Category: Good Friday Agreement

.@BorisJohnson’s Cunning #Brexit Re-Run Plan

by dsmooney, posted in Backstop, Boris Johnson, Brexit, Good Friday Agreement, Northern Ireland
This column predated the meeting between the Taoiseach and the British Prime Minister. Here I look at what is behind the Brexiteer’s obsession with getting rid of the Backstop (be it Northern Ireland only or UK wide.  It first appeared here on Broadsheet.ie on October 7th. 

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Opening his Sunday morning BBC1 show yesterday, Andrew Marr wondered if Boris Johnson’s cunning Brexit plan was to pretend that he has a cunning plan to cover the fact that he doesn’t have a cunning plan.

Mr Marr has a point. Most of Johnson’s cunning plans have thus far failed. His ruse to prorogue parliament was demolished by the Supreme Court, and he has still to win a single vote in the House of Commons. He entered Downing Street at the head of a government with a majority (via the DUP) of one. Now, thanks to his handling of the grandest of the Tory grandees, it has a majority of minus 42.

Yet, despite these failures and setbacks, Johnson is doing well in the polls. The Tories now enjoy a steady lead over the Labour party of anywhere between 7% and 13% (YouGov polling). As with John F Kennedy’s handling of the Cuban missile crisis, it seems that the worse he does, the more popular he gets.

This is Johnson’s cunning plan. A speedy election putting the Tories back with a solid majority, no longer dependant on the DUP and ERG. Johnson believes in nothing as deeply as he believes in his destiny to lead.

Continue reading “.@BorisJohnson’s Cunning #Brexit Re-Run Plan” →

Tackling the #Brexit Threat of #DirectRule in Northern Ireland Directly

by dsmooney, posted in Backstop, Border, Boris Johnson, Brexit, Good Friday Agreement, Leo Varadkar

This article first appeared on Broadsheet on September 10th 2019

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Boris Johnson came to call on us, He wanted to tell all of us, Brexit won’t put a wall ‘round us, it’s frictionless.

Not so, says Leo back to him. We’re waitin’ for some facts from ‘em, So it’s the Backstop we’ll be backing then, Athena.

Take him up to Monto, Monto, Monto…

If you listen closely you can just hear the ghost of George Hodnett groan at the thought of his comic folk song “Monto” having my pitiful new verse inflicted upon it.

Nonetheless, commemorating the visit of the reigning contender for the twin titles of worst and last ever UK Prime Minister to our fair city, in verse does somehow seem appropriate.

Continue reading “Tackling the #Brexit Threat of #DirectRule in Northern Ireland Directly” →

Time to Revoke #Article50 and avoid a Johnson with an extension #Brexit

by dsmooney, posted in Brexit, DUP, Good Friday Agreement, Politics, UK politics

Boris Haircut

Boris Johnson – new haircut, new role?

Winston Churchill famously said that the United States always does the right thing – but only after exhausting all other options. If only the UK were somewhere near that point.

But it is not, it is still fumbling through just a few of the worst possible option while closing its eyes to the only right option now, revoking Article 50.

Theresa May’s speech last night was a disgrace. She appeared before the public with all the trappings of office, but with none of its authority. She tried to act like an authoritarian, an unpopular populist telling a divided public that it’s you and me against the others… against all those MPs stopping us from doing what we must do.

It was like a very bad live re-enactment of the disgraceful Daily Mail November 2016 front page that branded those judges who ruled that Parliament must be consulted on Brexit as: Enemies of the People.

It was a shocking performance and it is to be hoped that it is the one of the last acts of a British Prime Minister who may still be well intentioned, but whose continuance in office remains a blockage to any progress.

Continue reading “Time to Revoke #Article50 and avoid a Johnson with an extension #Brexit” →

Trimbling in fear of #Brexit #Backstop

by dsmooney, posted in Border, Brexit, Good Friday Agreement, Northern Ireland, Politics
This column first appeared on www.broadsheet.ie on Feb 5th 2019

Trimble

British Prime Minister, Theresa May is in Belfast today to make a speech at… sorry… to give a speech to local business leaders. The speech will re-state her “absolute commitment” to avoiding a hard border, post Brexit.

Her statement of commitment is welcome, just as welcome as it was when first made over two years ago, but with only seven weeks to go to the March 29th exit and after 18 exhaustive months of negotiations, surely it is not asking too much to expect her to say how she will turn this commitment into reality?

This is a crisis of her own making. She says she is committed to no hard border, but then she also says that she is equally committed to having a Brexit that takes the United Kingdom of Great Britain and parts of Northern Ireland out of the EU’s Customs Union and the Single Market, as well as out of the EU institutions.

The hard truth is that she cannot commit to ensuring no customs union, no single market and no hard border at the same time. You can do two out of three, but you cannot do all three.

Continue reading “Trimbling in fear of #Brexit #Backstop” →

My Summer 2018 @broadsheet_ie political reading list

by dsmooney, posted in Brexit, Fake News, Good Friday Agreement, Politics, US politics, Writing

This is my Broadsheet.ie 2018 Summer Political Reading List

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If you are thinking of taking a few political books away with you as you wind down in August, then the list below may be of help.

As with last year’s list, the books here appear in no particular order. These are the books that caught my attention over the past few months, including some from the second half of 2017 and one that I wanted to like, but couldn’t.

As this list broadly reflects my personal biases, feel free to offer your own suggestions in the comments section below. Enjoy the Summer and see you back here towards the end of August.

Beyond The Border, The Good Friday Agreement And Irish Unity After Brexit by Richard Humphreys

A timely read, this book by High Court judge and former Irish Labour Party Sp/Ad, Richard Humphreys examines how the structures and principles that underpin the 1998 Good Friday Agreement could work in a post Brexit, United Ireland.

Continue reading “My Summer 2018 @broadsheet_ie political reading list” →

How @DublinGAA indirectly got @DUPleader to Clones… via the Somme

by dsmooney, posted in Arlene Foster, Border, Culture, Dublin, Good Friday Agreement, Northern Ireland

This Broadsheet.ie column explains how one low-key but deeply sincere Dublin GAA action did more to get the DUP’s Arlene Foster to move, than months of politicians and pundits haranguing 

192414946-a4dfa92e-086c-418c-84fd-8c7989444412Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc. Though I am tempted to pretend that I recall this dusty old latin phrase from my days doing inter-cert latin in Synge St., the truth is that I only know it from watching The West Wing.

It is the title of episode two of season one and its significance is explained by the President Bartlett character when it translates it to his staff saying:

“‘After it, therefore because of it.’ It means one thing follows the other, therefore it was caused by the other. But it’s not always true, in fact it’s hardly ever true.”

Yet another “The West Wing” truism. If only today’s real thing were as clever as Aaron Sorkin could right it. Nonetheless, the point is well made. It’s a common mistake in politics to so imagine that there is order and logic in events that we manage to project some form of order and sequencing on to them.

In politics, the cock-up theory more often applies than the conspiracy one.

Continue reading “How @DublinGAA indirectly got @DUPleader to Clones… via the Somme” →

Change the record Mary Lou

by dsmooney, posted in Border, Brexit, Good Friday Agreement, Northern Ireland, Politics, Sinn Féin

This column appeared on Broadsheet.ie on May 29th 2018.

fr-billy-o-dwyer-spinmasterThere have been a few Fr Ted references here over the past few days, so let’s start off with another one. Remember that episode of Fr Ted where the lads need to raise money to fix the water leaks in the parochial house?

You know the one, they destroy the car Bishop Brennan gives them for the raffle and thus have to rig the draw to ensure that Dougal’s ticket wins it. Ted gets Fr Billy “Spinmaster” O’Dwyer to do the disco before the draw, but there’s a problem. Fr Billy has only one record with him and it’s “Ghost Town” by The Specials. Undeterred, the Spinmaster plays it over and over and over again, oblivious to the fact that the crowd have stopped listening.

I like Ghost Town. Not only is it a good song, it is a serious piece of popular social commentary, but even the loyalist Special fan would concede that forcing anyone to listen to it over and over again could turn them against it.

This is something that Sinn Féin’s “spinmasters” Mary Lou MacDonald and Michelle O’Neill could do well to bear in mind.

Continue reading “Change the record Mary Lou” →

#GFA20: when voting united us – Why Seamus Mallon should be honoured

by dsmooney, posted in Border, Good Friday Agreement, Politics, Sinn Féin

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Truth and Reconciliation Platform (TaRP) event at Kennedy Institute, Maynooth University: Stephen Travers, Seamus Mallon, Eugene Reavey and Dr. Rory O’Hanlon (Pic via https://twitter.com/TaR_Platform)

In a week when a referendum campaign that has managed to divide some of us comes, mercifully, to an end; it is worth recalling that this week, in fact this day, marks the twentieth anniversary of a referendum that briefly united us across this island.

Twenty years ago today, almost 2.5 million people across this island went to the polls to vote on accepting the Good Friday Agreement. Just over 2.1 million of them said Yes to the Agreement while 360,000 voted against.

The results, North and South, endorsed what the parties had agreed at Stormont Buildings and saw Northern Ireland set to see a return of devolution based on partnership government.

Heady days. But anyone who thought that having such a sizeable public endorsement and mandate for the Good Friday Agreement was going to ensure its smooth and speedy implementation was soon to be sorely disappointed.

Continue reading “#GFA20: when voting united us – Why Seamus Mallon should be honoured” →

Bringing It All Back Hume #GFA20

by dsmooney, posted in Good Friday Agreement, Northern Ireland, Politics

This column first appeared on Broadsheet.ie on April 10th, 2018

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By the time you read this I will be in Belfast attending several special events to mark 20 years of the Good Friday Agreement.

One of those, at Queen’s University entitled: Building Peace, and organized by the Senator George J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice at QUB, is described as

“the only one of its kind to gather together so many of the key influencers on the Good Friday Agreement to mark its 20-year anniversary”.

It is not an idle boast. The former US Special Envoy for Northern Ireland, and recent star of RTÉ TV’s Ray Darcy Show, will be joined by former U.S. President Bill Clinton, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, as well as many other key players including: Seamus Mallon, Gerry Adams, Jonathan Powell, David Trimble and Peter Robinson. Continue reading “Bringing It All Back Hume #GFA20” →