall in November to suggest a joint bid for funding the “dual purpose hall”.

The suggestion is that the ground floor will be “neutral”, open to nominally everyone (drama groups and the like), while the first floor would have a private room, exclusively used by the Orange Order and plastered with all the sashes, flags and banners that go with it.

Moyle DUP Councillor David McAllister claims that this is more of a symbol of the community coming together than just a way for the Orangemen to raise a lodge-load of cash by the back door.

“I would say it’s positive. It’s a rural community and we have to stick together.”

Just so long as the Catholics stick downstairs.

 

Colour back in his cheeks

The Liberal Democrats’ spokesperson on Ireland has told BBC’s Talkback programme that he’d rather be remembered for his contribution to the peace process than his high-profile love life with a young lady who struts her stuff as one of the Cheeky Girls pop duo.

 “Life is interesting,” he said, as it would be for any man whose new loveboat’s party piece with her twin sister is The Cheeky Song (Touch My Bum).

“I’m an optimist and I hope that colourful optimism will be reflected in a colourful optimism in the DUP as well.”

He adds:

“So, good luck to Sinn Féin, good luck to the DUP, and thank you to everyone who is so interested in what I’m doing when I’m not working.”

There’s a mouse in the house

The Dutch Party for the Animals has banned the use of poison in their parliamentary offices to get rid of a plague of mice.

Born in October 2002, the animal party had two MPs elected last November to the parliament, which is centred around a cluster of medieval buildings in Amsterdam prone to rodent infestations.

The Party for the Animals has insisted that the mice problem is solved humanely, by capturing them and then releasing them in the wild.

 

Strip like an Egyptian

A parliamentary debate in Egypt on moves President Hosni Mubarak strengthening his powers to dissolve parliament was interrupted when a male opposition MP started to strip.

Shouting, “Should I take my clothes off?” in an apparent reference to a saying used to challenge someone taking liberties with you, Mohamed Hussein started to do just that.

When the Speaker threatened to have him thrown out, fellow MPs persuaded Mohamed to keep his parliamentary briefs on and leave before he was dragged out by his amendments.