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What you want to say – 23 September 2020 September 23, 2020

Posted by WorldbyStorm in Uncategorized.
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As always, following on Dr. X’s suggestion, it’s all yours, “announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose”, feel free.

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1. Joe - September 23, 2020

Seán Haughey says Seán MacStiofáin tipped off the Garda about the arms importation that led to the Arms Trial.
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/ira-chief-of-staff-tipped-off-garda%C3%AD-about-arms-trial-guns-says-se%C3%A1n-haughey-1.4361912

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WorldbyStorm - September 23, 2020

Interesting.

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CL - September 23, 2020

“A practising barrister David is the son of Dick Burke, a FG TD in the 1970s. the sat on the Public Accounts Committee in 1971 that investigated how the money given to Charles Haughey in 1969 for the relief of distress in Northern Ireland had been spent, i.e. the source of the funds which was subsequently spent on arms in Hamburg.”
https://irishinterest.ie/book_Deception-and-Lies–The-Hidden-History-of-the-Arms-Crisis-Burke/?id=50046

Dick Burke ‘ In 1982 ….accepted an offer from the Fianna Fáil taoiseach Charles Haughey to go to Brussels for a second term.’
(IT, March 15, 2016)

“SECRET Garda and Department of Justice files which Judge Barron’s inquiry into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings complained were “missing” contain some of the most sensitive information about Garda undercover operations against both republican and loyalist paramilitaries. According to senior sources the files – whether or not they still exist – will not be released as they go to the heart of the Garda’s intelligence-gathering operations….
According to senior sources, this was based on well grounded reports from agents including, it is reliably recorded, the one-time IRA Chief of Staff, Sean MacStiofain, who regularly passed information to gardai.”-Jim Cusack
https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/secret-garda-files-from-1970s-will-never-be-released-26238292.html

In 2001, “Sunday Times” journalist Liam Clarke claimed Mac Stíofáin was an informer on dissident republicans for the Garda Siochána from 1969. According to Clarke, Mac Stíofáin’s former Special Branch handler, the late Hugh McNelis, claimed that: “I think he was doing it because he wanted to get rid of certain people.” Liam Clarke and his wife Kathryn Johnston were formerly members of Official Sinn Féin. Dubious|date=March 2008
https://enacademic.com/dic.nsf/enwiki/1036780

Sean Mac Stiofain “goes into the Midleton affair, where he organises the Cork republicans into support of local peoples’ committees against the sale of their leases to speculators. This was seen as an intervention of the movement politically in the public interest. What he does not say is that this type of action was along the lines of what Goulding and I were promoting, but that he, SMacS, had to be restrained from ‘taking out’ exemplary landlords and speculators. He was fundamentally a militarist in all situations.”-Roy Johnston
http:/www.rjtechne org

“he main career victims of the Arms Crisis were those on the republican wing of Fianna Fáil, most prominently Neil Blaney, Kevin Boland and the less celebrated Wicklow TD Paudge Brennan.
At the heart of the Arms Crisis was an attempt by the government in Dublin to grapple with a situation that was veering out of control in the north…
the IRA’s campaign, under the leadership of Cathal Goulding, had become political and Marxist with little actual military capability to defend the community….
David Burke, for the first time ever, explains why Berry and the Special Branch moved to close down what, as a matter of political and historical fact, was a legitimate operation of state, approved by the Taoiseach and supervised by his most important ministers.
‘The reason is truly startling: Seán MacStíofáin – the first Chief of Staff of the Provisional wing of the IRA played the Special Branch – to damage Goulding’s Marxist wing of the IRA and perhaps to split, and corrupt history’s view of, Fianna Fáil’…
MacStíofáin, using his role as Head of IRA intelligence, set out to undermine Goulding by feeding false material about him to Special Branch. This paved the path to MacStíofáin becoming the Chief of Staff of the breakaway Provisional IRA and this all happened unnoticed by his own leadership and the Special Branch….
The Provisional IRA, thanks to the machinations of MacStíofáin, emerged as the main repository of hope for beleaguered and abandoned nationalist communities in the north. …the crisis which became public knowledge in May 1970 was a crafty and opportunistic Provisional IRA dirty trick designed to throw Fianna Fáil into chaos.”-Conon Lenihan
https://villagemagazine.ie/deception-and-lies-a-thrilling-history-that-confirms-lynch-not-haughey-as-unprincipled-and-explains-how-a-named-ira-double-agent-deceived-the-nation-and-the-record/

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gypsybhoy69 - September 24, 2020

You truly learn something new everyday. I’ve known David Burke for years due to work although I can’t say that I’ve seen him in a long time, perhaps because he was writing a book. I never knew he was the son of Dick Burke.

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Jim Monaghan - September 25, 2020

All this stuff about informers, real, perceived and imagined, is grist to the deluded who believe the Provo war (lack of a better name) could have been won. It feeds the refusal of some dissidents to take an objective view of the war. It had run out of steam. The support was restricted to a large percentage of the nationalist population of the 6 counties. For various reasons it had failed to break through in the 26.But why face up to reality, when there is a convenient story of informers etc. Why doi the hard slog of thinking up a strategy that can gain mass support, when that sort of thing just gives people headaches. I have seen statements that Adams was an informer, now we have the above.
The Officials convinced themselves that the Provos were just a FF plot to divert the masses from their true leaders.Easier to believe this than look at the objective reasons for the rise of the Provos.
The anti-vaxxers, Covid denialists etc. are not the only believers in conspiracy theories.

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roddy - September 25, 2020

Ironically it is the Dissidents who have been fatally compromised by informers and who have been rendered impotent in a manner never seen before in Republican history.The Provos could have continued indefinitely and would always have had more than enough support to do so.The nonsense about informers includes massive contradictions.The dissos feed stories that McGuinness for instance was on the Army council and then in the same breath try to falsely portray him as an informer. How then were the massive operations like the Brighton bombing,the mortar bombing of Downing street,the Long Kesh break out,Canary wharf etc allowed to proceed.The fact is Adams,McGuinness and those around them saw that an armed campaign could continue on a large scale for generations but yield no political gains.They sued for peace and got an interim solution which could be built on by building a mass popular party the likes of which had not been seen in Republican circles for nearly a century.Any honest observer can see that the “Union” was never in a more precarious position and the party Adams built was never in a better position to capitalise on that.Several years ago a dissident confided to an Adams supporting former prisoner I know that he (the disso) could trust nobody in his own circle.The dissidents if they have any sense should disband and try to get their ever growing number of prisoners out of jail.

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WorldbyStorm - September 25, 2020

Exactly. Agree completely re the contradictions about informers at those levels and even tilting a movement one way or another seems implausible – the reappraisal of armed struggle wasn’t a simple top down process, it required there to be sentiment amongst the broader republican movement for changes or an openness to reconsider (which by the way is the response to those who said that everything before was a waste… approaches were a function of context, when the context changed the responses changed).

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Jim Monaghan - September 26, 2020

An extra point. Given the source, a party which would love to have SF tear itself apart. Though I suspect to people under sixty, Mac Stiofain is a figure from the ancient past. I met him once with a friend doing an interview. Very much the old soldier trying to keep the record positive. Cannot find the interview
Sadly, I think coming off the hunger and thirst strike ended his prominence.
https://www.themilitant.com/Intercontinental_Press/1972/IP1044.pdf#page=16&view=FitV,35

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2. Paul Culloty - September 23, 2020

TFW you accidentally create a border in Kent:

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wobbly jerrie - September 23, 2020

Now Kent can enjoy the joys of partition.

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3. roddy - September 23, 2020

What does a Kent do to apply for an access permit?

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CL - September 26, 2020

“Every year, more than 150,000 trucks transport over 3 million tonnes of freight to and from Ireland to the rest of the single market across the UK “land bridge” – an arrangement that involves Irish trucks using British motorways to reach the continent….
A no-deal outcome could sever Ireland’s most important route to EU markets….
These ports aren’t yet able to differentiate between British and Irish freight, but once they are, a two-speed processing system would ensure Irish trucks are fast tracked through the system and UK trucks subject to regulatory delays. The Irish government is keen to ensure that the land bridge isn’t considered a major negotiating point in UK-EU trade negotiations….
For the UK, the land bridge means that a third country is directly contributing to national air pollution, with all the health consequences that entails”
https://theconversation.com/brexit-irelands-land-bridge-to-the-continent-boosts-air-pollution-in-the-uk-143775

“If British trucks were backed up for miles because they are not in the EU, why should Irish trucks be held up as well?…
Some diplomats worried about the risk of violence if Irish truckers were given preferential treatment on their way into Dover….
The UK may be in no mood to offer Irish trucks Ryanair-style priority boarding at Dover just because they are moving EU produce from one part of the single market to another.”
https://www.rte.ie/news/analysis-and-comment/2020/0703/1151272-brexit-land-bridge/

“The failure to develop fast daily direct ferry services to continental Europe has exposed this country to another economic hammer blow in just three months time. The consequences for industry and employment, coming on top of all the other current woes, will be devastating….
This week’s warning by UK Brexit minister Michael Gove that there could be queues of 7,000 lorries at the port of Dover, even if there is a trade deal, should have finally woken people up to the fact that special dispensation for Irish hauliers using the landbridge is simply not feasible…
It is astonishing that the penny is only now beginning to drop with both Government and hauliers that the landbridge will no longer be a feasible option for the bulk of our continental exports after January 1st. Part of the explanation for the inertia is probably psychological. Our long historical trading links with the UK have created a dependency that makes the landbridge appear an easier option than opening far more direct routes to the continent.”
https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/ireland-faces-devastating-blow-due-to-our-failure-to-develop-ferry-services-to-europe-1.4363802

“The Irish Road Haulage Association has urged the Government to help set up a fast, direct daily ferry service with continental Europe for lorries to avoid post-Brexit disruption on the UK transit route.”- I.T Sept 21

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Jim Monaghan - September 27, 2020

The landbridge submission deserves a separate post. Hugely important.

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Michael Carley - September 27, 2020

“But what might the loss of Ireland’s land bridge mean for the UK? Our research has found that it could entail substantial benefits for air quality and roads throughout the country.”

https://theconversation.com/amp/brexit-irelands-land-bridge-to-the-continent-boosts-air-pollution-in-the-uk-143775

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Bartholomew - September 27, 2020

The authors of that article calculate that Irish trucks produce 34 tonnes of Nitrogen Oxide per year in the UK.
They also say that total UK road transport Nitrogen Oxide emissions are 258,000 tonnes.

From this they conclude that ‘Perhaps one of the strangest outcomes of a no-deal Brexit may be that, for all the potential economic consequences for both Ireland and the UK, Britain’s air pollution problem might substantially improve.’

By removing 34 from 258,000? Really?

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Michael Carley - September 28, 2020

Every little helps.

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4. Paul Culloty - September 23, 2020

UK Labour abstain on a vote concerning statutes of limitation on British Army operations overseas:

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sonofstan - September 23, 2020

I’m fascinated by the notion of the shibboleth, the thing that outsiders can’t understand and thus a way you can tell they’re outsiders.
I accept I could never live in England long enough to get the attraction of a loon like Johnson, but now I can’t see what they see in Starmer either: if nothing else, he strikes me as one of the most boring men alive.

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crocodileshoes - September 23, 2020

Just seen Starmer and Biden on the news, felt a spontaneous ‘meh’ reaction to them… then reminded myself that they are not, respectively, Johnson and Trump.

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Fergal - September 23, 2020

Starmer sounds like a weird mash-up of Noddy and Big Ears with a soupçon of Paddington bear thrown in for good luck…
-How in the name of all that is sacred and holy did Noddy get a driver’s license?
– How can he be a taxi driver?
– What exactly is the relationship between Noddy and Big Ears?
– Why are Big Ears cheeks always red?

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sonofstan - September 23, 2020

“UK Labour abstain on a vote concerning statutes of limitation on British Army operations overseas”

18 Labour MPs, led by Corbyn, McDonnell and Abbott voted against.

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Fergal - September 24, 2020

Are we to take from this that around 10% of the parliamentary party are left and the rest flag-waving British nationalists à la Keir?

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5. crocodileshoes - September 23, 2020

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-hidden-costs-of-streaming-music

The great Alex Ross on how streaming is far from green.

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sonofstan - September 23, 2020

“Music has, it seems, been freed from the grubby realm of things. Kyle Devine, in his recent book, “Decomposed: The Political Ecology of Music,” thoroughly dismantles that seductive illusion”

He gave a talk at our place last year – you’ve reminded to read the book.

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6. Alibaba - September 24, 2020

‘The Abortion Rights Campaign welcome the review into the 2017 law on sex work. Rather than protect sex workers, the current law actively harms sex workers and puts them at risk. …

As with abortion, criminalisation breeds stigma and threatens safety. This review presents a valuable opportunity to correct mistakes of the past — but if and only if the voices and experiences of sex workers are central.’

Good on them.

Submission to the Department of Justice and Equality on the Operation of Part 4 of the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2017

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7. roddy - September 25, 2020

John Taylor (former MPand MEP for the”moderate UUP)now claiming high covid rate in Donegal is spreading into Strabane and is being ” spread by foreign prostitutes” in Letterkenny”

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WorldbyStorm - September 25, 2020

Wow, classy as ever JT.

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8. 6to5against - September 25, 2020

The fact that Biden, if elected, would be only the 2nd President from a Catholic background fascinates me. To what extent its about the entrenched privilege of the WASP world or demographic factors, I do not know – but it can’t simple be coincidence that this is the case. (according to wikipedia, the US is 20% catholic and 43% protestant)

When so much is made of there never being a woman president (as it should be) I think its worth noting that even being white, male, Christian and wealthy hasn’t always been enough in the past – if only to highlight how many Venn diagrams are needed to represent the prejudices involved in US politics (and politics everywhere else, too of course).

The article below is one of the few I’ve seen even to mention the fact, and a lot of it seems odd to me – like when the writer says: ‘The notion that Catholics made for strange citizens in liberal democracies caught on — and was not entirely ridiculous.’ (!)

I’d love to know what yourcousin, or other US contributors, make of it?

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sonofstan - September 25, 2020

It’s an interesting one. The obligation to be at least some kind of religious for US presidents is an anomaly in the ‘west’ also. I wonder, if Bernie had been allowed win the nomination whether disavowed anti-semitism would have reared a head?
Political anti-catholicism isn’t confined to the US either: there were mutterings from Paul Mason, who should know far better, about Rebecca Long-Bailey ‘taking orders from the Vatican’ during the leadership race and I remember a piece in the Spectator about an Irish catholic mafia around Corbyn – RLB, Milne, McDonnell, Burgon etc.

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6to5against - September 25, 2020

I’d forgotten that. It was similar to the charges laid against Kennedy in 1960. But made more odd still in that it combined distrust of Catholicism with a complete indifference to the existence of an established church, that still retains seats in the House of Lords for some of that Church’s bishops.

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sonofstan - September 25, 2020

Yeah, it was always my stock answer if people here accused Ireland of being a ‘theocracy’. We were always notionally, and probably are now in fact, a secular republic.

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Joe - September 25, 2020

Always remember the great answer from Michael D in one of the telly presidential debates. Can’t remember the exact wording of the question but I think it was ‘Do you believe in God’? To which Miggledee replied most sincerely “Well, I’m a believer”. He didn’t say in what though… could be the fairies, the Lizardmen or even that he only became a believer when he saw her face.

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crocodileshoes - September 25, 2020

Re the Venn diagrams of prejudice: read somewhere that Americans won’t vote for bald men either. There hasn’t been an ‘openly’ bald president in the mass media era.

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6to5against - September 25, 2020

You know, I made the Venn diagram comment casually, but now that I think about it, it could turn into a whole exercise to fill the time that should be made up with work.

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sonofstan - September 25, 2020

Gerald Ford?
But then he wasn’t elected, so your point stands.

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CL - September 25, 2020

“More presidents have been Episcopalian than any other religion..- 11.
Three presidents (Jefferson, Lincoln, and Andrew Johnson) did not have any religious affiliations.”
https://www.potus.com/presidential-facts/religious-affiliation/

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9. CL - September 25, 2020

” Biden was the first Catholic vice-president.
The Democrats have had four other Catholic vice presidential candidates.
The first Catholic vice presidential candidate was William Miller, Goldwater’s running mate

Al Smith, back in 1928 lost NY state, but carried most of the deep
south.

All but two of U.S. presidents can trace their roots to Britain, as does Biden.

‘Two-thirds of the current Supreme Court were raised in the Catholic faith, though Catholics make up only about 20 percent of the U.S. population. (Catholics are also overrepresented on Capitol Hill: 31 percent of the 115th Congress, when sworn in last year, identified as Catholic’-
https://www.americamagazine.org/politics-society/2018/07/18/why-do-catholics-make-majority-supreme-court

There are many successful Jewish politicians in the U.S including several senators. Joe Lieberman, Gore’s running mate in 2000, was the first Jewish candidate on a major political party ticket.[

“Catholics have become more assimilated into middle-class American whiteness, losing their ethnic base.” Thus they became, with some exceptions, indistinguishable from white, Protestant America”- NYT.

A typical New York bar it has been said is full of Jewish drunks, Irish lovers, and Italian intellectuals.

We are all Anglo-Saxons now.

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10. Paul Culloty - September 25, 2020

Andrew Neil leaves the Beeb to launch GB News, because – wait for it – Britain needs a right-wing news channel:

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/sep/25/andrew-neil-launches-24-hour-new-channel-to-rival-bbc-and-sky

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WorldbyStorm - September 25, 2020

😦

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Starkadder - September 26, 2020

Yes. What with the Daily Mail, the Daily Express, the Sun, the Telegraph, The Times, the Economist, the Spectator, Standpoint, Spiked, The Critic Magazine, and Unherd and a brazenly right-leaning BBC, the UK’s already groaning with reactionary media outlets. The British media landscape is beginning to resemble Orban’s Hungary.

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11. CL - September 26, 2020

Testing….testing…

“Mr Donnelly went on to defend the country’s testing and tracing system saying it was “one of the best in the world,” but he acknowledged the need to make it “better and better”, but it was something on which the country should be proud.”
https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-40054247.html
Sept. 24

“The Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly, has told senior Government figures he believes that the level of testing needs to be substantially increased ahead of the winter period.
It is understood that the HSE has been asked to produce an options paper on significantly increasing testing capacity.”
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/covid-19-ireland-faces-critical-two-weeks-in-fight-against-virus-minister-says-1.4364963
Sept. 26

“By Monday morning, GPs’ WhatsApp groups were buzzing with worrying signs of what would become apparent to the rest of the country the following evening. The number of people looking for a test for Covid-19 was surging. It was only a matter of time before positive cases would follow. “It’s starting to feel like March,” one GP said on Twitter. ….

The most pressing question now is whether our system of test, trace and isolate – still the best toolkit in our armoury in the battle against Covid – will be able to rise to the challenge. …

“We’ve never been consistently near our capacity, which is amazing, because we clearly should have been doing serial testing in meat plants and other high-risk areas” earlier, says Dr Tomás Ryan, associate professor in the School of Biochemistry and Immunology and Institute of Neuroscience at Trinity College.

“We were expecting that they would build [capacity] up in the background over the summer. I hoped that as soon as cases started to rise again that we would see a much slicker operation ready and waiting to pounce on outbreaks and contact chains. And the opposite has happened….
“We should not have been caught off guard. We should have been ready for this,” says Ryan.

Ryan also believes that public health campaigns should stress the importance of reporting symptoms earlier; and that smartphones should be provided to people who can’t afford them to aid uptake of the Covid Tracker app.”
https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/health-family/covid-19-testing-we-should-have-been-ready-for-this-1.4351735

“Stephen Donnelly…is not helped by the fact that Simon Harris, a constituency rival, is seen to “hang around” health like a former spouse refusing to accept that things have moved on.”
– Alison O’ Connor, Irish Examiner.

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12. tomasoflatharta - September 26, 2020

Ugly scenes are visible at the highest levels of Belfast’s assembly government, rivalling FFFGGG coalition government jobbery in Dublin. Anything Fianna Fáil Fine Gael and the Greens can do in Leinster House is matched by the Democratic Unionist Party and Sinn Féin in Lord Carson’s Stormont.

🐷 Three piggies are slugging 🐌 it out, frantic to slurp alone at a very expensive trough – it is called Head of the NI Civil Service.

“In July, it was reported that the NI Civil Service was offering a salary of up to £188,272 for its top job.

The NI Civil Service employs about 22,845 staff and has a total annual budget in excess of £20bn.”

First and Deputy First Ministers Arlene Foster and Michelle O’Neill hold the keys 🔑 needed to unlock 🔐 a pot of gold, but can’t agree which of three piggie’s snouts 🐽 is the winner.
https://tomasoflatharta.wordpress.com/2020/09/26/who-will-be-boss-of-the-northern-ireland-civil-service-foster-oneill-deadlock-frantic-piggies-🐷-in-queue-for-182272-top-job/

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roddy - September 26, 2020

False equivalence again.None of the “3 piggies” you are slabbering about would have the slightest connection to SF or any form of Republicanism. In fact one of them is the husband of leading DUP figure Emma Little Pengelly .In fact absolutely nobody in the higher echelons of the civil service would have the slightest sympathy for SF.They are all Unionists or Catholic Uncle Toms.So the idea that SF would have some insider or favourite for the job is total bollocks.In fact SF is the only party on these islands which has members barred from taking up advisor posts due to a law passed by a combination of far right Unionists,half Tory Alliance members and SDLP Redmondites.

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13. tomasoflatharta - September 26, 2020

As expected, it looks as if Trump is going to choose as his Supreme Court nominee, an anti-abortionist disciple of a cult that could have come from the Handmaid’s Tale.

Trump To Appoint Right-Wing Catholic Sect Member To Supreme Court

US President Donald Trump plans to nominate a woman, Amy Coney Barrett, to his country’s Supreme Court. Ms Barrett is a member of a very creepy Catholic Church cult called “People of Praise”. Amy Goodman, host of “Democracy Now”, investigates. https://tomasoflatharta.wordpress.com/2020/09/26/trump-to-appoint-right-wing-catholic-sect-member-to-supreme-court-handmaids-tale-fiction-to-become-an-american-reality/

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Fergal - September 26, 2020

Roe v Wade is almost 50 years ago… can this really be rowed back on? Liberals cry wolf every time a judge is nominated to the SC but abortion is still legal?
Or am I missing something?

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WorldbyStorm - September 26, 2020

I would worry that it has become ‘the’ issue on the SC – in the sense that other socio-economic issues get under the radar and are ignored. I wonder would it profit Republicans to row back on RvW? Still, the latest pick – as of writing this -does look all too likely to take the harshest possible interpretation if the issue gets to the SC.

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CL - September 26, 2020

William Brennan, a practicing Catholic whose parents were from Roscommon, was appointed to the Supreme Court by Eisenhower. Although he did not write the opinion in Roe v.Wade, he had developed a constitutional right to privacy which formed the basis for the decision.
Since then some conservatives have maintained that as there is no explicit right to privacy in the U.S constitution Roe v. Wade was wrongly decided.

” No matter how heavy the theorizing may get, the project of interpreting what is known as the “living” Constitution is nothing more than the dishonest use of the law to reach ideologically pleasing results. This is one of the salient lessons of a new biography of Justice William Brennan, Jr., Justice Brennan: Liberal Champion, by Seth Stern and Stephen Wermiel. This book, though not without flaws, provides a balanced and lucid portrait of this masterly behind-the-scenes law-bender whose influence is, alas, alive and well on the current Court.”
https://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2010/12/1993/

‘Strict constuctionists’ such as the late Justice Scalia oppose the notion that the constitution is a living document and take a textual approach to interpretation insisting that its the original intent of the framers that counts.

‘The conservative movement has been searching for years for a woman to assume Justice Scalia’s mantle — someone who could lead a new move to the right in American jurisprudence with the kind of personal appeal and intellectual rigor that conservatives say made him so effective for decades. In Judge Barrett, 48, who is President Trump’s expected pick for Justice Ginsburg’s seat, conservatives believe they found their woman…They view Judge Barrett… as an all-but-certain vote to overturn Roe v. Wade,’ NYT

Even if Roe v.Wade is overturned abortion would still be legal in the more ‘progressive’ states.

“Abortion was legalized in New York in 1970, three years before the Roe v. Wade ruling, providing the broadest access to legal abortion in the country at the time”
https://www.cityandstateny.com/articles/policy/health-care/what-happens-new-york-if-supreme-court-overturns-roe-v-wade.html

Because Roe made state abortion bans unenforceable if Roe were overturned, the power to legalize abortion would essentially return to individual states

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Fergal - September 26, 2020

But how can R v W be overturned and why hadn’t it happened over the last 50 odd years?

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Paul Culloty - September 26, 2020

Basically, Reagan thought his selections would overturn it, but most of them joined with the liberal and moderate wing over the years, and there weren’t too many vacancies during the Bush era.

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CL - September 26, 2020

Obviously it can be overturned by a 5/4 ruling. It has not been overturned because there has not been a majority on the court in favour doing so.

June 29, 2020:
“This morning, the Supreme Court announced its decision in June Medical Services v. Russo, the first big test of whether, and how, this Court—with two Donald Trump appointees—would revise abortion rights in the United States. When Trump was running for president, he explicitly promised to appoint judges who would “automatically” overturn Roe v. Wade, the case that established the constitutionality of abortion. Today, the Court has repudiated Trump’s promise with its decision in June Medical. While the ruling does not signal that abortion is safe at the Supreme Court, it’s a message that anti-abortion advocates cannot simply expect the Court to reverse abortion rights just because conservative justices now dominate the bench.”
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/06/supreme-court-abortion-trump/613642/

There are several abortion cases in the pipeline right now going through the federal court system. One or more will reach the SC. Barrett replacing Ginsberg could give the necessary majority to overturn.

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Fergal - September 27, 2020

Thanks CL… I’m still not convinced by it all… there is no way women in the usa will let this happen … plus decisions can be taken at federal level to allow for terminations…
What modern state has abolished abortion rights? Poland is trying… but still unable to

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6to5against - September 27, 2020

I suspect the likely scenario is not the overturning of Roe vs Wade, but that local or state laws will be enacted that limit abortion rights. And when these are challenged in the courts, they will be upheld. It coouls lead into a scenario of abortion being available in some states and not others, requiring many women to travel. A situation not entirely unfamiliar to us here.

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CL - September 27, 2020

“The addition of Amy Coney Barrett to the U.S. Supreme Court will maintain the number of female justices, but the composition of the panel continues to look quite different than the rest of America in gender, race and religion as well as on certain key policy issues….
In an era of increasing questions about systemic racism in the judicial system, the court may find itself out-of-step with the rest of the country if the November election results in a substantial shift to the left….
Some of the issues on which the court may come to be at odds with public opinion include abortion, which 79% of Americans say should be legal, at least under certain circumstances,”
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2020-us-supreme-court-liberal-conservative-makeup/

“”the Supreme Court follows the election returns”
.-Mr. Dooley
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._Dooley

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14. Paul Culloty - September 26, 2020

Interestingly, if Barrett wins the nomination, 6 out of the 9 SC judges will be Catholics, along with Gorsuch, who grew up as one. As for any accusations of Democrats being “anti-Catholic”, they only have to point to Biden and Pelosi, along with Tim Kaine from 2016.

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15. Paul Culloty - September 26, 2020

First time Labour lead a UK poll in the Johnson era:

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Joe - September 27, 2020

Meh.

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16. Alibaba - September 27, 2020

Did you know there was a munitions strike in 1920, when rail and dock workers refused to transport soldiers or weaponry for the British state? I didn’t. The author of a play about this, Deirdre Kinahan, says this:

“With the War of Independence, we think of the boys with guns and ambushes and Tom Barry and Dan Breen and all that heroic stuff, the guerrilla warfare … But civil militancy was a huge part of it. I was always aware of that but I had always kind of thought it was an individualistic thing, I didn’t realise how orchestrated a lot of it was and the huge role the labour movement had within it.

And then I was thinking ‘Why do I know so little about this?’ Well, because a very conservative capitalist state emerged and didn’t want us to celebrate or commemorate that labour grassroots movement. It was very dangerous if you were worried about a socialist agenda and a socialist Republic.”

This play offers to explore others’ infuriated passions too. 

https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/stage/this-image-of-a-man-tarred-and-feathered-driving-a-train-out-of-rage-just-haunted-me-1.4358534

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CL - September 27, 2020

“Dublin, 24 April 1918 – Almost all of the country ground to a halt yesterday as workers withdrew their labour in opposition to the proposed extension of conscription to Ireland.

The calling of the general strike followed an Irish Labour Convention at the Mansion House in Dublin over the weekend. 1,500 delegates attended and a resolution calling for yesterday’s strike – ‘as a demonstration of fealty to Labour and Ireland’
https://www.rte.ie/centuryireland/index.php/articles/ireland-closes-down-due-to-general-strike-against-conscription

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Fergal - September 27, 2020

Fascinating story! Did Loach not touch on this in the ‘wind that shakes the barley’ with the Dub train driver?

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terrymdunne - September 28, 2020

There was also action against a permit system carried out by motor vehicle drivers – https://www.rte.ie/centuryireland/index.php/articles/christmas-outlook-gloomy-as-trade-hit-by-reaction-to-motor-permit-order and https://www.irishnewsarchive.com/wp/mullingar-three-cars-shot-03-january-1920/
Also a national general strike in support of hunger striking political prisoners, a local one against executions in Dublin, and an embargo against food exports, to list some of the more “political” industrial actions of the period, that can sit next to the now better known Limerick Soviet.
None of this was “hidden” at the time – newspapers’ are replete with dramatic reports of the likes of the April 1920 general strike rally in Ennis, or the celebrations of the release of imprisoned motor driver activists in what was then Maryborough. In fact if anything it must easier to research the like of this than necessarily clandestine ambushes and reprisals – given the fact that journalists can, and did, report on open public events. I think it is more interesting and relevant than who shot who when and whether they had surrendered before they were shot or not.

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Daniel Rayner O'Connor - September 29, 2020

It is certainly true that these events were covered at their time, albeit in a biased manner. However the counter-revolution that began in the 1921 Truce and escalated after the treaty made sure that the social struggle after 1916 was suppressed in the histories.

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terrymdunne - September 29, 2020

Oh for sure this was excised from history by omission – my point, far too obliquely made, is that the evidence for all kinds of popular mobilization is there to be found without any great difficulty (comparatively) – the fact that typically histories of the period simply leave it all out, or just mention it in passing, does not give great credit to the just concentrate on what’s in the documents empiricist methodology ostensibly followed by many historians.

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17. Paul Culloty - September 27, 2020

Ireland Thinks seems most realistic about the current FF state of play, perhaps rather high for Aontú and low for the Greens, but overall looks balanced for most parties:

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WorldbyStorm - September 27, 2020

Another poll. But not all that much out of line with others. All much of a muchness, aren’t they?

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18. Paul Culloty - September 27, 2020
WorldbyStorm - September 27, 2020

That’s a brilliant exercise.

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19. Liberius - September 27, 2020

The government is examining the potential for an “insane” pilot scheme to shoot seals with high-powered rifles from boats.

The scheme would see licenses granted potentially in Kerry and Cork to protect fishermen’s catches.

The latest population estimates available to government indicate that there are approximately 8,000-10,000 grey seals and about 5,000 harbour seals in Ireland.

According to Minister Dara O’Brien, while seals are a protected species, the Department for Housing, Local Government and Heritage may issue licenses to “cull individual problem seals, and affected persons can apply for such licenses”.

I have visions in my head now about sea-going Elmer Fudds.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-40055645.html

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WorldbyStorm - September 27, 2020

🙂

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Joe - September 28, 2020

Can we get a visa for yourcousin? Has to be the man for the job.

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yourcousin - September 28, 2020

I’ll need season dates before I commit.

😉

I’m leaving Thursday to chase pronghorn, shoot dove and scout for quail.

On an actual note, culling problem animals at an interface is nothing new. I would simply be curious at the science behind it. But would agree that an overall healthy ecosystem is the key. Culling problem animals is usually what is done instead of having an actual policy in place.

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Joe - September 28, 2020

The science behind it is this. Fifty years ago I fished for mackerel off the rocks at Balscadden in Howth. We were happy. The fish were a decent size.
In recent years I’ve gone back to the same spot to fish again. Two things – the fish are smaller and the local seals have now developed the skill of patrolling the waters where we fish and taking the fish off our hooks as we reel them in.
Sorry seals, but that aint’ kosher.
I’ll be quite happy to eat any seals culled in the inevitable reckoning. I’ll wear sealskin jackets too.

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yourcousin - September 28, 2020

The reality is that global warming will create winners and losers both in nature and society. As colder areas warm, some animals will benefit while others suffer. Obviously seals are but one link in the chain. If they are thriving while the fisheries decline then culling makes total sense, especially if there are animals cueing into human activity as a way to get food (think of bears who habitually raid garbage dumpsters).

And while I’m not even going to touch upon the fur market aspect of things, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with utilizing all the parts of animals that are culled.

The irony of today (on the precipice of global catastrophe) is that here in America certain animals are making a legitimate comeback (grizzlies and wolves) which come with their own realities.

The logistics of coexistence are not the sexy or flashy part of environmentalism. But it is exactly this area that needs to be focused on if we are to genuinely move forward environmentally as a species.

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alanmyler - September 28, 2020

Having spent my entire adult life scarred by the experience of seeing Jaws in the cinema at the age of 12, what I’m thinking here is that increasing seal numbers combined with changes in ocean temperatures and currents due to climate change could be creating ideal conditions for great white sharks to move into Irish waters. Cue the music. There was a fatal shark attack the other side of the pond during the summer, in Maine, where such things were previously unknown. I’m just saying, be careful out there comrades!

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WorldbyStorm - September 28, 2020

Don’t go in the water.

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Bartholomew - September 28, 2020

Seals around Dublin Bay have been nipping and bumping swimmers for about ten years now. I was bumped on two different days the summer before last, and last weekend one surfaced about two metres from me, took a good look at me and dived again. Probably not dangerous, but a shock even so. And you’d need a tetanus shot if one nibbled you.
But please, not white sharks!

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20. sonofstan - September 27, 2020

Take it where you can dept. From another forum, a description of Starmerism: ‘a beige loafer stamping on the human face forever’

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21. terrymdunne - September 28, 2020

I saw this on the Irish Centre for the Histories of Labour and Class FB page, the obituary of Mike Cooley, a Tuam man involved in the Lucas Aerospace plan – plan drawn up by workers involved in military production for turning their work into something socially useful, he subsequently wrote about, it seems, participatory approaches to work and technology organisation –
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/sep/17/mike-cooley-obituary

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CL - September 28, 2020

““A spider conducts operations that resemble those of a weaver, and a bee puts to shame many an architect in the construction of her cells. But what distinguishes the worst architect from the best of bees is this, that the architect raises his structure in imagination before he erects it in reality.”-Karl Marx.

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Bartholomew - September 28, 2020
22. Joe - September 28, 2020

Fortnight magazine back on the shelves after a nine-year hiatus. The current edition looks at how to “how to retain the principles of the Good Friday Agreement, in the event of possible unification or possible joint authority, or just getting things as they are.
We think it’s important for people to think about these things in advance, rather than rush into a yes-no referendum.”

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23. Joe - September 28, 2020
24. sonofstan - September 28, 2020

I never knew that corner: Woody Guthrie was a tenant of old man Trump and wrote possibly the first anti-Trump lyric.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Man_Trump

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CL - September 28, 2020

“In 1950, Woody Guthrie moved into an apartment at Beach Haven…owned and operated by Fred Trump, which means that, for the two years Guthrie lived and wrote there, Trump was his landlord. It remains unsettling to accept that their signatures co-exist on the same lease agreement….
In the nineteen-seventies, Fred Trump was accused by the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Justice Department of creating a “substantial impediment to the full enjoyment of equal opportunity” at Beach Haven; it appeared that he didn’t like to rent apartments to black people.

I suppose
Old Man Trump knows
Just how much
Racial Hate
He stirred up
In the bloodpot of human hearts
When he drawed
That color line
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/a-story-about-fred-trump-and-woody-guthrie-for-the-midterm-elections

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CL - September 28, 2020

Briseann an dúchas …

“A lot of it is about the genes, isn’t it, don’t you believe? The racehorse theory. You think we’re so different?…
Trump has a long history of suggesting certain people, including himself, have superior genetics.

“I have Ivy League education, smart guy, good genes. I have great genes and all that stuff which I’m a believer in,” Trump said at a 2016 rally in Biloxi, Mississippi.”
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-told-crowd-of-white-supporters-they-have-good-genes-2020-9

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CL - September 28, 2020

The Missin’ Cousins version was referenced here some years back, at 5

In a Trump world… Policy

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sonofstan - September 28, 2020

I figured I was late to this…

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25. Paul Culloty - September 28, 2020

The Catalan President, Quim Torra, has been deposed by the Spanish Supreme Court for hanging a political banner outside the Catalan parliament building – new elections could well be called:

https://www.lavanguardia.com/politica/20200928/483722850757/quim-torra-tribunal-supremo-condena-inhabilitacion-desobediencia.html

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26. Joe - September 28, 2020
27. Starkadder - September 28, 2020

Trinity College has rescinded an invitation by Richard Dawkins to speak at the College Historical Society next year. Auditor of the Hist Bríd O’Donnell stated she had been “unaware of Richard Dawkins’ opinions on Islam and sexual assault until this evening”, adding that the society “will not be moving ahead with his address as we value our members comfort above all else”.

http://www.universitytimes.ie/2020/09/the-hist-will-not-be-moving-ahead-with-richard-dawkins-address/

I can’t say I agree with Dawkins’ views on Islam ( I assume the “sexual assault” comments refer to Dawkins’ infamous comments about “Mild date rape”). Nevertheless, I find the idea that a university-which is where people come to learn about new ideas – should value its students’ comfort over encouraging them to face difficult ideas dismaying.

Writing about American universities in 2015, Rani Neutill said:

Colleges are the new helicopter parents, places where the quest for emotional safety and psychic healing leads not to learning, but regression.

https://www.salon.com/2015/10/28/i_wanted_to_be_a_supporter_of_survivors_on_campus_and_a_good_teacher_i_didnt_realize_just_how_impossible_this_would_be/

It seems we’ve imported this US culture of anti-intellectualism dressed as sensitivity to Irish universities.

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28. Tomboktu - September 28, 2020

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29. roddy - September 28, 2020

Any views on Leo being assailed by a young woman throwing a liquid over him?Have to say since viewing it a number of times it looks very iffy.Especially the look of “shock” on one of those present.

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Dr Nightdub - September 29, 2020

I’ve seen American wrestlers portraying “shock” better than that beardy director guy in the Varadkar-as-victim video.

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CL - September 29, 2020

“From anti-abortion protestors to Andy Warhol: legendary activist Aron Kay looks back on a lifetime of political pie-throwing…

While many members of the Youth International Party (or “The Yippies”) dabbled with using confectionery as a tool of political irreverence, Aron was the crème de la crème of pie throwers. His impressive hit list included dozens of big names of the conservative establishment, corrupt politicians, and many public figures that dared to take themselves too seriously”
https://www.huckmag.com/perspectives/activism-2/the-yippie-pie-man-americas-unlikely-hero-of-the-radical-left/

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30. CL - September 29, 2020

“A lecture taught by Dolores Cahill will be mandatory for first-year undergraduate medical students at UCD.”
https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/education/anti-lockdown-professors-lecture-mandatory-for-ucd-medical-students-despite-outcry-39571389.html
Sept 29

“UCD school of medicine disassociates itself from professor’s views”
(Irish Times headline, June 19

‘A University College Dublin (UCD) professor, who chairs the Eurosceptic Irish Freedom Party, has been asked to resign from a leading European Union scientific committee over online claims she made about the Covid-19 pandemic….
Prof Dolores Cahill said.
“Lockdown and social distancing is not needed to stop the spread of the virus, she said. People who recover are then “immune for life” after 10 days and deaths and illnesses could have been prevented by extra vitamins, she claimed…
the European Commission said the claims made by Ms Cahill, a professor of translational medicine in UCD, could cause “significant harm”, if taken literally.
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/ucd-professor-asked-to-resign-from-eu-committee-over-covid-19-claims-1.4277698

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31. Tomboktu - September 30, 2020

I think one of the reasons I find reading for pleasure a challenge these days is that for work, I need to read quickly and frequently. When you need to do that for much of the day, five days a week, it can be hard to change gear, to stop skimming or skipping to find the key facts and let the style, the shape of the sentences, the adornments cuddle you or tickle you or provoke you.

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