Ahem. Years.

90 days after it was signed was 1922 :-/

Arthur Griffith was tweeting the inside track the whole time.

Why? Cause a bunch of scroungers are getting less for spurting out a few sproggs?

ye jumpthecat while enda kenny and the rest of the fat smug bastards line there pockets with the ‘savings’

Their.

Stay in school.

Observation. I always find it pathetic reading people correcting other’s grammatical or spelling errors.

But somehow can’t help myself correcting the corrector. “Cause” does not have the same meaning as “because”. “Back to school” yourself jumpthecat!!!

It was signed under duress and was legally void as a result. Nothing to see here.

@colm, my mistake. Comment relates to thread as a whole.

It’s wasn’t worth it. We would have achieved independence from the UK just as Canada, New Zealand or Australia did.
And if we didn’t, big deal. Are the welsh or Scottish any less than the Irish in nationality?

Last time i checked Australia new Zealand and Canada are all still under the monarchy. Please do some research before making stupid comments.

Independent nations.

The monarch of the commonwealth is still the head of state.

They are still independent nations.

My comment wasn’t stupid.

But if Collins didn’t take it, the cost on the Irish side in the impending war would have been absolutely catastrophic.What the Brits gave up was what they were willing to give up to stop the conflict then and there. They wouldn’t have given up any more and would’ve bombed us into oblivion. RE: Canada, NZ etc ,you can say that now with the benefit of hindsight but any kind of independence was not achievable at the time without this agreement or a massive sacrifice of Irish lives. If it was me in that chair, i don’t think i could have allowed the certain death of a significant proportion of the people i was representing. Could you?

Even back then our politicians didn’t even have the courage to face down a bully. They don’t have it now either. Different bully, same bend the knee!

Reada, that is perhaps the most idiotic comment I’ve seen on the journal.

Rob. Im sorry. Truth always hurts but it doesn’t like to hide.

Maybe had he not been killed by another Irishman, for being a “traitor”, who in turn turned on other Irishmen, things may have been different. But we’ll never know that now.

A terrible war resulted anyway. More terrible in fact with families torn asunder. And we’re still dealing with the disaster now. Some among us still can’t see past FF or FG. And the mere mention of considering voting for SF guarantees a good thumb-smacking.

Can’t see his successor Enda standing up to the bullies either. Different state, same bending of knees! Some among us are sick of it…

For the record I have never voted FF FG or SF. Nor do I wish to send any person “back” no matter when they settled here! I’m a pacifist and have no interest in people’s religious persuasions.

“Some have come from a land beyond the wave” as the English version of our National Anthem goes. All welcome as far as I’m concerned.

And Rob, it’s sad that you thumb-smacked me when what I wrote was factually accurate. Very sad. Goodnight.

It was a foot in the door to freedom, and considering we were on our knees at that point we done well to get the foot in, but alas we couldn’t even last one hundred years on our own.

Réada, it’s your assertion that “our politicians didn’t even have the courage to face down a bully” which I take issue with. While I agree with it in regard to De Valera, Collins orchestrated a war against the British administration if you remember correctly, which as it happens led to Lloyd George and the boys eventually agreeing to talks. Remember that? Anyway, Collins was then forced to go to London and then forced to sign a treaty under threat of war ‘immediate and terrible’ by a man with who just came from the negotiating table at the Treaty of Versailles (Collins being a 31 year old with no diplomatic exp.). Also, people seem to talk about Collins as if he effectively partitioned the country himself, forgetting the fact that Northern parliament was already sitting. And on an aside, Dev hadn’t the faintest notion of how to deal with the Unionists anyway, seeming to believe that in the long-run they’d turn on the crown and we’d all live in some sort of utopian frugal Irish wonderland. So in short, it’s the assertion that Collins didn’t have courage which I find idiotic, regardless of the terrible civil war that followed.

Rob. I really am sorry for shouting my mouth off. I’m excellent on the Irish history. A+ in fact. I was a bit harsh on Collins indeed as he certainly should not have been the man sent there. That was why I had the word “traitor” in inverted commas. Dev was the coward IMO.

In hindsight just wish maybe they had held out seeing as what ensued was much worse. Irish against Irish. I’m a pacifist but still a nationalist. An inclusive nationalist as many of my heroes came from both sides of the religious divide in Ireland. Nor does my nationalism make me feel superior to other nations nor inferior. It’s my identity, like my name.

But a lot among us do have an inferiority complex and like to bend the knee to the master. Just look at the amount of red thumbs a commentator gets if they challenge a moderator. It always makes me laugh.

Anyway sorry Rob for being a bit of a cow but it was a tough day.

What was it in the constitution about families being central to Ireland and supporting them? Does this make the budget unconstitutional?