There are people who see SF as a threat to the gombeen political order of FG and FF, which they have used to loot this state for 90 years, forcing 40% of the people born here to emigrate. They have built up a system of back scratching and corruption that must be protected. If you look at the most ardent foes of the Shinners it is nowadays usually FF’ers and ones that have a long history of contracts, and state perks and jobs. If a new party emerges on the centre right, they’ll attack them just as much, the status quo must be protected.

Whatever the right or wrong that was done in the North, they couldn’t care less, it is their own pocket that they are concerned with, and that pocket gets filled very quickly when FF are in power.

That is the right attitude. It should be collective on all sides.

One of the great wrongs of the last 30 years, and there have been so many, is how the victims and families of Dublin/Monaghan were treated for years after, with continual secret branch tailings, house raids, their customers being told they were being investigated for terrorism, destroying their business. All for daring to question FG on why it stopped the investigation in to the bombings after a few weeks, when the evidence started to show that it was more than the UFF involved.

Unfortunately both FG and FF Govts have worked to destroy most of the evidence and findings of the investigation, with a final clear out of the files in the 90′s from all gardaí stations. Naturally they are all lost now.

The state had no problem in covering up the murder of over 30 people to suit the political requirements and narratives of its 2 largest parties, and people wonder then why we go completely broke every 20 years. They view us as worthless.

Thought they apologised for bloody sunday last year?

Mattoid, the IRA apologized for many of their murders as well. They apologized for Enniskillen, they apologized for Warrington to name but two.
I have heard Adams on multiple programs apologize for all the victims, McGuinness also. So, how would you propose the IRA apologize now? Should they reform, in order to apologize?
I have never heard the British apologize for the murder of 12 civilians over a 3 day period back in 1972. They broke the Geneva Convention on Human rights that says you do not murder people as they go to the aid of others. Yet, at Ballymurphy, that is exactly what they did. They shot women, and as priests and others went to their aid, they were shot dead. Who owes the apology?

I have to agree here. For so long, most of us wanted peace. But peace cannot be enforced before justice. The struggle for justice is universal. The IRA committed atrocities, so did the British Army, albeit in a difficult situation for a regular army. The north was a basket case of sectarian apartheid = conflict will continue until democracy was restored.

McGuinness is absolutely right. The only way to proper reconciliation is through every party apologising for their failures, political, diplomatic and military. That includes the British Government primarily due to their inability to restore normal non-sectarian civil authority in Northern Ireland. It also includes Unionism who desperately fought to maintain a ‘majority rule’ (Unionist) domination of the North. There’s no escaping that culpability. Bad political leadership, incendiary speeches, populist rhetoric etc. all contribute to an atmosphere of division and violence.

Everyone should apologise. Collectively, and with no sense of ‘competition’. As for the British tabloids and their views on McGuinness’ handshake/ IRA apology…. they never had a sense of any impartiality anyway. They don’t even figure in the debate.

Ermm Cal…nI think you’re reading a little more into my comment than I actually wrote…nI was merely pointing out a simple fact in response to Cat’s comment, nothing more than that….nI made no reference to the IRA whatsoever so I’m not really sure what triggered off your little rant??

Apologies Mattoid, its just a deep sense of frustration that i see folks making our that there was only one side perpetrating murder in the North. The IRA start in 1969, 2 years after the first Irish were being murdered there by the Police). Most folks don’t seem to realise that. I will make a conscious effort to ensure my ire is aimed at the correct commenters going forward ;)

Just out of curiosity Seanbeag, how did you vote on the Poll? I understand your viewpoints that you are contributing, but i am wondering at a higher level, if you feel only one side should apologize?

I don’t think an apology should be dependent on anyone else. Either you are sorry or you aren’t. If you apologise and they don’t that just makes you the better person. Holding out for an apology from the UK makes it look like a political stunt and not at all genuine.

Sean, The IRA released a televised unconditional apology when they disbanded. Do you not think it would be onerous on the British Government to do the same (But i am not calling on the British Government to disband).

Exactly. Some people are confused as to why the provisional IRA became so popular. It wasn’t partition that caused the conflict, it was the absence of human rights for Catholics. That is why dissidents have very little support, because Catholics are all but equal now.

Their performance in the polls is dropping. Do you mean inverse proportion or are you trying to imply that the media is trying to restrict them? If so then I disagree. What’s happened is their closet was filled to bursting capacity and now all the skeletons are all falling out.

@ Seanbeag

Was thinking the same thing. SF dropped in the last SBP poll.

The securocrats must have infiltrated The Journal!

Agreed Sheila, No-one was clean and pure during the war. No-one in the North and definitely no Irish Government since the 1960’s. I mention the 1960’s because that is when the conflict started. The first shots and murders were carried out systematically from 1967 onwards, 2 years prior to the IRA starting its campaign.
Its the Irish Governments and the tabloids that have tried to bury that fact. Their revisionist history starts in 1969 only.

The IRA and the UVF apologized for the loss of life in the 90′s. Dublin has never apologized for its role in the conflict, its covering up for Loyalist killings in this state for its own political reasons. Britain has yet to apologize for being an extremely partisan player. Bloody Sunday was the norm in attitude for the army, rather than a one off.

Britain should say, yes we carried out atrocities funded and ran Loyalist terror groups as a military tactic. Dublin should say yes we helped cover up for Loyalist killings here, and were not an honest broker for most of the last 30 years, choosing every side that was against Republicans, even if they were killing people in this state, yes we should have demanded equal rights and fair treatment for Nationalists in the North decades ago, rather than turn a blind eye. The IRA should apologize for no warning bombs etc. The UVF/UFF should apologize for having no political aims bar a love of killing Catholics.

The key to the healing is that there was wrong on all sides.

Who is Dublin?

“Who is Dublin?” is an interpretative art collection exploring what it means to be a Dubliner, conceptualized from the point of a young emigrant returning to the city of their birth. It explores self-identity, social anomie, belonging in a world bereft of inter-generational touchstones. All expressed through the medium of butter and stencils.

I know of 2 IRA members that were also reps for FF in the last 10 years in the Oireachtas.

5 thumbs down, ahh come on people. This isn’t exactly ground breaking revelations here. It is common knowledge in many political circles.

Fagan, the party faithful do not like to hear anything against their party, after all they are the party of destiny, and have never done anything wrong. Never. The economy is the way it is, because of the Global situation. They were ordered to pay the unsecured Bondholders by God,. They wouldn’t have done it otherwise. The Mahon and Moriarty tribunals were works of fiction. No FF party leader was ever corrupt. Haughey and Ahearne saved their confirmation money to buy the mutl-million euro houses.

I think you need o apologise to Pearse Doherty Steven ..what do you think about the E=Vote machines been sold for a few grand after costing a kings ransom..i seen your comments in the Daiy Mail looking for answers from Aengus O Snodaigh as your Chairman of Wicklow Fianna Fail party and a Computer expert and special advisor to FF Government i was wondering did you have any involvement with the E-Vote machines ..or is it a classic case of people in glass houses!!!

Relating to this story and others just in case people think im going off topic..Charlie Haughey was a gunrunner aswell as a corrupt Taoiseach ..Your mate Bertie was corrupt too ..cheek of you

I agree with you Patrick. Even though they said they were fighting “for God and Ulster”, theUDA,UVF,UFF,LVF, Red Hand Commandos and the Orange Volunteers were never a legitimate fighting force. The fact that they were backed up covertly by the British Government and that the UDA were involved in terrorist and criminal activities for years before being proscribed still doesn’t give them legitimacy.

@ Patrick Lyons, Kevin O’Sullivan, Sean Beag, Old Nokia Charger etc.

Notice how some are playing mind games with others posts?! I unfortunately was a victim of minds for years until I got sense. At first I played the better game, but then I learned to ignore them. Ignoring is hard but fun watching the other person getting nowhere and frustrated, pissed off because I/we didn’t don’t react. ;)

And yet you commented and therefore reacted! :-)

Kevin, who will apologise on FFs behalf for having armed the IRA in 1970?

Yes i do. Would you not kill the man holding a gun to your childs head

Hmm,PAW has disappeared.looks like someone rewrote him and consigned him to history!

Pat, i had a close friend of mine shot in the back by the British Army. He was a civilan. The paratrooper who shot him, told him the day before he was giong to do it. Aidan told me and his family and all his friends what the Paratropper said, but we all laughed. We were not laughing the next day.
The Paratrooper was charged with nothing. When you make jokes about the threat of murder etc that the Irish lived under in the North, you should be ashamed of yourself. The IRA started in 1969, 2 years after the first shootings, 2 years after the first explosions. The old IRA living in the North were shunned at the time, because they wouldn’t defend our homes. Are you not aware that there were Irish refugee camps in Butlins and other border areas in `1970, to house the Irish being driven out under threat of death by the Brtitish? Shame on you for your revisionist comments.

Sorry, just looked at your profile and see you are a member of FF. The same party that gave the IRA their guns in the first place back in 1969/70

That’s a Willy O Dea type of response in all fairness Pat Lyons.. and im not trying to insult you..

Cal. Patrick is a FF’er. He’ll change his tune to suit whatever stuffs his pockets. The day that SF go in to Govt. in Dublin will be the day that he’ll be singing about Bobby Sands and submitting an application to join them.

This is utter nonsense. I can only assume that you are a kid or a Shinner.