When Irish eyes should be sleeping… – The Anna Raccoon Archives

by Anna Raccoon on October 1, 2016

Does the insistent buzzing of an alarm clock wake you in the morning? Depending on when you went to sleep, what day of the week it is, or how well you have slept, the chances are that you have little idea of where you are, or why that infernal bell is clanging in your ear.

When you do finally figure out what is going on, one of the few redeeming factors of the situation is when you remember that it was you who set the alarm clock and that you had chosen to wake at this time – albeit at the behest of your paymasters.

Say your chosen hour was 7am – how would you feel if by diktat of the European Union, or another foreign power, 6.30am was now the new 7am…? Angry? Rebellious? Murderous even? How dare they steal half an hours sleep from you!

Ms Raccoon has just noticed that 100 years ago today, the British parliament imposed Greenwich Mean Time on the population of Ireland. Previously Ireland had run on ‘Dublin Mean Time’ because the sun rose there 25 minutes and 21 seconds later in Dublin than it did in Greenwich.

Those whose days were dictated by natural light and the rhythm of their cattle suddenly found that they were expected to get out of bed in the dark and stumble out to the stables in order to get the milk on the train, which ran on Greenwich Mean Time, naturally.

It has been shown that night shift workers who constantly wake in the dark, and survive on less than optimal sleep, are more likely to suffer a range of serious illnesses – cancer, diabetes, and heart complaints. To say nothing of being terminally bad tempered and minded to wreak vengeance on whoever or whatever had disrupted their sleep. It’s bad to sleep too little; it’s also bad, and maybe even worse, to wake up when it’s dark.

A rural population which had been refining their inbuilt circadian rhythm for centuries by taking care never to breed with ‘foreigners’ – i.e. anyone from more than four miles away – suddenly have 25 minutes of sleep time ‘stolen’ from them.

An entire population already enraged by the events of Easter Sunday, kicked out of their beds half an hour early, purely for the benefit of the British railway and telegraph companies – need we consider any other reason for the desire of some in Eire to exterminate the British as a race?

Has anyone ever studied the effect of Greenwich Mean Time on Irish Nationalism? I’ve tried searching but can find nothing.

Discuss.

{ 144 comments… read them below or add one }

David October 1, 2016 at 10:08 am

In the old days every town and village in effect had its own time-zone. When the sun was at its highest point in the sky, everyone knew it was midday. If people travelled across the country on foot or by horse then they would simply reset their watch at their destination. This all served us well for thousands of years until someone went and invented the railway and then there were immediate problems. What was 10am in London was not 10am in Liverpool. For a while people did try and create complicated train time-tables taking into account the day/date and co-ordinates of the train station but in reality it was all too complicated.

Mudplugger October 1, 2016 at 10:29 am

If they were only ever breeding within four miles, then losing 25 minutes of sleep would seem to be a minor inconvenience compared to the local genetic concentration issue. Ireland ….. Norfolk…….

Anna Raccoon October 1, 2016 at 10:35 am

Our builder tells us that he married a ‘foreigner’. Still moans about the 7 miles each way he had to cycle whilst courting…..

The Blocked Dwarf October 1, 2016 at 11:46 am

Tha ‘here new fangled clock ‘hin’ on thur chaach ‘ower do keep on a ‘roshin’ round withou so much as a ‘by yooor leave’ bu’ oi pays tha’ navver noo mind. When ‘hem du’ch flower lorries do hoor’le ‘hrough thur village tha’ be toime ‘o gi’ up and when yooor sis’er tairkes orff her dress tha’ be toime ‘o goo ‘o bed.

Ed P October 1, 2016 at 2:04 pm: That contains so many insults to the good honest people of Norfolk I’ve lost count* – well done!

* it would help if I had some extra digits…

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Grandad October 1, 2016 at 10:38 am

I still haven’t got over the change. And now that you’re leaving the EU, can we have our time back please?

Andrew Rosthorn October 1, 2016 at 10:49 am

Dear Anna, let’s not forget that on October 1, 1916, there was a world war in progress. Around 29,000 Irishmen had just been killed in the Battle of the Somme. The 16th Irish Division lost 450 men killed storming the village of Ginchy on September 9. The 6th Royal Irish Regiment and the 8th Munsters had advanced in four waves, followed by the Connaught Rangers and 7th Leinsters.
That was the day that 36 year old poet and former home rule MP, Professor Tom Kettle was killed. He had written a sonnet to his his infant daughter before the battle:
“So here, while the mad guns curse overhead,
And tired men sigh, with mud for couch and floor,
Know that we fools, now with the foolish dead, died not for flag, nor king, nor emperor,
But for a dream, born in a herdsman’s shed,
And for the secret scripture of the poor.”
I’m not surprised that changing the clocks in the city of Dublin, still damaged from the 1916 Easter Rising, caused very little resentment.
It was a bit premature of you to refer, in the English language, to “Eire”.
It was not until 1937 that the de Valera constitution declared that “name of the State is Éire, or, in the English language, Ireland.” Under the Republic of Ireland Act 1948 the term “Republic of Ireland” became the official “description” of the state.
“Ireland” is the formal name of the state as defined by the Constitution.

tdf October 1, 2016 at 7:51 pm: ‘It was a bit premature of you to refer, in the English language, to “Eire”. ‘

I disagree. I have always considered the use of ‘Eire’ by some English people a means of avoiding offence, rather than the opposite. Far better than ‘Southern Ireland’.

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Ho Hum October 1, 2016 at 11:07 am

@ David

In the old days, there was an idiot in every village. Mercifully he didn’t have Google or we’d have been swamped with cut and paste parchments

https://stephenliddell.co.uk/2013/11/02/a-brief-history-of-timezones-or-why-do-we-keep-changing-the-clocks/

Sean Coleman October 1, 2016 at 11:08 am

My mother and father were born eight miles away from each other, on either side of the Ballaghaderreen. This possibly accounts for my enduring good looks.

I have to say this is the first time I have heard of Dublin Mean Time. My lot would have a pretty poor opinion of Dublin. The modern term of disapproval (or badge of honour) is ‘Dublin 4’, which refers to the posh part of the city, including its citadel of propaganda, the national broadcaster RTE. ‘Controversial’ (as Wiki no doubt refers to him) journalist John Waters invented the expression, but while it is rooted geographically it is really a mental thing and there isn’t a corner of the country, go where you will, which is without its robotic advocates of ‘progressive’ thinking (as defined by past or present colonial masters). (I note in passing that tdf is from Dublin and this is probably no coincidence. Sorry mate, it has to be said.) However, having said all this, I suppose it was the railways which forced a uniform clock on the country, in the same way as it usurped local time in England. If you were a simple countryman you used the height of the sun in the sky like any sensible person.

Bad as GMT is it will be nothing compared to Berlin Time, which the Euro-Obsessives are surely working on at this present, er, ‘time’.

A few decades ago they introduced daylight saving or *what-ever* when the clocks moved an hour forwards or backwards: it is hard to remember because the continual changes are disorientating. In my wife’s part of Kerry (and elsewhere for sure) many people refused to adjust their clocks and remained by the Old Time, which went on for quite a long, er, time. It came to a head when people were turning up for Sunday mass after it had finished. I suspect there are some who still cleave to the Old Time, perhaps using secret time pieces, or within the innermost recesses of the heart.

Whyaxye October 1, 2016 at 11:13 am

“Has anyone ever studied the effect of Greenwich Mean Time on Irish Nationalism?”

If it made bomb timer devices harder to set, it would be on the whole a good thing.

tdf October 1, 2016 at 8:08 pm: I didn’t think that Irish nationalists were using bomb timer devices 100 years ago, but according to Wiki I might be mistaken.

The wiki article records the use of timed devices as early as 1881-1885 by the Fenians. The wiki link doesn’t mention any use of time bombs during the 1916 Easter rising, but does record the use of such devices in the same year, by labour leaders in San Francisco during the ‘Preparedness Day Bombing’.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_bomb

Go figure, as they say in sunny Frisco….

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Ho Hum October 1, 2016 at 11:13 am

More seriously, I well remember when we Scots had permanent summer time imposed on us. If the English again want to make us live in the dark until 10am during the winter, then don’t be too surprised if we get Bolshie

Henry Wood October 1, 2016 at 12:50 pm

Here! Here! sir!
I am an Englishman living in Scotland (since 1970) and I well remember the blackness visited on us by Westminster’s experiment.

The only other similar experience was when I was working on an oil rig North of 61 degrees (that meant we got to bring back duty free goods back to Aberdeen!) and it also meant Winter was Black with virtually no daylight at all and Summer never, ever put the lights out. It did upset some internal clocks.

Little Black Sambo October 2, 2016 at 10:58 am

To read some opinions by Scotchmen, you would think the Government had the power to increase or reduce the hours of daylight. Since it can only determine what the time is called there would be nothing to stop the Scottish administration adopting their own timetables for schools and businesses, or indeed for individual institutions to do decide for themselves.

Mrs Grimble October 2, 2016 at 12:48 pm

“there would be nothing to stop the Scottish administration adopting their own timetables for schools and businesses, or indeed for individual institutions to do decide for themselves.”
Exactly the same could be said for organisations and businesses in the rest of the UK. I’ve never seen any need for BST at all. The usual excuse of “But we have to keep in time with European business!” is hogwash – if ithat’s vital to your business, just set your working hours to European time.

Ho Hum October 2, 2016 at 1:48 pm: Probably fine if you live west of Bristol.

On a practical note, would you put the school starting times back by an hour too? If not, in December, every child in England goes to school in the dark

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Greg Tingey October 4, 2016 at 8:32 am: WRONG
We are permanently an hour “adrift” of the EU as regards time, since (most of) the EU uses Berlin time – an hour earlier than ours.

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David October 1, 2016 at 11:22 am

Yes, I do know where to look for information, only in exams do I write things ‘in my own words’. But using a phone to write is difficult enough as it is, without having to type out things with my finger. Also, I was asked by the landlady to reference my information, but I know that other people propping up the bar with time on their hands can do that quicker if I give them the chance!

Ed P October 1, 2016 at 2:09 pm

I’m sorry to hear you have lost nine digits.

Mudplugger October 1, 2016 at 7:56 pm: Or maybe a few more if he hails from Norfolk…..

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Hadleigh Fan October 1, 2016 at 11:27 am

Airlines seem to manage – but then we have chunked everything up into time zones. Incidentally, Dublin is still in the same zone as Greenwich, although Microsoft tells me that GMT + 0 is Dublin first before London, so the barmy Micks have little to complain about.

Before they threw their toys out of the pram finally, they were over-represented in Parliament just like the Scots and to an extent the Welsh are (and Labour!), with a total of over 700 MPs for a total population of the British Isles half of what we have today. (Although today we have supernumary politicians in Ireland – Republic and North, Scotland and Wales to add in).

Being congenitally stupid*, the Irish political class decamped from Dublin to London and pretended they weren’t Irish at all, although it did have the beneficial effect of stopping lots of lovely Georgian streets ever being developed into modern rubbish. ‘Absentee landlords’ managed this pretense so well, that those back in Ireland believed it. It would have made sense to have Parliament rotate between London, Edinburgh and Dublin, then when the Krauts got offensive, government could have run rather better out of range of Messrs Heinkel & Dornier and fat Hermann. Unfortunately, some of the Dublin Remainians were as dim as the political class, and always chose to have a rumpus when the English were having a punch up with someone on the Continent, and had therefore had enlarged the army (often with large numbers of Irishmen!) and other services, given them a taste of bloodshed, while Paddy sought and obtained weapons from England’s current enemy, and thus guaranteed an over-reaction caused in part with the fear that the enemy were entering by the back door, or should I rephrase that?

Then we have the Potato famine. What a load of mythological twaddle. What is colcannon without potato? Answer: cabbage.Surely they grew something else. And, the whole of Europe was gripped by famine, viz some of the scenes in Les Miserables, as a result of shifting climate. It turns out that government spent £100,000 on maize – a huge sum, and maize because it was available from North America and buying it wouldn’t shaft the wheat price, which would have meant a different kind of poverty. Grateful? Not a bit of it. Too hard, they said. But you have to cook the bloody stuff. Every time I’m in Dublin, I check. Popcorn – yes. Corn on the cob – yes. Sweetcorn – yes. Polenta – yes (in Italian or pretentious restaurants). So they finally learnt.

Fantastic. So they get their self-government and launch themselves into a civil war over nothing, chuck out anyone with the slightest view that it wasn’t a good thing, and reimpose a religious oligarchy that gives the priests of the Catholic Church free reign to bugger and rape children at will (a topic not covered for some reason in Father Ted), support the Nazis and generally get obnoxious with their neighbours about who rules an inconsequential corner of Ireland, when everyone is busy deciding ‘not me – it’s Brussels’.

And all this over 25 minutes and having to get up early! What the heck are they going to do when they discover that they are no longer recipients of EU largesse, but have to pay their share?**

*As politicians usually are. So are extremists and Orla Guerin (Goering?). Mostly I find that the Irish population is made up of far more sensible individuals who are friendly and charming, well-educated and articulate. Dublin has two fine Universities, and a sensible education system (priests and nuns excepted). I like the Irish.

** And get up another hour earlier, when Berlin time becomes the standard for the whole of EU Europe?

Andrew Rosthorn October 1, 2016 at 12:29 pm

* Your unpleasant nationalist remark about the Irish political class being “congenitally stupid” would mean that the Duke of Wellington, Edmund Burke, Michael Davitt, Henry Grattan, Lord Castlereagh and Sir Edward Carson, were born stupid. I think not. Nationalism, even the bar room Boys Own Paper stuff like yours, kills. Join the dots.

Hadleigh Fan October 1, 2016 at 2:23 pm

And weren’t they? Why should they be any different to any other political class? Especially of the time. Andrew, you took offence unnecessarily – didn’t you read the footnote? Calling the political class of two centuries ago ‘congenitally stupid’ is not Nationalistic, but a considered opinion based on their (largely aristocratic roots and the inbreeding that they experienced. Worse in many respects than Norfolk. I know that the Duke of Wellington claimed not to be Irish with the remark that being born in a stable doesn’t make one a horse, so maybe not stupid in the sense of lacking in a sense of repartee and wit, but stupid in pretending not to be what he was – and probably being prickly about it unnecessarily, like the clamour about ‘thick irish sausages’. (You can still buy them, you know!)

Never heard of Michael Davitt or Henry Grattan, and think I can survive not knowing of them. Castelreagh put down the Irish Rebellion of 1798, and eventually topped himself, so when one reads (in the devillish Wikipaedia) that: “There probably never was a statesman whose ideas were so right and whose attitude to public opinion was so wrong. Such disparity between the grasp of ends and the understanding of means amounts to a failure in statesmanship” although I am not familiar with the original source. Add to that an observation that he was insane (and I will reserve judgement on his being blackmailed for homosexuality) and favoured an engagement with continental Europe, then he clearly was barking bonkers. He also went to Cambridge, but that put him off education for life: he should have gone to Trinity, which is a better place. Maybe then he would have graduated and demonstrated whether his place came from privilege or intellect.

I shan’t comment on Carson, because he comes so late in the day he can’t be responsible for the decamping of the political class to London and abandonment of their roots, which is perhaps the most stupid thing any group of the wealthy and overprivileged could do.
Perhaps understandable before there was a steamer from Dublin’s port to Fishguard and the GWR, but still unwise.

By the time Carson was an adult, it was possible to commute.I’m not sure that he has many fans in the Republic. Nor popular with fans of Oscar Wilde. I imagine that Castelreagh is a bogeyman too, south of the border.

In replying, I realise that the residual animosity in the Republic against England is probably more to do with the Irish in London and Government sticking 2 fingers up to their homeland than the English, the majority of whom would rather sink a pint, eat a curry or donner kebab, and watch football, and probably have no more idea of what or where Ireland is than of what or where is Timbuktu.

I suspect that you never read the Boy’s Own Paper …

Andrew Rosthorn October 1, 2016 at 11:29 pm: The paper boy delivered B.O.P., Eagle and The Children’s Newspaper to our house. I think I must have dropped the B.O.P. for the Meccano Magazine.

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Sean Coleman October 1, 2016 at 4:57 pm

Hadleigh Farm

‘priests and nuns excepted’

Why would you except them? What tall tales have you heard?

Please tell me more. (This should be fun.)

tdf October 1, 2016 at 7:38 pm

“and reimpose a religious oligarchy that gives the priests of the Catholic Church free reign to bugger and rape children at will (a topic not covered for some reason in Father Ted)”

The early Irish republic really was a borderline failed state by most indicators. 2% of the population emigrated each year in the 1950s (sorry, Sean, but I really have to remind you!). Before that DeValera had destroyed half the economy with his utterly mad ‘trade war’ with Britain during the 1930s. In between, of course, Ireland shirked the war against the Nazis.

I must however defend the writers of Father Ted (a UK produced series, incidentally):

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/graham-linehan-ive-come-to-hate-the-church-8665386.html

Sean Coleman October 1, 2016 at 8:22 pm

tdf

What time is it? Saturday evening. That means it is time for our little weekly chat.

No need to apologize or remind me. I know Ireland was, and remains, a failed state but that was not because of the Church. In fact, it had nothing at all to do with religion. Crotty believed there was a very close inverse relationship between the increase in the number of cattle carried on the land (cattle rearing being land intensive, in that you need a lot of land for a given output) and the number of people. As cattle numbers rose (as they did from around the time of Waterloo onwards) so the population fell.

De Valera’s protectionist policies are the subject of knowing titters on the part of the average Irish Times reader, who seems to labour under the delusion that reading the newspaper makes him well educated. His policies were preceded by a period of old-fashioned fiscal rectitude by the party that later became the Blueshirts and Fine Gael. Their first proper measure on gaining power after the Civil War was to take a shilling off the pension. At least De Valera’s Fianna Fáil made an effort to do something for the little man. in the early 50s the govt abandoned De Valera’s self-sufficiency and tried deficit financing (other countries were doing it you see). When that led to more disaster and emigration the next things were the ‘economic take-off’ theory that was fashionable at the time and Keynsianism. Ireland joined the EEC in the hope that they could solve its problems. We all know now what European ‘solidarity’ means in practice. I think the mess is bigger now than it ever was.

But the sniggers are reserved for De Valera and Catholic Ireland. I am sure that down the local right-on comedy centre you could still raise the roof by saying the words ‘De Valera’ with a knowing smirk. (I remember being dragged along to Camden years ago for a night of ‘political pohtry’ (the poht was a Geordie) which relied heavily on saying ‘Mrs Thatchah’ every other sentence.) For those interested in that kind of thing, you do realize that the famous lines in his long-ago ‘Dream Speech’ about comely maidens dancing at the crossroads were never written or said and exist only at the level of fantasy? Comparable, I suppose, to Jimmy Savile spending every Chrstmas at Chequers as a guest of Margaret Thatcher?

As for ‘shirking’ the war, I have already told you this is beyond stupid, so why do you persist? You are aware, aren’t you, that the drive for independence after 1916 was caused (in the short term) by the desire to avoid conscription? So why have a war of independence over joining a world war only to go to war twenty years later. And for what, exactly?

Off topic. I came across this the other day. I imagine it is well known. Did you know that Eddie the sniffer dog that found the notorious piece of coconut shell or wood in Haut de la Garenne (they thought it was part of a baby’s skull) was the same one that picked up the ‘scent of death’ in the McCann case?

Sean Coleman October 1, 2016 at 8:30 pm

Forgot the link, which I got courtesy of Irish Salem:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1217863/Bungled-Jersey-child-abuse-probe-branded-20million-shambles.html

tdf October 1, 2016 at 9:14 pm

@Sean

Re Eddie the sniffer dog, as it happens, yes, I did know that.

tdf October 1, 2016 at 9:40 pm

“De Valera’s protectionist policies are the subject of knowing titters on the part of the average Irish Times reader, who seems to labour under the delusion that reading the newspaper makes him well educated. ”

None of this has anything to do with the price of fish or indeed the 1930s Anglo-Irish trade war. Ricardo’s theories on trade were developed in the early nineteenth century, and drew on earlier research from Adam Smith and others. Nothing to do the Irish Times, or Irish Times’ readers (tittering or otherwise) or even Keynes. Basic stuff, which De Valera was unfortunately ignorant of, and his ignorance did great damage.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_advantage

“Their first proper measure on gaining power after the Civil War was to take a shilling off the pension. At least De Valera’s Fianna Fáil made an effort to do something for the little man.”

Reminds me of what Ahern supporters used to say in defence of their hero (but shure he’s a great man for the sports, isn’t he!) or before him, what CJH supporters used to say of theirs. Or even to this day, probably what some say of the Healy-Rae clan (but he fixed de road!!)

The history of post-independence Irish politics consists mainly of the Gombeen FF’rs and their lackies wrecking the economy, and the adults (not that FG is entirely free of the gombeen cult either) been left to clean up the damage. This has been repeated again and again. Will be too in another decade or so, doubtless.

Sean Coleman October 1, 2016 at 10:32 pm

I don’t think Ricardo (the bankers’ economist) or comparative advantage had anything to do with it. I think the whole comparative advantage thing has been exaggerated beyond all bounds. Please show me where comparative advantage has a decisive influence, or even any influence, in the world today. Anywhere.

What comparative advantage does Ireland exercise or enjoy nowadays? Our economic policy seems to be based on attracting multinationals by offering them better tax breaks than our EU neighbours. You obviously believe in the cliché of Whittaker’s economic miracle. As I explained above, they tried everything and nothing worked.

The whole thing about Fianna Fáil and its gombeens is also wrong. When the great crash occurred seven or eight years ago the media and many ordinary people pointed the finger immediately at FF. The Great Satan. And yet the other parties had been every bit as enthusiastic about spending the windfall from property tax on a housing boom that none of them really believed would never end. Fantasy and cliché, the great story of our times. Where are the ‘adult’ politicians left to clean up the wreckage? Everwhere you turn it is another fairy tale. The Good Whittaker, Garret (Fitzgerald) the Good, the Wicked Charlie Haughey.

What about the incredible story of the collapse of Albert Reynolds’s government as a result of a delay in extraditing the paedophile priest Brendan Smyth? (RTE News used to show footage of him in slow motion to make him appear more sinister. The Italians used to play background music to some of their news items and probably still do.) Labour pulled out of the coalition because they genuinely believed that Opus Dei were behind the delay. Pat Rabbitte referred to a mysterious letter from the ‘hierarchy’ which, if discovered, would rock the foundations of the state. That’s right, there was a hulking albino straight out of the Da Vinci Code roaming the corridors of power. Who are the ‘adults’ in this case?

A couple of journalists from the Daily Mail wrote an interesting book about modern British economists a few years ago which they named well: Fantasy Island.

‘Gombeen FF’rs and their lackies’ (sic) ‘Lackeys’ takes cliché to a new level and brings me back to the Radio Tirana of my schooldays. In my mind what I call extravert rhetoric is inextricable from extravert cliché. Words and phrases (the more high-flown the better) are offered as if they are things in themselves, creating their own reality. I think this is an example of what is known as ‘reification’. (The Dutch psychologist Trudy Dehue uses the term reification in her work to describe how ideas such as Attention Deficit Disordere come into being. Like lumbago as a term for back ache they add nothing to understanding.)

Tdf, without meaning to be rude, do any ideas pass through your head which aren’t well worn clichés, by which I mean both lacking thought and completely wrong?

And passing onto yet another cliché, World War 2 as a battle against Nazism, which Ireland somehow shirked. Do you know anything, anything at all, about the course or causes of that war? At what stage did it become a just war against Nazism? In what ways were Stalin’s Soviet Union preferable to German Nazism?

Please don’t take the above as criticism. Keep them coming. The insights are fascinating.

tdf October 1, 2016 at 10:45 pm: “I don’t think Ricardo (the bankers’ economist) or comparative advantage had anything to do with it. I think the whole comparative advantage thing has been exaggerated beyond all bounds. Please show me where comparative advantage has a decisive influence, or even any influence, in the world today. Anywhere.

What comparative advantage does Ireland exercise or enjoy nowadays? Our economic policy seems to be based on attracting multinationals by offering them better tax breaks than our EU neighbours. ”

This isn’t really what I meant by citing Ricardo. The point I was making was that under the terms of trade theory, even a weaker power does better by trading internationally than by protectionism (according to Ricardo’s theory). A weaker power, by setting off a trade war, is simply shooting itself in the foot. That is, of course, if Ricardo was correct.

“What about the incredible story of the collapse of Albert Reynolds’s government as a result of a delay in extraditing the paedophile priest Brendan Smyth? (RTE News used to show footage of him in slow motion to make him appear more sinister. The Italians used to play background music to some of their news items and probably still do.) Labour pulled out of the coalition because they genuinely believed that Opus Dei were behind the delay. Pat Rabbitte referred to a mysterious letter from the ‘hierarchy’ which, if discovered, would rock the foundations of the state. That’s right, there was a hulking albino straight out of the Da Vinci Code roaming the corridors of power. Who are the ‘adults’ in this case?”

It was indeed a complicated story. Probably more complicated than has come to light so far.

Opus Dei were certainly and provably involved in all kinds of secretive activity, and it is known that senior figures in the Irish establishment were linked to them, so Rabbitte’s or Labour’s theory might not be as mad as it seems to you.

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tdf October 1, 2016 at 10:57 pm: “The whole thing about Fianna Fáil and its gombeens is also wrong. When the great crash occurred seven or eight years ago the media and many ordinary people pointed the finger immediately at FF. The Great Satan. And yet the other parties had been every bit as enthusiastic about spending the windfall from property tax on a housing boom that none of them really believed would never end. Fantasy and cliché, the great story of our times. ”

If you ask me, this is woolly thinking. The fact that many ‘ordinary people pointed the finger immediately at FF’ may well be correct (very probably is correct) but doesn’t prove that ‘the whole thing about Fianna Fail and its gombeens is also wrong’. It simply proves that a high % of ‘ordinary people’ like the gombeen cultist economics of FF (and to a lesser extent FG) if they think it is making them richer, but scream like little babies when the dream of the gombeen cult turns sour. In other words, they want the Kingdom, but they don’t want God in it

Ever seen or read the play ‘The Field’, or if not are you familiar with its plot in general terms?

“‘Gombeen FF’rs and their lackies’ (sic) ‘Lackeys’ takes cliché to a new level and brings me back to the Radio Tirana of my schooldays. In my mind what I call extravert rhetoric is inextricable from extravert cliché. Words and phrases (the more high-flown the better) are offered as if they are things in themselves, creating their own reality. I think this is an example of what is known as ‘reification’. (The Dutch psychologist Trudy Dehue uses the term reification in her work to describe how ideas such as Attention Deficit Disordere come into being. Like lumbago as a term for back ache they add nothing to understanding.)”

This doesn’t mean anything. It’s just word salad.

“Tdf, without meaning to be rude, do any ideas pass through your head which aren’t well worn clichés, by which I mean both lacking thought and completely wrong?”

Ad hominem.

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tdf October 2, 2016 at 10:33 pm

@Sean

“Comparable, I suppose, to Jimmy Savile spending every Chrstmas at Chequers as a guest of Margaret Thatcher?”

I can scarely believe that you somehow managed to find a pretext to bring Savile into this thread! What an odd mind you have.

I will let Louis Theroux have the final word. This will be my last comment on Savile.

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-37517619

KevinS October 2, 2016 at 2:12 pm

I believe that the last thing the Government of the UK in 1939-1945 was the Republic of Ireland joining in the fray, which would have given hundreds of miles more coastline to defend without the manpower to do it. From a purely tactical point of view Irish neutrality was the best course of action for the allies.

tdf October 2, 2016 at 10:38 pm: @KevinS

I guess that’s a fair point. Interesting that Churchill didn’t bother defending Jersey. He presumably felt he simply couldn’t sacrifice the manpower at that stage in the war.

Churchill did however put a lot of pressure on Eire’s government to try to get them to allow the Allies to use the ‘Treaty Ports’ (control of these ports had only been relinquished by the UK the year before the war). DeValera’s government refused.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_Ports_(Ireland)#British_dissent

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Major Bonkers October 3, 2016 at 6:51 am: That, regrettably, is wrong. It would have been of immense help in the Battle of the Atlantic, including the hunt for the Bismark.

We also ought to draw a distinction between the actions of the Irish people – who did join up (eg. Seaman Magennis, who won a VC for an x-craft attack in Singapore harbour) – and the actions of the government, which were disgraceful (eg. de Valera’s signing of the book of condolence after Hitler’s death).

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The Last Furlong October 1, 2016 at 11:31 am

Fascinating thoughts! I lived in a little town about 7 miles away from Kirkby Lonsdale. As an off comer myself, I remember a chat with someone whose family name was Viking and whose family had lived there in that small place since those times. The man said “My mother was the first foreigner to marry into our family.” I held my breath, Tahiti? China? Sweden? Istanbul? Nigeria? Patagonia even, thinking exotic and exciting. “Oh?”I said, “where was she from?” “Kirkby Lonsdale” he replied.

The Blocked Dwarf October 1, 2016 at 12:29 pm: School children bused in from the outlying villages to be schooled, at the ‘big Skool’ in the Norfolk town where i lived, used to talk about being ‘skooled in ‘he CITY’. Yep, kids from LowerSisturbotherm (Pop:1-according to geneticists) regarded the town (Pop: 6K) one ‘Norfolk mile’ (ie 3 British miles) away as ‘the city’…

…and you know what they do say about them city-girls, bor.

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The Blocked Dwarf October 1, 2016 at 12:06 pm

Fascinating thought, just the kind of historical ‘Nodal point’ (Gibson) I like. I too, despite countless hours singing IRA ballards, had never heard of when the ‘Saxons’ stole good Irish women and children’s sleep…no doubt at gun point. Wolfe Tones you have failed me!
”Through the little streets of Belfast
In the dark of early morn
GMT came marauding
Wrecking little homes with scorn

Heedless of the crying children
Dragging fathers from their beds…..

Refrain:
With amoured cars and tanks and guns,
they came to take away OUR sun
But every man must get up
earlier by half an hour!”

I wonder if we will look back and discover a nodal point for BREXIT in years to come? The one little thing, totally innocuous taken on it’s own, that tipped the majority (well sorta) towards a ‘leave’ vote. Like ‘Yes PM’ with the sausages.

Don Cox October 1, 2016 at 12:13 pm

Harold Wilson imposed permanent “Summer Time” on the English as well as on the Scots. Fortunately this law was reversed after a few years.

Now how about dumping this absurd changing of clocks altogether and staying on Greenwich Mean Time ?

windsock October 1, 2016 at 1:04 pm

I think my irony meter is broken.

WAYNE October 1, 2016 at 1:11 pm

Easy to solve, simply get up half an hour late, and work late later. simples

Anna Raccoon October 1, 2016 at 1:22 pm: By which time the milk train has left for market….!

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binao October 1, 2016 at 2:20 pm

‘night shift workers….serious illnesses’
I worked on a rotating so called American shift system for a spell back in the sixties. Three shifts covered the 168 hours each week with a three week cycle, in sequences of two and five 12 hour day & night shifts, all 6 to 6. There was one break of about four and a half days within each cycle. I don’t believe my digestion or sleep patterns ever settled.
The effect when on the day shift was to wonder how the ordinary day staff (part timers?) got anything done and what was the point of them anyway, as they were hardly ever there. The night shift meant no bosses, floating purple dots around 3 am, and the pleasure of going home when everybody else was getting up and going groggily off to work. Four or five hours sleep after breakfast. Brain & body affected. Who’d do it now?

Anyway, I think the North to South daylight hours are more important than the Greenwich thing; the pleasure of the Campsies, even the Lakes, on a late summer evening with all that extra daylight. Rather offset unfortunately by the misery of a wet and dark journey to work on a winter morning.

dearieme October 1, 2016 at 7:31 pm

If you are to distinguish British and Irish accurately you should refer not to the British but to the UK parliament, in which Ireland was somewhat overrepresented relative to its population. Though it does seem perverse to recommend accuracy on any writing to do with Ireland, to be sure, to be sure.

Andrew Rosthorn October 1, 2016 at 8:05 pm

If you seriously believe that all politicians are “congenitally stupid” it’s not worth further discussion. Bar room chatter. If you argue that the Irish eighteenth and nineteenth century politicians were especially “congenitally stupid”, that is that they were born stupid, you are not just wrong, you are indulging in the nationalistic stereotyping that has cost so many lives.
The Irishmen I named were all clever. I picked them from all sides of the political spectrum. Castlereagh travelled by freezing carriages across Germany in mid-winter to represent Britain at the Congress of Vienna in 1815. He designed the Congress System that staved off war in Europe for about forty years. It was his idea.
Henry Grattan, a brilliant orator who had opposed the union of the two parliaments in 1800, was forced by events to come to London as the MP for Malton in Yorkshire.
Wellington, who spoke with an Irish brogue when he was young, commanded a British Army that was 42% Irish. He outwitted the French Army of Spain, numbering 360,000, with 34,000 British and Portuguese soldiers.
As you suggested, all the men I had named did find their way to England. That happened largely because London had made itself the seat of the government of Ireland.
Michael Davitt was however driven out of Mayo by hunger to work in a Lancashire cotton mill at the age of nine, lost his right arm in machinery at 12, but nevertheless founded the Irish Land League, the only successful Irish political project of the nineteenth century. The Lord Lieutenant of Ireland attended his funeral.
“Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind” EINSTEIN.

tdf October 1, 2016 at 8:14 pm: @Andrew

Yes, Grattan’s Dublin parliament was moved by edict from London in the Act of Union of 1800. That was why Ireland’s politicians ended up decamping to London.

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Andrew Rosthorn October 1, 2016 at 8:24 pm

I know mealy mouths do say “Eire” to avoid the ghastly “Southern Ireland”. But it remains a nonsense to use the Irish word when talking English. Just call it “Ireland”.
Whenever one needs to avoid confusion with people and events in the six counties, one can call it the “Irish Republic”. By saying Anna was “premature” to use the word “Eire” I only meant that there was no “Eire” on October 1, 1916.

tdf October 1, 2016 at 8:41 pm

@Andrew

Points taken.

A pet hate of mine is the use by some (not all) English Tories of ‘Ulster’ when they really mean the Six Counties/Northern Ireland. In fact, three of the nine Ulster counties (including the largest one in terms of geographical area) are not in Northern Ireland at all but in the Republic. I’m pretty sure Thatcher started this trend. I don’t know if she was deliberately trying to cause offence. I suspect it is more like that she was just pig-headedly ignorant of Irish affairs.

tdf October 1, 2016 at 9:22 pm: That said, I stand in general by my view that the use of Eire by British people is mainly not to cause offence but usually for the opposite reason.

I’ve heard in recent years, British television broadcasters referring to the Irish police as the Garda Siochana, but I am sometimes told off by my Cork friends for referring to the Gardai Siochana as the police! Possibly it’s my Pale/Dublin/’Anglo’ origins. (Most of the rest of the country thinks that we Dubs are ‘west Brits’, as witnessed right here in this thread with Sean’s snipe at me above).

This short docu was recently put up on the RTE website, and is in interesting period piece:

http://www.rte.ie/archives/2016/0926/819288-beat-generation-at-club-arthur/

It’s basically an insight into Swinging Sixties Dublin, in so far as the Swinging Sixties made it over here to this side of the Irish sea. One of the interesting things about it to me is that most of those interviewed, in spite of being obviously Irish, speak in well-modulated, almost ‘RP’ tones, and even refer to the Gardai Siochana as – you’ve guessed it – the police!

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tdf October 1, 2016 at 10:06 pm

Apols for the borderline-hyperactive series of posts, but Hadleigh Fan’s passing observation on the London Irish reminded me of it (because Neil Hannon once wrote a song called ‘London Irish’).

Hannon & Walsh’s ascerbic suggestion for a new Irish national anthem:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVj7cwnFtYI

suffolkgirl October 1, 2016 at 10:09 pm

I wouldn’t sign up for that. Personally I can’t see the point of light in the morning unless you work in the open air. And the farmers round here work with lights anyway, it’s common to see ghostly lights in the fields late at night. One of the pleasures of visiting friends in Spain in the winter is the light in the early evening. It was a real annoyance for me that the opportunity of even asking what most people want was filibustered away by that lover of direct democracy, Jacob Rees Mogg.

tdf October 1, 2016 at 10:27 pm: @suffolkgirl

“It was a real annoyance for me that the opportunity of even asking what most people want was filibustered away by that lover of direct democracy, Jacob Rees Mogg.”

Has Rees Mogg put himself forward as a lover of direct democracy?

I think that UKIP’s sole MP Douglas Carswell does, and probably sincerely means it, but euroscepticism is a broad church.

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Ho Hum October 1, 2016 at 10:15 pm

suffolkgirl
October 1, 2016

You clearly never tried to go to school in any place where it was pitch dark till 10am

Ho Hum October 1, 2016 at 10:22 pm

@ tdf
October 1, 2016
‘Apols for the borderline-hyperactive series of posts, but Hadleigh Fan’s passing observation on the London Irish reminded me of it (because Neil Hannon once wrote a song called ‘London Irish’).’

Thank you for the apology, but having tried to pass by on that particularly mind numbing part of the thread, I can honestly say that this is the first time I have been grateful that my phone refuses to play most embedded YouTube videos

tdf October 1, 2016 at 10:31 pm

@Ho Hum

Not a cricket fan then, or just not into pop music?

tdf October 1, 2016 at 11:04 pm

@Ho Hum

“Some erstwhile Irish cricketer wrote a pop song about some London rugby union players who have pretentions of playing for a Fifty Shades of Green outfit? ”

Er, well, no. Not exactly.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Duckworth_Lewis_Method

“Besides, if I wanted to hear such, I’d go to Celtic Park – well, at one time in the past maybe, when the Scottish National Phascists hadn’t added football fans to their list of those who should be sent to Stalag Salmonella”

Celtic Park? I take it they play soccerball there. I’d be surprised if the music of Duckworth Lewis Method is played at Celtic Park, or at any other soccerball stadium, at any time, ever.

Ho Hum October 1, 2016 at 11:32 pm

@ tdf

Having now sat down at a proper computer, not one of those worm eaten pomaceous things, I can now honestly say that this is the first time I have ever been ungrateful that it will actually play most embedded YouTube videos

After perusing that little ditty, the only merit I can see in using the Duckworth Lewis Method in connection with the Emerald Isle is in persuading Kim Jong-il that it is the best known method of target setting that he can use when he comes to first launch his versions of (Not so) Little Boy and Fatman

tdf October 2, 2016 at 12:12 am: @ Ho Hum

Maybe that was how the Krikkit wars got started? (Douglas Adams reference)

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Ho Hum October 1, 2016 at 10:50 pm

‘tdf
October 1, 2016
@Ho Hum

Not a cricket fan then, or just not into pop music?’

Some erstwhile Irish cricketer wrote a pop song about some London rugby union players who have pretentions of playing for a Fifty Shades of Green outfit?

Never heard of it

Besides, if I wanted to hear such, I’d go to Celtic Park – well, at one time in the past maybe, when the Scottish National Phascists hadn’t added football fans to their list of those who should be sent to Stalag Salmonella

Joannie October 2, 2016 at 1:15 pm

Interesting blog this. The idea that Irish nationalists got cranky through lack of sleep is an amusing one, but of course the real reason they got cranky was because Britain could never answer the Irish Question properly. The question being “would you ever get the hell out of our country” and Britain being unable to take a hike and stop bullying the smaller country next door to them.

David October 2, 2016 at 1:47 pm

@Joannie I agree they should have held a referendum for the whole of Ireland, in/or out of the UK. But instead, each county decided in or out separately. Some decided to stay, others left to form the Republic.

Perhaps if every county in the UK, and major city, voted for in or out of the EU, several British Counties, and Cities would stay in the EU, while the rest left the EU.

One system for in or out of the UK for Ireland and another for in or out of the EU for the rest of us.

Ho Hum October 2, 2016 at 1:54 pm: .

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Joannie October 2, 2016 at 1:49 pm

Fermanagh and Tyrone didn’t decide to stay.

Mudplugger October 2, 2016 at 4:01 pm

In defence of modern Ireland (Eire, Republic, Southern, whatever), it’s important to remember that this is a nation still in its childhood, it’s not even a teenager like the USA, far from being an adult, being formed only in 1922. Hence it will make all manner of mistakes as it learns how to manage and conduct itself independently – we should kindly forgive all these as youthful indiscretions. Give it time – preferably another couple of hundred years at least, before expecting anything profound to emerge, but don’t expect it even then.

We need to consider its advantages – lots of fertile land, er…… that’s it.

So we have a prepubescent state with no natural advantages, not even scale, a population which can’t create a diaspora quickly enough (doesn’t matter where, anywhere will do) and it’s trying to make its way in a playground full of bullies, almost all of whom are much larger, more mature and thus smarter in the ways of the playground. They have no tools or attributes at their disposal to develop into a proper independent nation, so we may even excuse their obsession with staying in the EU, as that makes them feel more important than they really are, because those awfully nice folk in Brussels pretend to listen (but those awfully nice folk in Brussels are, of course, wise to the playground games). All they can ever do is play at being a tax-haven, a mini-Luxembourg cast adrift offshore, which lets them pretend to be attractive to trade and industry, but it’s only ever on paper.

Even when it grows up, Ireland will never be a big-hitter on the world stage, it will barely even register a blip on the seismometer of presence, but that doesn’t mean it’s a bad place, it doesn’t mean they’re bad people, it’s just that it’s an irrelevance – get over it.

And before you ask, yes, I do have ancestors who were potato-famine escapees, but I don’t insist on wearing green, drinking Guinness and wailing alien dirges at every opportunity just to prove it. I got over it.

An Bac Dwarf October 2, 2016 at 6:35 pm: so we may even excuse their obsession with staying in the EU, as that makes them feel more important than they really are,

Their ‘obsession’ with being Europeans goes all the way back to before the birth of their nation, Kettle wrote (1912?): “My only counsel to Ireland is, that to become deeply Irish, she must become European” . A wisdom sadly lacking on this septic isle in these post Brexit xenophobic days.

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Joannie October 2, 2016 at 4:55 pm

Its a shame you didn’t get over the urge to sneer at your neighbours while you were at it. Modern Ireland is a normal western European country, and like every other such country its has it faults, but our problems are entirely first world problems. I’m very glad I live in a country where third level education is available to all, same sex marriage can be legalised by popular vote and where I could receive the excellent and life saving medical care I received last week at Galway University Hospital. So Mudplugger, you can take your patronisng “infant nation” defense and shove it where the sun doesn’t shine.

Sean Coleman October 2, 2016 at 7:42 pm

‘Modern Ireland is a normal western European country’

No it is not.

‘I’m very glad I live in a country where third level education is available to all…’

Why is that a good thing?

‘… same sex marriage can be legalised by popular vote’

Yes, that glo-o-orious burst of Sunshine in May was the sacred moment the Irish nation had been yearning for and striving towards through the long dark night of the ages. Yay! What did you think of Brexit by the way? There was a popular vote there too.

‘and where I could receive excellent and life saving medical care’

I wouldn’t disagree with that.

Where do you stand on the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of Mercy?

Joannie October 2, 2016 at 7:51 pm

“No it is not.”

Yes it is. See how easy that is?

“Why is that a good thing?”

It should be self evident why making education widely available is a good thing in any country.

“Yes, that glo-o-orious burst of Sunshine in May was the sacred moment the Irish nation had been yearning for and striving towards through the long dark night of the ages. Yay! What did you think of Brexit by the way? There was a popular vote there too.”

I couldn’t care less about Brexit other than how it effects the North. And is there any need to be so sarcastic about the gay marriage referendum? We’re so far the only country which ever has legalised it by popular vote, so that is something to be proud of, much as the self loathing type of Irishman doesn’t like to be told that his country has done anything right,.

“Where do you stand on the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of Mercy?”

I’m an atheist, I don’t care about them either way.

Sean Coleman October 2, 2016 at 8:07 pm

‘Yes it is. See how easy that is?’

Back it up. For example emigration rates, debt, agricultural productivity. One contributor on this thread thinks it was nearly a theological dictatorship.

‘It should be self-evident why making education widely available is a good thing in any country.’

It is not self-evident why universal third level education is a good thing anywhere. See how debate isn’t quite as easy as you thought it was?

I had assumed you were an atheist. Surely then you have an opinion? Dear Daughter, Tuam babies, Nora Wall, the Letterfrack Holocaust?

Referendums. The Eighth Amendment outlawing abortion was achieved by a referendum. Ireland might be the only country, for all I know, that ever did this by popular vote. Do you support it or are you the kind of self-loathing Irish woman who doesn’t believe this country has ever done anything right?

Joannie October 2, 2016 at 8:35 pm

“Back it up. For example emigration rates, debt, agricultural productivity. One contributor on this thread thinks it was nearly a theological dictatorship.”

I don’t see why I should when all you said was “No its not.” You didn’t back anything up, I notice. However, I will be nice anyway…

We have net immigration again this year for the first time since the crash of 2008, our debt to GDP ratio is 93% and agricultural productivity is higher than the EU average.

“It is not self-evident why universal third level education is a good thing anywhere. See how debate isn’t quite as easy as you thought it was?”

Universal access to third level education is a good thing because it gives people more life opportunities, is that not self evident to you?

“I had assumed you were an atheist. Surely then you have an opinion? Dear Daughter, Tuam babies, Nora Wall, the Letterfrack Holocaust? ”

I don’t know about Dear Daughter, the Tuam babies have yet to be investigated, Nora Wall suffered a miscarriage of justice and there never was a holocaust at Letterfrack any more than there was at Haute de la Garenne.

“Referendums. The Eighth Amendment outlawing abortion was achieved by a referendum. Ireland might be the only country, for all I know, that ever did this by popular vote. Do you support it or are you the kind of self-loathing Irish woman who doesn’t believe this country has ever done anything right?”

Ireland gets plenty right, but the 8th amendment wasn’t one of those things. I don’t want the UK’s abortion laws either though.

Ho Hum October 2, 2016 at 8:45 pm

You can find a good example of the consequences of poorer educational attainment here

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/06/brexit-vote-statistics-united-kingdom-european-union/488780/

Ho Hum October 2, 2016 at 8:45 pm

Or, for those with strong stomachs, here

https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2016/jun/24/the-areas-and-demographics-where-the-brexit-vote-was-won

Sean Coleman October 3, 2016 at 7:03 pm

I think it shows that the more you educate people the more stupid they become!

Ho Hum October 3, 2016 at 10:36 pm: So, in contrast, you’re implying that you may well not be stupid, but consequently might be expected to be pretty ignorant?

I’ll buy into that one….

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Sean Coleman October 2, 2016 at 9:02 pm

First world country. Ireland is the only European former capitalist colonized country. Half of the people born in the new state emigrated and it is only because of the historic availability of an emigration escape valve that the remaining half of the population achieved living standards comparable to those of Western Europe. If and when the policy of attracting foreign multinationals fails I don’t see how Ireland will make a living. I don’t think they have had many ‘downstream’ benefits on domestic industry, such as local suppliers and it’s really just the direct employment as far as I can tell. Let’s hope we can keep it going.

Third level education. It is argued that this merely delays young people entering the work force and reduces the unemployment statistics. Many occupations now require a degree when this was never the case before. I don’t see what is gained by, for example, nurses now requiring a degree. I don’t believe it makes them better at their job. The ‘life opportunities’ may be much the same only now you have to get a degree first. Whatever it is, it isn’t self-evident.

Gay marriage. You might have noticed that this wasn’t something uniquely Irish but it was the usual case of Ireland slavishly following the fashion elsewhere, as in everything. I wouldn’t be too critical as few places dare to buck the trend nowadays but it was noteworthy that, as in most things, there was no criticism in the media. Gay people’s rights were secured already by legislation on same sex partnerships surely. It is hard to see what exactly it supporters were looking for in the gay marriage campaign other than yet another pc badge of honour.

Joannie October 2, 2016 at 9:20 pm

You sound very bitter. Ireland currently has a higher proportion of foreign born nationals in its population than either Britain or Germany, the majority from other EU countries. Not sure how that fits with your image of a country that has to export people to maintain a standard of living, personally I think emigration is a culturally ingrained response most likely put there by the Famine. Its something the Irish should grow out of, our country would have progressed far faster if the younger generations had stayed and forced change, instead of running away.

Sean Coleman October 3, 2016 at 7:10 pm

Joannie

It is impossible for a man as good looking as I am to be bitter. Perhaps you just don’t like my arguments.

I note you do not counter my points about the gay marriage referendum, which you singled out as an indicator of Irish First World status. The numbers affected are likely to be tiny while marriage has become increasingly irrelevant to everyone else.

Recent prosperity, real or apparent, is totally at odds with preceding Irish history. Perhaps you remember all the speculation, going back twenty years, about the origins of the Celtic Tiger. How exactly had Ireland done it? The bursting of the gigantic property bubble in 2007-8 gave one explanation.

I partly agree with you that emigration has become a cultural habit, certainly nowadays with all the searching for ‘life opportunities’ and lifestyle choices. You are also correct that the emigration escape valve removed pressure for political change as the discontented half left.

‘instead of running away’

This unfortunate turn of phrase makes light of the desperate struggle to find a livelihood in Ireland. The winners got to stay. It rivals for silliness tdf’s assertion that Ireland somehow ‘shirked’ WW2. (Tdf, that is such a daft idea that I’m prepared to accept you made it up all by yourself.)

Although you think my negative ‘image’ of the country comes from deep personal bitterness and disappointment, in fact it derives largely from the late Raymond Crotty whose economic and historic insights have been unrivalled. He is the man who put his house on the line thirty years ago when he made his constitutional challenge over the Single European Act and it is thanks to Crotty that Irish people get the chance to vote in referendums on both important issues and trivial ones. I suppose he must have been bitter too. Why couldn’t he look on the bright side? If you don’t think much of Crotty, how about the historian, Prof Joe Lee, or is he too bitter as well?

Joannie October 3, 2016 at 7:41 pm

Now you just sound hysterical. I agree with you that tdf’s comment about shirking WW2 is ridiculous, maybe he’s read too many Warlord comics. However I stand by my comment because while many had to leave to earn a living, there are also many, (including my own mother), who left perfectly good jobs to emigrate due to their culturally ingrained attitude that the grass must be greener somewhere else. She came back thankfully, but many don’t and their loss allowed the old and silly to dominate Irish politics for far too long.

Sean Coleman October 5, 2016 at 7:38 pm: Joannie

If you read my earlier comment you will see that I partly agree with you about emigration as a lifestyle choice. In fact, I have used this argument myself over the years. However, this is a fairly recent thing and your mother is either quite young, or was fortunate, or both. Read Joe Lee ‘Ireland, 1912-1985’. To say that people ran away is childish, as is name calling.

tdf October 2, 2016 at 10:14 pm

@Sean

Of course, no-one has claimed has ever claimed that there was a Letterfrack holocaust.

You are setting up strawmen.

Did an unlawful death ever take place at Letterfrack? I’d reckon more than likely. Will it ever be proven? Unlikely.

If you wish to reply to this post, don’t bother citing Rory Conor as a source.

Sean Coleman October 3, 2016 at 7:25 pm

What is that buzzing noise around my ears?

Why hello, tdf.

What is it now? Did I forget the *Roman* in Roman Catholic again? Or have I committed ad hominem? Moi?

What can it be?

“Summoned, one trudges guiltily into the Court of Trivia.”

Uh-oh, it’s those strawmen again.

I don’t know, tdf, I write down something innocent and (or so I thought) uncontroversial and still you are upset.

But hold! There is more:

‘Did an unlawful death ever take place at Letterfrack? I’d reckon more than likely.’

Tell me more! What kind of unlawful death do you think it might have been? Accidental impalement on a crucifix? Did the Evil Brother cuddle the boy too hard or did he coldly and deliberately take the innocent white flesh of his victim’s throat between his two strong hands and squeeze them like an steel vice, callously disposing of the body in an unmarked grave before calmly organizing the Cover Up?

‘Will it ever be proven?’

We don’t need proof!

http://www.irishsalem.com/individuals/accusers/mannix-flynn/mannixflynn-irishgulag-02jun09.php

What’s that? You *did* ask for Rory Connor didn’t you?

And I just spotted this in an earlier comment which I *somehow* must have missed:

“Opus Dei were certainly and provably involved in all kinds of secretive activity, and it is known that senior figures in the Irish establishment were linked to them, so Rabbitte’s or Labour’s theory might not be as mad as it seems to you.”

Don’t get carried away but I think you have stumbled upon something BIG there. And when you have finished your forensic investigation I want to hear all about it! No, we can’t wait: keep us constantly updated along with your valuable observations on current affairs and the history of WW2. Here’s what I know: there is a huge, lumbering albino Opus Dei monk called Silas prowling the streets of Dublin and interfering with the establishment. If you see him do NOT approach because he is HIGHLY DANGEROUS.

tdf October 3, 2016 at 10:35 pm

Mannix is in the news today. His current campaign strikes me as a bit over the top to be honest.

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/security-alert-in-dublin-as-councillor-climbs-onto-window-ledge-35099888.html

Joannie October 3, 2016 at 10:39 pm

That man’s an awful eejit.

Ho Hum October 3, 2016 at 10:45 pm

Rosie and Jim were braver too

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/EXTRA-LARGE-GIANT-30-inch-ROSIE-AND-JIM-NARROW-BOAT-CANAL-DOLLS-UNIQUE-Vintage-/262616220426

Ho Hum October 3, 2016 at 10:48 pm

Sorry. Correct link was

http://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/bHsAAOSwjVVV1flL/s-l1600.jpg

To mutch educashion, I gess

Ho Hum October 3, 2016 at 11:06 pm: Of course, that could be Mr G and the landlady in disguise….

Ho Hum October 2, 2016 at 8:33 pm

Oh, go on, how about asking her where she also stands on Stalin, Mao, The Khmer Rouge, Che Guevara and his numerous acolytes, and a whole host of other Nasties who killed countless millions in their attempts to purge the world of what they perceived to be the sins of its people? This country, that country, wherever, you’ll find some outfit that will fit the bill for that sort of stupid question

And, believe me, I really am NOT belittling the tragedy that befell, what is a small number in relative terms, of people as a result of the actions of some of those who were involved in the organisations you refer to. Really, I’m not

Sean Coleman October 3, 2016 at 7:38 pm

If this is directed my way (I can’t tell from the layout) I don’t know what you are on about. It should be obvious that I was drawing out her views on the Great Irish Witch Hunt. I don’t condemn these crimes because with very few exceptions I don’t believe they ever happened, except in the imagination.

Ho Hum October 3, 2016 at 10:39 pm: On that basis, my comment would have been uncalled for.

Thank you for clarifying that that is what you really meant

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The Blocked Dwarf October 2, 2016 at 8:47 pm

the Sisters of Mercy?

Stand? No I dance, well that’s what I call it…’drunken spasming drug induced twitching’ might be nearer the mark. There was a time when my ‘cosmic tree’ to ‘Alice’ caused little goth girls to go all weak at their torn legging knees…although that might have been due to the Kaolin & Morphine spiked Merrydown….

Ho Hum October 2, 2016 at 8:50 pm

Get your Alice here. She knows all about the uselessness of the ones Mother gives you…..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WANNqr-vcx0

The Blocked Dwarf October 2, 2016 at 8:59 pm: You cultural philistine ! I meant https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GwWra1sQgo
not that one from Jefferson Lead Balloon (although actually it is a bloody good song too).

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windsock October 3, 2016 at 9:04 am

sisters of Mercy – great band.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhMT5SI4GDo

Sean Coleman October 5, 2016 at 7:40 pm: Apparently Kevin Myers said the Sisters of Mercy have no charity and the Sisters of Charity no mercy. But I forgive him. He does not run with the mob.

Reply

Andrew Rosthorn October 2, 2016 at 5:14 pm

Mudplugger you are an arrogant clown. You talk, I presume, from a dis-united kingdom in the aftermath of a ludicrous referendum, in a nation about to commit industrial hara kiri. You suggest that one of the most ancient nations in Europe, a people whose land was Christian when England was pagan, a land of saints, scholars and vikings, is too young to find its way in the world? That’s arrogant English nationalism. UKIP?

An Bac Dwarf October 2, 2016 at 6:48 pm

a land of saints, scholars and vikings
and wailing spirits, pixies, obnoxious belligerent drunks and semi-mythical heroes who could turn around in their own skin- how cool is that?
Sod Robin Hood frolicking in the glade with his gay band of merry men and lincoln green hose, I want my folk heroes to be able to warp spasm, I read every episode of Slaine in 2000AD!

*weak nancy voice* “Bury me where this arrow doth fall”? Bollocks! *Strong HERO voice* “Tie me to yonder rock so I can kick arse until the last possible moment and BRING ME MY BROADSWORD! And even when you strike me dead my mighty hero BO will take your hand off!”

Sean Coleman October 2, 2016 at 7:57 pm

An tAbhac Beag,

As the girl serving in the shop in the Algarve said to my wife last summer, ‘I LOVE Irish history! And the pixies!’

Ho Hum October 2, 2016 at 8:17 pm

Dearie me.

Leprechauns, I could maybe believe, but in the history of the British Isles, Pixies are primarily Cornish

tdf October 2, 2016 at 9:23 pm

In Las Vegas a few years ago, a Philipino lady who sold my ticket for a helicopter tour of the Grand Canyon commented that she knew of Ireland because she was a big Corrs fan (they are among the most popular band in the Phillipines, apparently!)

Ho Hum October 2, 2016 at 11:42 pm

I wouldn’t complain too much. She could have said she knew of it because that was where Mel Gibson fought the English in Braveheart

tdf October 2, 2016 at 11:45 pm

True.

Bandini October 3, 2016 at 1:03 pm

Díd you watch the Theroux thing, TDF?
Hardly got off to a great start with serial liar Kat Ward first off the bat, but compared to what was coming…

Here’s Chérie Wheatcroft – who claimed that He Came In Through The Bedroom Window – speaking in 2008 (around about the 3-minute mark) about the terrible accident that led to her stay in Stoke Mandeville:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFOMb5OUVSA

Maybe I missed the mention of Savile… Unsurpsisingly, there is more ‘material’ floating around. There is barely an illness/accident known to man that didn’t lay her low at one time or another. Forever falling off chairs!

Bandini October 3, 2016 at 1:22 pm

Ho ho ho! She was “born in an oxygen tent then brought back to life” – and that was just the start of her troubles!

“In 1973 Victim 7 was a patient at Stoke Mandeville Hospital. She was
sitting on the end of her bed when Savile climbed in through the open
window… had been heavily sedated… … Victim 7 was around 18 years of age at the time.”

The usual ‘problem’ doing simple calculations when it comes to people’s ages; God knows why when there is an easily accesible register of BMDs:
https://www.freebmd.org.uk/cgi/information.pl?scan=1&r=209728668:3890&d=bmd_1474873875

tdf October 4, 2016 at 4:05 am: ^ Only watched the last 20 minutes or so of the Theroux doc.

Quick attempt at a transcript of the relevant section from the Youtube interview with Wheatcroft uploaded on Apr 12, 2008:

“…basically what happened then…it was a simple accident…I got out one door and walked through another door to the nurse’s room….ehm..I heard footsteps in the middle of the night…I couldn’t walk properly because of my pelvis…turned around quickly and there was an electric fire behind the guard without a guard and I burned my hands. And then that led me to be in Stoke Mandeville Hospital for three years having skin-grafts…which obviously set me back.”
tdf October 4, 2016 at 4:54 am: I personally know people who were born in oxygen tents and brought back to life, and subsequently lived more or less normal lives. Sometimes, with long term health effects of greater or lesser severity, depending on how lucky or unlucky they were.

If what you’re saying is accurate, this lady seems like a then vulnerable young adult that was ill, was being heavily sedated and when interviewed decades later, misremembered the precise age she was in hospital.

In other words, a fairly typical Savile victim. Precisely of the ‘type’ that he victimised and attacked.
tdf October 4, 2016 at 5:14 am: @Bandini

Ok. I see what you mean now.

Possibly she is recalling a dissociative or psychogenic fugue state, I think that it is relatively well known in the literature and research.
Owen October 4, 2016 at 11:08 am: Bandini, I see someone at the Guardian’s review of the Theroux programme caught what I presume to be your alter ego out trying to distance Savillle from Stoke Mandeville after 2000, in the face of the evidence from the Surrey Police investigation. You’re always so quick to criticise everyone else, you should perhapps try to be a bit more careful yourself.

Nearly all the commenters found the Saville they saw in the programme to be the same devious, calculating exploiter most of us are well familiar with. Not you. “Ancient Nurse” was on the money with that “Jimmy is that you?” follow-up to another of your efforts to wriggle Savile off the hook. Go watch the programme again. Ignore Theroux. Even ignore the witnesses if you want – and even ignore the last one, Eve, if you must. But keep watching Savile.
Owen October 4, 2016 at 11:12 am: iPlayer:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b07yc9zh/louis-theroux-savile
Owen October 4, 2016 at 11:14 am: And “Savile” not “Saville” of course.
Owen October 4, 2016 at 11:28 am: And to clarify (I should have phrased what I wrote more carefully myself – I know hhow you love pouncing), PanBimboSinCorteza was trying to say that Savile could no longer count on the supportive protection of the hospital authorities, not trying to distance Savile physically from Stoke Mandeville hospital itself.
Bandini October 4, 2016 at 2:06 pm: TDF, I urge you to watch the full programme & then spend a while locating the voluminous output of the woman born under the baddest of bad stars.

The point over age: I didn’t explain myself very well there and my beef is not with anyone misremembering their age – nor even with anyone downright lying about it! – my complaint is with officialdom who present us with mealy-mouthed, wishy-washy and unnecessarily vague factoids. A person has a date of birth, a stay in hospital has a specific date – surely they found the records? – and there is absolutely no excuse for stating that she was “around 18 years of age at the time.”

If you still haven’t watched it this won’t make much sense, but the claim is that she was estranged from her parents & Savile perused her notes & identified her as being ‘alone’ and, by implication, easy prey. (That he would go to such incredible lengths to commit the offence of kissing someone – twice! – is surely proof of his depraved nature!). Elsewhere her father lovingly nursed her back to health after the terrible accident with the electric-fire.

Ah! The accident! Well, in Theroux’s version she had simply given birth & wished to get out of hospital as soon as possible. In another version she was in hospital as she had, as you allude to, had yet another of her many mishaps: she’d broken her pelvis in two – snapped it did – giving birth.

The ‘three years’ of treatment at Stoke Mandeville, skin grafts and whatnot, didn’t hold her back too much as she first married the father of the child (love to see the wedding snaps – all in white with great big bandages on her hands!) and then a year or so later they have another child. ‘My Left Foot (In My Mouth)’… She lost the place at art college that they’d offered her upon catching a glimpse of a half-finished picture she was carrying; they kept it open for her for two years, but alas – no time getting married and having kids!

When asked to confirm that he had previously heard about the Savile Story, partner Clive mumbles about having heard “fleeting parts” and then changes the subject. A wise move! I wonder if the crack team of documentary film-makers knew that Clive’s other job to publicising & selling his missus’ paintings is ghost-writing? He hasn’t had much success – only one lonely work, it would seem – but that’s more success than his book/poetry/radio plays have had, all languishing in the ‘to do’ pile. But the Incredible Life Story he helped write is, indeed, incredible: multiple near-deaths balanced out by multiple saving-of-lives, a time-warping humerous put-down from roly-poly James Corden, on and on it goes. And it’s all TRUE!!!

You’ll certainly marvel at her fan-portraits if you watch it, the posh one-hit wonder James Blunt ‘sitting’ for her.
“She [her daughter] introduced me to him. Believe it or not [thinking rapidly] James Blunt came at the side of me and I got pushed into him!” She’s touched him! Perhaps this is the basis for the following:

“Cherie is also an accomplished portrait artist. One of her subjects was singer songwriter, James Blunt, in a striking pose. The painting was in aid of Medecins Sans Frontieres.”

Was it indeed! ‘Believe it or not…’
We’ve been here before. I mentioned the ‘heavily sedated’ aspect as I didn’t want to come out and directly call her a liar. But I would bet my life that this story – a threadbare story of a man forcibly kissing a woman and then doing nowt – is baloney. Maybe check her appearance on reality [sic] television out. Wonder if she’ll mention her “37 patterns” (again)? Ho ho ho!
Bandini October 4, 2016 at 2:36 pm: Owen, this:

“You’re always so quick to criticise everyone else, you should perhapps try to be a bit more careful yourself.”

Eh? Careful about what? Explain yourself, man!

” Go watch the programme again. Ignore Theroux. Even ignore the witnesses if you want – and even ignore the last one, Eve, if you must. But keep watching Savile.”

Why would anyone ignore ‘the last one, Eve’ (presumably you mean Sam?) when she is the only alleged victim they could come up with that could conceivably be labelled ‘victim of a paedophile’?

The woman who delivered glasses to him, and who was personally requested by Savile for her “big knockers” (big-knockered professional women a favourite of paedos, obviously…) who contacted the media to relate her showbiz story upon his death (with no mention of the ‘attack’) but who now claims to have been so mesmerized by said ‘attack’ that she stuck around to be interviewed for a radio programme immediately afterwards. Was it Savile saying: “Howzabout that then!” that bewitched her, one wonders…

The double-kiss victim mentioned in reply to TDF – a woman who’d given birth. Kat Ward – almost 16. Here she is recently, nodding her head to confirm that she was 14 (i.e. lying):
http://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/jimmy-savile-victim-opens-up-8510639

Where are these victims who were actually, you know, children? Is that really the best that Liz Dux could offer up to the programme makers? And what about the boys? Girls, girls, girls…

Back to Sam (and Kat): what one can say on The Guardian website is difficult to gauge. Perhaps you read how I urged those who seriously believe Ward’s story to insist that her prior tales are urgently investigated? You remember: she met Savile years before Duncroft – and was not abused by him – when she was on the holiday island of Jersey. Funnily enough, it was at Haut de la Garenne where she was twice raped. Presumably you believe this – please confirm/deny – and if you do believe it then please follow my suggestion and get some investigation kick-started. Howzabout ‘Operation Madland’ for a name? Let’s track that fireman down!

And Sam. I don’t know if the moderators have once again deleted quotes from the official reports or not – I don’t think I can be bothered checking – but if not you’d have read me urging the believers in the story to insist that the “man in a suit” who accompanied Savile is hunted down. Savile, reaching out from behind a curtain at the back of a church on a twice-monthly basis for a period of five years… You do believe this, right? If so, let’s have the bastard in a suit brought to book.

I’ve elsewhere suggested that we are all due an update on the very serious allegation that a teacher would lead a girl into Savile’s office at S.Mandeville to be raped – the police were investigating. What do you think they found? If you think this really happened, go and find out. If you don’t, evil men are escaping justice & people would rather blather about how ‘they knew and did nothing’ – when that is exactly what they are doing.
Bandini October 4, 2016 at 3:17 pm: For TDF:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04lwvyd
Owen October 4, 2016 at 4:13 pm: Bandini, the comment from “PanBimboSinCorteza” which suggested that the relationship between Savile and Stoke Mandeville had broken down after 2000 and so staff at Stoke Mandeville wouldn’t have needed to fear the consequences if they came forward to whistle-blow was contradicted by another commenter who posted a link to the transcript of Savilee’s interview by Surrey Police in his office in Stoke Mandeville. I followed the link and read the transcript, in which Savile points to the quarter of a million pounds he is bringing in annually to Stoke Mandeville. He refers to “lovely ladies” who appear to be his office staff and at one point he says that he owns Stoke Mandeville, the NHS run it. The poster appears to be flatly contradictiing PanBimboSinCorteza.

Either PBSC didn’t know what he was talking about or was deliberately seeking to mislead. PBSC is one of the minute handful of commmentators intent on exculpatng Savile. I could hear your voice echoed so clearly in PBSC’s that I may have jumped to the wrong conclusion. I doubt it, but if so I apologise for mixing up the two of you. It certainly would have been a very close call to rule you out.

I suggested disregarding Theroux and the witnessses, because I know you have a seemingly boundless store of reasons why all these people claiimng to have been a victim or witness of Savile’s reported misconduct should be disbelieved, laughed at and even scorned, to the extent that it would be hard to believe the man ever put a foot wrong in his life. That’s why instead I suggested that you – and anyone else – concentrate on Savile himself – in his words and actions the Savile who befriended Theroux tells the story clearly enough for anyone prepared to watch.

I’d like to add that the intensity of your attacks on Savile’s victims is extraordinary for someone who I presume doesn’t know them personally. Your sympathy with the claims of Savile’s innocence appears at times to drift into becoming a sort of crusade. I suggest watching Savile in action as an antidote to any inclination to over-identify with the cause.
Ho Hum October 4, 2016 at 4:40 pm: Owen October 4, 2016 at 4:13 pm

‘the comment from “PanBimboSinCorteza” which suggested that the relationship between Savile and Stoke Mandeville had broken down after 2000 and so staff at Stoke Mandeville wouldn’t have needed to fear the consequences if they came forward to whistle-blow was contradicted’

Owen, I don’t think you have a clue what you are talking about on that one. Having read the whole of the Stoke Mandeville report, my understanding of that relationship was that had someone actually made any accusations at the time, the senior management there would have welcomed them with open arms.
Bandini October 4, 2016 at 4:42 pm: Owen, it was hard following the thread(s) at The Guardian as my comments were so often deleted, some belatedly. I genuinely don’t understand why some were/some weren’t. (It was an old account I’d all but forgotten as – guess what – comments relating to a story about Muslims of all things were unfathomably deleted & I thought better of it. Adios, guardianistas!)

I’d several times posted a link to Moor Larkin’s excellent post highlighting the low esteem in which Savile was held after battling against the encroaching privatisation; it’s a story – a true story – that really ought to appeal to your typical Guardian-reader. They don’t want to hear it, can’t begin to accept it, as they endlessly bleat that Savile “was a Tory” and was doing Thatcher’s bidding. Again:
http://jimcannotfixthis.blogspot.com.es/2015/03/smoke-of-war.html

The link to the interview transcript was posted without explanation (though directed at myself). Forgive me if I didn’t dive in and read it for what would have been the dozenth time, without having any idea what the lazy link-poster was getting at.

Interesting that you now seem to ‘believe’ Savile – he was the man, he brought the money, he OWNED the place! – when you know full well that he was an entertaining bullshitter who told tall tales. Please refer to the Stoke Mandeville report (around about the 90-page mark) and disabuse yourself of the silly notion that he was King Mandeville.

“In 1999 the ownership issues regarding the NSIC resurfaced. Savile and
the Stoke Mandeville Hospital NHS Trust had a serious and protracted
legal difference of opinion about the ownership of the NSIC.”

Never the same again. Relationship broken. Parting of the waves. Loathed by the profiteers now in charge who had been defeated by a single man. What a tale! Makes you wonder why people feel the need to invent ’em, eh?

Now, would you do me the favour of answering the simple question: do YOU believe that Ward was raped by a “Frenchman and a fireman” while bumping into Savile prior to being ‘interned’ in Duncroft, holidaying at – where else? – Haut De La Garenne on Devil Island? I don’t think you belive this for one second but are too cowardly to admit it lest you are accused of being a ‘victim basher’ (as you now accuse me of being).

Neither do I believe that YOU believe that Savile – on well over one hundred occasions, and often in the presence of a ‘man in a suit’ – abused a girl behind a curtain in a church. Again. your cowardice reeks. (And isn’t it a shame that the police managed to ‘lose’ Savile’s diaries which might have been useful settling the matter?!?)

Of course, I’ll apologise if my assumptions are incorrect & you detail your ‘campaigning’ to bring those evil men to justice. Let’s be ‘aving you…

P.S. Probably better moving over to today’s article to continue your lily-livered posturing.
Owen October 4, 2016 at 6:07 pm: Bandini, my liver may not be lilyish whatever that is, but it does find it difficult to cope with your thicket of rambling observations, interpretations and guesses, so I’m fine for us to continue our posturing, if that’s what you call it, under the “Theroux knife-job” post.
Owen October 4, 2016 at 8:04 pm: Ho Hum, the tensions between Savile and senior management didn’t mean that it wasn’t important forsenior management to continue managing the relationship such as it was, and the very heavy weight of the evidence , however you assess it, of the way nurses, students and patients were warned about Savile, warned against making complaints or ignored suggests that a direct confrontation over accusations of abuse wasn’t something senior management were keen to embark on. Instead he kept his offiice and continued his contribution to fund-raising. Neither of us know what the situation was on the ground, but it’s not unreasonable to believe that he was still a figure of influence and potential intimidation at SM for some years after 2000, contrary to what Bandini was suggesting at the Guardian piece.
Owen October 4, 2016 at 8:14 pm: Bandini, to tie up a loose end:

I don’t know enough about Karin/Kat Ward to pass any sort of opinion about what may have happened to her at Haut de la Garenne. I do know that Savile seems to have lied about not having been there and been caught out by a photograph taken of him with a group of kids.

You seem to get yourself off on attempting to insult me. If it helps you, it helps you but don’t expect me to be dragged any further into your self-entertainment.
tdf October 4, 2016 at 10:09 pm: @Bandini.

Yes have watched it, actually watched it last night. BBC iPlayer links are no good to me as they never seem to work in Ireland, but someone has put it up on Youtube.

I agree that that lady’s story is…odd.
Bandini October 5, 2016 at 2:13 am: Owen, you seem to be having trouble nailing your colours to the mast. ‘Yellow Sails In The Sunset’?!?

“I don’t know enough about Karin/Kat Ward to pass any sort of opinion…”

Aye, but you won’t let that stop you from ‘believing’ the bits from her tale that you need for this whole tale to be true!
Jersey? As far as I’m aware the furore over HDLG arose when Savile took exception to being linked in tabloid stories to horrific ABUSE there (stories even he appeared to believe; he may even have offered you a hand locating that missing ‘collagen’!).

This has now been perverted into ‘Savile denied ever visiting Jersey at all’ – including by the offical inquiry. Absolutely ridiculous, but the (twisted) genius of such manipulations is that you get to write rubbish like this:
http://www.itv.com/news/channel/update/2015-01-16/witness-evidence-supports-claim-savile-was-in-jersey-in-the-1970s/

Yes, thank God that we have some ‘witness evidence’ proving that the presenter of the famous ‘Flower Festival’ had, er, presented the famous festival of flowers (as international press reports & easily available film reels of him actually being there clearly wouldn’t suffice…).

So what do we end up with?

“The claim [against Savile] was made during police interviews in both 2008 [tell us the date! Prior to March 1st, was it?] and 2009 as part of the investigation into Haut de la Garenne… …
The Inquiry heard that in 2008 [1st March] the Sun newspaper had linked Savile to Haut de la Garenne but the presenter had denied he was there and started legal action. However evidence already before the Inquiry has corroborated 125’s account that Savile was at the home.”

What’s this you say, Owen? ” I do know that Savile seems to have lied about not having been there…” Hmmm…

“He has no recollection of visiting the home over 30 years ago and any such visit would have been unexceptional. Connecting Sir James to events at the home has caused him severe embarrassment and upset.”

Incredible though it may seem a bloke who spent his whole life visiting places and opening events may well have simply forgotten. Wouldn’t you have forgotten? I’ll tell you what though, dig out the date of that first accusation – not impossible to achieve, I wouldn’t have thought – and if it can be shown to be unconnected to the tabloid tat appearing in The Sun I’ll have another look. Otherwise, you’re on your own (with the thousands of other crackpots).
tdf October 5, 2016 at 2:41 am: @Bandini

“As far as I’m aware the furore over HDLG arose when Savile took exception to being linked in tabloid stories to horrific ABUSE there…”

However, the NOTW article made no claims about Savile committing any abuse in HDLG or anywhere in Jersey (or anywhere else, for that matter). It simply published a photo and there were a few lines stating he had visited HDLG.

So why the big legal threats from Savile? Successful legal threats, IIRC, as he wangled (extorted, really) cash money from them.

HDLG was already under investigation from 2006/2007. Read the Jersey inquiry witness transcripts, for example.
Bandini October 5, 2016 at 12:56 pm: TDF, I haven´t seen the original article(s), though they surely must be out there somewhere. I’m (mildly) interested if you have them to hand, but no more time to search myself.

If you see what was being published prior to The Sun-piece, even in the ‘quality’ press – ‘children raped, chidren tortured, children murdered, more bodies of children expected to be found’ – and then imagine your own photograph appearing in an article about same – ‘oh, and here’s a pic of TDF with some children’ – it’s really not hard to imagine why someone would take exception to it.

Savile claimed that he’d been the victim of a “mugging” by The Sun; I wonder what he meant. The oft-repeated line that he ‘denied’ being at HDLG (now expanded to Jersey in the 70s/Jersey at any time at all) came from where, exactly? I’m just thinking out loud here, but is the following a possibility?

– ‘phone rings –
JS: Sir Jim speaking.
WFTS: Now then, Sir Jimmy! It’s your old pals from The Sun calling.
JS: Well well well [yoddles like a nutter] – what can I be doing you for?
WFTS: Don’t want to keep you, know you’re a very busy man, but…
JS: Now then, ‘as it happens I am indeed the most busiest of men – I’m just on the way out to Stoke Mandeville to complete a 10-hour shift, I am, I am… built it with my own bare hands –
WFTS: [interrupting] Ah, okay. Was just wondering if you’d been following the news about those bodies they’re digging up on Jersey.
JS: Ohhh, a terrible business. Horrific. Spent a lot of time there myself with the Duchess. Hard to believe such things could happen…
WFTS: [fingering photograph of JS at HDLG taken more than 30 years previously] Do you remember ever visiting the place, Sir Jimmy?
JS: I’ve been to very many places, young man. Don’t recall as I ever visited ‘aut de la whatdyamacallit.
WFTS: [crookedly smiling] Okay, Sir Jimmy! Thanks for your time.

The following day: ‘Jimmy Savile DENIES ever visiting scene of rape, torture & murder of children. Here’s a photograph of Jimmy Savile at the scene of rape, torture & murder of children… with some children!’

The photo apparently appeared in the first article. There may be a bit of the ‘Freddie Starr’ effect here – honest mistake twisted and presented as PROOF of criminality. Who knows?

“This was followed with a series of articles. One asserted that he was unwilling to assist with the police investigation [seriously libellous unless true] and another that he admitted [confessed!] having visited the home. The Sun also criticised Savile for being unprepared to “go some way to fixing it for the victims”.”

Sorry, TDF, but I can’t imagine there are too many people who trade on their reputation who WOULDN’T seek redress.
I let curiosity get the better of me & went to see if I could find the information I suggested Owen might care to dig out – the date of the 2008 complaint of abuse at HDLG by Savile. As expected, it wasn’t that hard to find (though the Jersey Inquiry’s website is a bloody nightmare when it comes to searching for stuff).
Perhaps Owen already knew the answer, or maybe he found it, but I doubt he’d have had the good grace to post it anyway so I will:

– the complaint against Savile made to the police in 2008 (and reported in the press as being ‘corroborated’ by ‘discovery’ of the bleeding photograph) was made by someone who had already made allegations against others with no mention of Savile.
– the Sun piece linking the very famous man to HDLG appeared in March 2008.
– in August 2008 (six months later) the complainant has a new complaint – that famous man who appeared in the press as being linked to HDLG is now also his abuser.

What do you think? It’s certainly not proof that the claim is untrue – it may be for all I know – but it may be a pretty good example of why someone would take exception to being smeared in the press & an excellent example of what those smears can lead to.
Bandini October 5, 2016 at 1:49 pm: TDF, not sure is this actually true or not, but…

“Savile unsuccessfully attempted to sue The Sun after it published a photograph in 2008 of him and group of children at the care home.”

https://www.thesun.co.uk/archives/news/315255/savile-in-50000-bribe-to-stop-child-abuse-rap/
Bandini October 5, 2016 at 2:05 pm: TDF, pages 18-22 relate to ‘Witness 125’:
http://www.jerseycareinquiry.org/Transcripts/JERINQ%20-%20Day%2043%20Final.pdf
Having read that a couple of times I’m withdrawing my previous comment that ‘it may be [true] for all I know’ & replacing it with ‘Oh, for the love of God…’

tdf October 6, 2016 at 6:32 am

@Bandini

The Jersey inquiry website is tricky to navigate, you’re not the first to complain about it.

I haven’t read that last day’s report, but will do so.

If those statements that I have read to date, the most interesting to me, was that of former police officer Anton Johann Cornelissen. If you have time, I do recommend that you cast an eye over it:

http://www.jerseycareinquiry.org/Transcripts/102%20documents%20optimised.pdf

What’s interesting, to me, is that Cornelissen claims to have been involved in extensive investigations of CSA complaints, including a possible child abuse network centred around sailing circles and the island’s poshest secondary school, but he is also very critical of Lenny Harper (Harper being, if you recall, the former deputy head of police who ‘campaigners’ view as a hero, deeming him to have been shafted by the Jersey establishment).

Harper only relatively recently publicly acknowledged (in 2014, IIRC?) that he DID receive a complaint against Savile during his (Harper’s) time on the island (bear in mind Harper retired in late 2008), but having investigated that complaint, he had deemed it to lack sufficient evidence to justify forwarding it to the Jersey DPP. Bear in mind also that Harper’s main complaint against the Jersey establishment is that the DPP’s office failed to pursue prosecutions in relation to many of the files he sent to them regarding HDLG.

tdf October 6, 2016 at 8:02 am: FWIW, I might as well put up some more links from the Jersey Inquiry:

Lenny Harper’s statement:
http://www.jerseycareinquiry.org/Transcripts/Day%20122%20Documents%20Optimised.pdf

Frank Walker’s statement (Walker is a former Chief Minister of the States of Jersey):
http://www.jerseycareinquiry.org/Transcripts/Day%20124%20Documents%20Optimsed.pdf

The Blocked Dwarf October 2, 2016 at 9:26 pm

and what are the Cornish but Irish with better food (I blame Rick Stein’s Lemon Grass & Green Tee infused mania) and worse beer?
*rides off on his Obby Oss

Joannie October 2, 2016 at 9:29 pm: Sorry to be a boring old fart and a pedant but the Cornish are actually the Welsh with better food. The Irish are the Scots with healthier diets.

Reply

Mudplugger October 2, 2016 at 9:24 pm

I shall wear the ‘arrogant clown’ badge with pride and my customary humility. I merely report the 21st century realities – when we meet again a couple of hundred years from now, I promise I won’t say “I told you so”.

Ho Hum October 2, 2016 at 11:48 pm: What sort of individual can be proud to be humble? Oh, I see…..

(Sorry, but you had that one coming…LOL )

Reply

james higham October 3, 2016 at 9:03 am

Or Greenwich Meaning Time, as Python would put it.

The CArCrash WatcHinG Dwarf October 3, 2016 at 12:42 pm

To lose one lawyer might be considered carelessness but to lose 5….?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3818920/Now-FIVE-lawyers-quit-child-abuse-inquiry-Two-resign-Janner-case-faces-axe.html

Hadleigh Fan October 3, 2016 at 1:22 pm

I’m loathe to comment again, especially as my tongue in cheek first contribution led to such outrage, but how the heck can an event 100 years ago be commemorated in a postcard dated 10 years before? (See the picture, clearly dated 1906). But then Wikipedia tells us it was 1916, so it must be true.

1816 would better suit the style of dress of the lady, but then did fashion keep up in Ireland?

Does the top hat indicate that he’s a toff?

Joannie October 3, 2016 at 1:34 pm: You’re assuming that Ireland follows the rules of linear time arbitrarily foisted on us by the curséd,evil, Saxon oppressor. We’re free now, we’ll follow our own rules, (assuming they conform to all the relevant EU regulations of course).

Reply

JimS October 3, 2016 at 6:13 pm

“Those whose days were dictated by natural light and the rhythm of their cattle suddenly found that they were expected to get out of bed in the dark and stumble out to the stables in order to get the milk on the train, which ran on Greenwich Mean Time, naturally.”

Wouldn’t the milk trains have run at times to match the supply of milk rather than the other way round? Boat trains in England had to run to catch the tides, presumably the same happened in Ireland.

The ‘clock change’ is a twice-per-year non-story that fills space in the media. The amount of daylight depends on the position of the Earth relative to the Sun and the latitude of the observer, ‘changing’ the clocks makes no difference. Why not use GMT (UTC) everywhere? Eat at 1300 hrs in London and 0100 hrs in Wellington, simple.

Bandini October 4, 2016 at 3:59 pm

Andrew, the allegation at least is a very serious one; if it were true – and I doubt it’s even possible – it would justifiably ruin Savile’s reputation (er, if he still had one!).
I’m far more wary of being critical of such a complainant than say someone who alleges she was merely kissed as an adult, foul smelling tongue or no foul smelling tongue, but those who find this story credible ought to be up in arms about the ‘man in a suit’ getting off scot free. Perhaps after well over one hundred alleged incidents the complainant could furnish them with a more detailed description & the rascal arrested?

I did however find her description of the turmoil caused by having a loved family member as abuser quite interesting & compelling; perhaps such turmoil led to the Savile story, who knows?

“Between 1978 and 1983 Victim 24 was systematically abused by Savile in the Hospital chapel presbytery during services. During a five-year period Victim 24 attended the chapel in the hospital grounds every Sunday with her family. When the abuse began Victim 24 was 11 years old. Her family were devout Roman Catholics. Victim 24 used to pass round the collection plate which she had to collect from the presbytery. On a regular basis, at least twice a month, Savile would attend the chapel. He would stand in the presbytery and watch the service from behind a curtain and this is where the abuse took place. He systematically abused Victim 24 for a period of five years. He was often accompanied by another man, described as wearing a suit, who watched. The abuse took the form of rubbing her body and putting his fingers in her vagina. Victim 24 felt unable to tell anyone. She noted how bad he smelled and that he could do whatever he wanted and that she could not stop him.
“Every time I went in that room I just knew that he would touch me wherever he wanted to touch me”.
Victim 24 did not report the incidents at the time.”

Anna Raccoon October 5, 2016 at 2:47 pm

Oh for the love of God part 2…..

Cuddly Mark Watts on ‘Talk to me’ Radio…’Mark Watts, former Editor-in-Chief of Exaro, presents a new weekly podcast on Talk2Me Radio from October 2016. Required listening for everyone who wants to see power held to account, it will strike fear into the heart of the establishment.’

http://www.talk2meradio.com/shows/the-mark-watts-show/csaexposed-episode-one-what-is-the-establishment-trying-to-hide-5th-october/

and the essential rider….’Support us as we try to crowd-fund the production of this weekly podcast. Visit http://www.gofundme.com/CSAExposed.’

The Blocked Dwarf October 5, 2016 at 3:03 pm

For the ‘love of God’? Methinks for something else’s sake might be a more apt comment.
Dunno if it will strike fear into establishment hearts but I bet a few lawyers are wandering back from their lunches with a warm rosy glow in their hearts and that, for once, not from the G&Ts. Indeed the hummed refrains of ‘I am reviewing the situation’ can probably be heard above the sounds of well manicured hands rubbing.

Bandini October 5, 2016 at 3:05 pm

And £60 gets you an invite to their Xmas party – imagine!

“I have heard among this clan,
You are called the forgotten man
(Is that what they’re saying, well did you evah! )
(What a swell party this is)”

Putting a weekly show together with an “extremely modest budget” requires donations of “just £850 per edition”. Er, not sure that Xmas party is going to happen.

The Blocked Dwarf October 5, 2016 at 3:21 pm

Someone (where do they find them?) has apparently donated £75 thus securing their invite to the shindig, their name on a vol-au-vent….if the Landlady wasn’t so honest and upfront I could almost suspect that anon-don came from somewhere in Norfolk….