Farewell to Gerry and his tired old rhetoric
SO at l ast Gerry Adams has announced that he is to retire from politics. I applaud his decision and welcome it as I think this is long overdue. Now maybe Sinn Féin can move forward and move away from this republican rhetoric that never seems to be far from Mr Adams’s mouth.
Mr Adams was always fairly adept at rabble-rousing – the main weapon in his armoury has been his ability to delivery a historical falsity with believable and emotional precision.
Nowhere was this more evident than at Saturday’s ard fheis. Within minutes of walking on stage he had mentioned Michael Collins, Bobby Sands, Margaret Thatcher and Cuba. One of his most glaring falsehoods was claiming to belong to the same Sinn Féin of Griffith and de Valera.
He rattled off a list of previous leaders of the party as his audience sat transfixed on his every word. Needless to say he never mentioned Fianna Fáil founder Éamon de Valera was a previous leader of Sinn Féin.
The rest of his speech was littered with references to hunger strikers and dead martyrs.
In the end he announced his retirement from politics, as sullen faces looked at him from the auditorium. In no time they’ll see how blessed they are to be rid of him.
The whole thing was pathetic and this sort of archaic republicanism is one of the main reasons so many people don’t trust Sinn Féin at election time.
Now, Sinn Féin has a gilt-edged opportunity to move forward while keeping its core values intact. It can, as a party, still strive for a United Ireland, but its main priority has to be people first and not ideology.
I hope to see a vast reduction in this kind of rabble-rousing and instead a committed effort to strive to improve the lives of their constituents.
CHARLIE JOHNS, Carlow.
They’ve not gone away
HAS Brexit reawakened a dormant British imperial attitude to Ireland? To read of the onslaught of the British media over the Irish approach to Brexit, one must assume so.
Saturday’s Irish Daily Mail essay by Sebastian Hamilton talked about the dire consequences that would befall Ireland in relation to Brexit if we didn’t roll over and acquiesce to Britain’s proposals/ demands.
Mr Hamilton referred twice to the consequences of our opposing Britain and I quote: ‘In taking this misguided stand making a hard border with 30ft walls, barbed wire command posts and guard dogs much more l i kely.’ I thought immediately of Lloyd George’s threat in the Treaty Negotiations of ‘an immediate and terrible war’ if the Treaty was not accepted.
For several good reasons this was a bluff by Lloyd George.
However, we were then only a weak colony at the mercy of British imperialism.
Not so today where we are an independent nation, a respected and loyal member of the EU.
I am aware our Government is playing for very high stakes but I am fully confident in the Taoiseach’s handling of our negotiations. However, a warning to our people, our Government and public representatives: if we don’t learn from the mistakes of history we will repeat them.
The British prime minister and her government are stonewalling about resolving the border question, talking vaguely of finding solutions in stage two. They are hell-bent on moving to stage two.
The thought of Perfidious Albion comes to mind, which describes acts of diplomatic sleights, duplicity, treachery and hence infidelity. And the saying ‘Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.’ LEONARD ROARTY, Manorcunningham,
Co. Donegal.
Shop frenzy? No thanks
AS United States citizens tuck into Thanksgiving Day dinner on Thursday, t he conversation around the table should be very interesting. Uncle Sam is still deeply divided after last year’s presidential election.
What will temporarily unite Americans this coming weekend is their devotion to consumerism.
Thanksgiving Day was sacro- sanct for Americans as a national holiday to give thanks for the year’s harvest. Regrettably, the deeper meaning of Thanksgiving Day has been eclipsed by a rush to a shopping spree.
The shopping frenzy begins with a dawn dash on Friday, which is called Black Friday in the US.
The shopping frenzy is alien to our core values.
Let’s prepare for a traditional Irish Christmas by sharing some of our time, our company and our resources with the needy, the lonely and the homeless.
BILLY RYLE, Tralee, Co. Kerry.
TV can drive standards
COULD we have a brief, say, twominute driving tutorial three times a day on two or three days a week on national television? That would help update driving skills and driving behaviour.
It is incredible that TV media tutorials are not screened when we have deaths, accidents and atrocious driving on Irish roads.
If communicating with the public through TV can induce people to buy products, then surely simil ar communication with the motoring public could have a beneficial effect.
J. McARDLE, Carlow.