An amusing thread over on Slugger O’Toole.
“Take Alliance seriously. They represent what most people want, the politics of compromise”.
Its not the most catchy headline that Brian “Dimbleby” Walker has come up with. But Walker, who might be styled a “liberal unionist” (if such a thing existed)….is a little over the top.
The first man to desert the sinking ship that is the UUP……appears to be Potty Mouth Emerson who revealed on Twitter that he and his family will be voting Alliance in future. Potty Mouth, who used a rather unpleasant word about the SDLP……does not descend to the gutter to tell us what he thinks about the DUP and UUP……well not as far as I know. I am still boycotting newspapers.
Walker also seems to have jumped overboard and is swimming furiously in the direction of the Alliance ship. They should be worried. Sympathy is a natural human emotion. Support……that is different.
It is all very well for liberal unionists to flounder about in life-jackets calling on the Alliance sailors to save their waterlogged arses but I would keep an eye on them when they start moving towards the bridge to tell Captain Ford that they want a course change to a liberal unionist paradise.
Keeping An Eye On the Czar of Russia 
Walkers originally from Derry isn’t he? he might double the party membership just by joining in that City.
I think so. He has often conjured up an image of wistful summer nights watching unionist RAJ types play polo on the North West Frontier….before the natives got restless.
He is. I’m always struck by the inherent decadence of your analysis John. You are so busy slagging everyone else you offer your own ship little in the way of ideas, analysis or navigation.
However the fact there is an SDLP friendly blog at all is in fact a healthy sign in and of itself. By thinking the world through from that base you have the capacity to crunch out useful insight (your criticism of Alliance in BCC on the flags vote, for instance, was one that might have been used by the party, had they not already been way out of line with it in the first place).
What’s more generally useful about Brian’s take is his assertion that the largest swathe of people in society want compromise. If that’s true, you have ask what’s the best way forward for nationalism’s true liberals, the SDLP? If its not, then you’re already dead men walking.
In an SDLP alternative universe how would you handle big ticket issues like education, health differently? How would you slice unification in ways that are distinct from SF? What about legacy issues, like marches and republican regressions like the dissident threat and smaller but crucial stuff like the needling of minority populations like those in Glenavy?
I suspect Alliance has an opportunity to grow something off the back of this. But I suspect there’s a limit to how far they can redefine politics and how it is done at the top table. Thats what ought to be on the SDLPs agenda, if they have an appetite for growth and power?
Why are the SDLP “nationalism’s true liberals” any more than Sinn Féin? The SDLP favoured the permanent removal of the British flag from Belfast City Hall. It was Sinn Féin that agreed to the Alliance Party compromise and the SDLP that rowed in behind them. If one were using your argument does that not make SF the “true liberals” of nationalism in this context?
In any case “liberal” is such a catch-all term. The Alliance Party are liberal Unionists. But people used to say that about the UUP back in the day: the “mainstream” Unionist party versus Ian Paisley’s fringe DUP.
If some UUP members, and Tory-lite types, are moving the AP’s way how long before the party starts shedding the “liberal” Unionism it now claims to stand for and becomes sucked into the same Unionist ideology now offered up by the UUP?
I would point out that in the view of many Slugger O’Toole is an Alliance Party friendly site. I genuinely don’t mean that in a smart way. I’m not out to cause offence and have no axes to grind here. I don’t want to get into the whole funding debate and political links behind SO’T and all that. Personally I’ve always found you a very fair and friendly debater. But the political vibe of SO’T is an open-minded, middle-of-the-road, liberal Ulster/Irish small “u” Unionist site with input from non-Unionists. Yes you try to steer a middle path in articles and postings between the two communities but the opinions offered by contributors on the flag debate tended to favour the status quo. And the status quo is by definition a Unionist one (or the Union one, as you might prefer to say).
If you feel that is an unfair characterization I apologise. But take this interview you did with Jason for the CSM:
“Mick Fealty, who runs the Slugger O’Toole political discussion website, says the flag motion should never have tabled.
“What we’ve got here is a situation where two cultures carry two different sets of values. British culture, which is actually the sovereign culture, is seen as provocative,” he says.”
To me that is a Unionist view. Or perhaps I should say a “status quo” view. That, I believe, is the essence of Slugger O’Toole’s (admittedly loose) editorial line. Statusim? 😉
Again, the curse of conversing via a keyboard, no offence intended. Just a point of view 🙂
One for Mick obviously if he wishes to take it up. But I think it is put better than I have ever put it. “Statusism”. But I think that might have happened in the vacuum of nothing really happening since 1998.
I am wary of “Conflict Resolution” imposing a set of victories and defeats which a 30 year campaign of violence involving three sides could not achieve……and attributing victory in the sovreignty or Flag debates is something that goes beyond Good Frday.
A Sheamais,
Nothing like putting a man on the defensive first thing on Monday morning, nach e? You of all people have no need to condition or explain your questions me. I’ve never see you act in anything other than good faith.
For ‘Alliance friendly’ you might also add, ‘barely mentions them’. Maybe you feel that underscores your point. But they are generally a party that does not interest me as much as the larger players.
We frequently talk southern politics on Slugger which your average Alliance voter has no interest in. DUPers in fact have more interest in it, now they are umbilically tied to SF’s story down there.
As for the CSM. I thinkJason’s *slightly* paraphrased me there. What I said was that unionists have some justification for pointing out that it is perfectly proper to fly the flag of the jurisdiction.
And that the argument being made is that their culture, as expressed by the sovereign nation of the United Kingdom is seen as provocative.
Don’t get me wrong, I can relate to the feelings it invokes. But calling provocative the flag of a nation you have consent to be part of until there’s sufficient consent to leave, then you are having your cake and eating it.
You might characterise that as a unionist argument, but my own reasoning is most certainly not.
As for your opener, why are the SDLP nationalism’s true liberals (with the clear implication that SF are not). Brass tacks first?
It is not ‘liberal’ to assassinate your enemies. As Danny Morrison pointed out years ago, that is a fundamentalist action taken on foot of a fundamentalist belief.
I would not gainsay the possibility of it changing, though I’ve never seen political project change that did not have a separate executive leadership in peace time than it had during the war.
If the SDLP is not the liberal alternative, then as I’ve said above, they are dead men walking. The space for fundamentalist nationalists. already been block booked.
When I say liberal, I mean in the broadest sense of liberal democracy: flexible, intelligent, quick on its feet to move into gaps and exploit them. Above all ready to make compromise where it suits their longer term aims to do so.
It’s worth reading Ruarai’s piece on the solution for Northern Ireland, which I don’t disagree with. You want a high way to independent, 32 county Irish Republic? Then follow Salmond.
He’s done what SF in their deep fatalist pessimism don’t believe can happen and brought unionists into the nationalist camp.
That’s about articulating a vision,yes. But also proving it is not fairy tale stuff by being BETTER than the unionist parties at doing Scottish Government.
If you can do what he’s done with Sinn Fein, happy days. But I don’t think that’s happening this side of the Adams/McGuinness leadership and it’s not clear to me what actually comes after that for them.
Why not? It’s not that I share their fatalism. There’s just been too much blood split and too many lies told. Running Martin in the Presidential election, has renewed that schtick for another generation in the south.
And like an old sore, they just can’t help picking it.
FJH,
You really cannot cope with argument, can you?
“…having your cake and eating it” aka, bread and circuses”
Frankly everyone wants Compromise on their own terms. And one of the irritating things I found about SDLP as the Slugger archives will show (2010, 2011) is that the SDLP had this obsession with listening to other people. You could actually say that it was in their DNA….talk to Gerry Adams (get criticised by the very same liberal unionists who think they should still be compromising). The best thing about SDLP in th past year is that it has actually found ITS OWN voice……not Duncan Morrows, Rev Norman Hamiltons and (for God sake!!!!) Davey Adams. Come to think of it, this Blog might be a part of giving the SDLP its own voice.
The SDLP rather than being in terminal decline is actually articulating the views of members, voters and potential voters and getting the pats on the back of liberal unionists who would happily stab us in the back while shaking our hands is no longer on the agenda.
I didnt join SDLP because it was brilliant. I joined SDLP because it was a bit of a mess……to be honest things have got a lot lot better.
Remember your correspondent is the same Brian Walker who was talking about unionist outreach and all that ……now it looks plain daft.
But heres the rub……the 1960s. Not that far from City Hall, the Presbyterian Assembly Buildings, Paisleyite demonstrators made life extremely uncomfortable for the “Guvnor of Norn Iron” and his good lady wife. It sent shock waves across BBC, Belfast Telegraph and civilised unionism in a way that a page from the old Protestant Telegraph or a Paisley led demo would not do.
Cos the Guvnor and his wife were …..ya know……not “themmuns”.
On your own websit during the summer you told us that the twelfth of July was a day for us all. …….but the lesson of the last week is that those loyalist mobs can effect the lives of “people like us”…….when it was just about “themmuns” nobody on Slugger really cared.
You can have problems with basic comprehension too (http://goo.gl/yGEKg):
In the meantime, it might pay all (Republican as well as Unionist) to remember they and their tradition cannot not completely own any date on the calendar.
So to all, a happy and safe 12th of July whatever you’re doing and whatever it means to you…
Why does the SDLP have to answer all these questions?
The “lets compromise” unionists are the new kid on the block and surely the onus is on them to explain themseleves.
What exactly do they want to compromise about?
If i were the SDLP I’d very wary about getting into discussions about compromise with unionists, i don’t think its served them very well in the past
Any political halfwit can see that unionism is in crisis here, Sinn Fein are being smart just siting back and letting unionism get on with it.
The SDLP should sit back, let the census results hit the deck and see what happens, the last thing they need to do is start answering questions from the likes of Mick Fealty and his “lets compromise” unionist mates, i can’t see one vote in it for them.
I agree.
SDLP is a nationalist, republican and socialist Party and of course a civil rights party.
Compromise is a fine thing but for some Parties and commentators, Compromise is a POLICY. Thats not serious politics at all.
The vision of Compromise that letsgetalongerists and liberal unionists have is always within a “UK” framework. Thats not compromise at all.
Frankly the Good Friday Agreement was left too long on the shelf with nothing being done. It might well be an end in itself.
But in Conflict Resolution, this presents a dilemna….how to resolve a conflict that has been ended on the basis of nobody winning and nobody losing. That was the rhetoric. Trying to impose winners and losers…wont work.
The battle for Berlin in 1945 ended a Conflict.
The losers were brought off to re-education centres to be de-Nazified.
This is essentially what letsgetalongerists want to do. Take us all off to Healing thru Remembering, Platform for Change etc to have us all repudiate our nationalism.
That is of course Hyperbole but thats basically what its all about.
IA,
They don’t, of course. They may never. And that’s a matter for them. But remember this, the SDLP and UU gave us institutions that put compromise at their center. There is no politics of any description without compromise without wrecking your own handiwork.
@Mick,
Good to hear that it didn’t come across the wrong way.
In relation to flags and the concept of a “shared Northern Ireland”, if sharing is to mean anything it must surely transcend the present territorial arrangements so that both communities are on an equal footing.
My own position in relation to the flag-flying above Belfast City Hall is that it should be both national flags or no national flag. That is the only fair compromise. I apply the same to say the likes of legislation on language rights for Irish-speakers. Not a an Irish Language Act but an Official Languages Act that encompasses and places both Irish and English on an equal legal footing.
The logical short-term outcome of the present political arrangements in the North is joint-sovereignty from the inside-out. Joint-sovereignty between the Irish and British communities in the north-east of the country under the auspices of the Belfast Agreement and subsequent arrangements. The medium to long-term outcome is reunification.
But the British Unionist community can hardly hope for fair treatment as a minority from a future regional Irish majority in the north if they are incapable of coming to such arrangements in the here and now. Better for Unionists to lay the groundwork of their own future treatment than leave it to others by creating a precedence. Or more correctly I should say reinforcing an existing historical precedence derived from decades of authoritarian one-party rule at Stormont.
Excluding the Alliance Party, Unionists have now declared that it is their flag and no other flag, even when a compromise was offered. How do they think that will effect the more important compromises that lie down the line? They are being politically myopic to the point of self-destruction.
I take your meaning about “assassination”. But then you know the response: RUC, B-Specials, UDR, RIR, UDA, UFF, UVF, RHC, LVF, UR, SAS, FRU, MI5, BA, etc…
The Salmond and SNP argument is interesting but only of limited value. The national histories of Ireland and Scotland, for all their similarities, are also very different. The argument over independence in Scotland does not turn on the issue of competing ethno-national identities derived from colonial legacies. A Scot may be a Unionist or a Nationalist but he or she is still a Scot.
That is simply not going to happen on this side of the Sruth na Maoile while partition and the fall-back position of a Northern Pale continues. Look what happened in the Unionist community south of the border with the removal of a fall-back position. Accommodation and integration. That is a closer parallel to Scotland.
That’s the zero sum game. If I thought it had a pup’s chance of pulling it off, I’d say ‘fair play’ and carry on. I just don’t think it’s going to work, any more than I thought the war would.
You say..
“The logical short-term outcome of the present political arrangements in the North is joint-sovereignty from the inside-out.”
Well that’s a matter of choice. Getting the union flag off the pole is one thing, changing sovereignty is quite another. And despite Jim talking about tactical moves, the party hasn’t even achieved that much in Belfast yet.
These are Buck House hours, not liberation.
If/when it eventually gets done, all you will have done in the meantime is build resistance and coherence within the DUP. You keep testing them, they get stronger. But in the meantime, you remain jugged at Stormont.
The real reason this is playing out on flags in a council that has big budgets compared to local authorities, but no real power is that you are loosing the battle at what qualifies as a real centre of power on the hill.
This is more of a vulnerability than it may seem.
SF’s reluctance to get its hands dirty on policy is probably an advantage if you are following the stratagem you’ve outlined above. But it is a non transferable skill and it won’t help you reach the parts other Republican parties could if and when they are finished taking an enforced bout of RnR.
Take education for instance. Abolishing selection was an inheritance from a British minister and couched in a British tradition that has little or no read across to the Irish system. That will make the sell harder, if and when it comes, not easier.
The Dioxin scare was a bit of a wake up call too.
Despite having an SF minister there was no direct reporting between the FSAs in Belfast and Dublin. To be blunt *you are the best by far that northern nationalism has right now” and frankly SF don’t show the least inclination to do the work necessarily to make unification possible never mind likely.
The flag issue doesn’t do it for me for another reason. All you are really selling is loyalist reaction as a benefit to a group of people to whom it is not an actual benefit. That’s a neat inversion of the old unionist trick on the Protestant working class, which is you may be in a bad, but look how pissed off that lot over there is.
As for there not being a common identity like there is in Scotland, I take your point. But if the plan is to abduct million Prods, Others and probably a little more than just a smattering of Catholics into the Republic, I don’t think that will work either.
If nationalists have to wait for a transference of sovereignty before you deliver them something anything tangible for voting SF, they will get bored and stop voting, or risk you opening the gate for some other force to come and engage them with a better offering.
Nature abhors a vacuum.
Belfast City Council today, Stormont tomorrow?
I agree with you about Sinn Féin’s lack of solid proposals on reunification. A Program for Unity is required with a recognition of the British Unionist minority as an ethno-national community in Ireland of (majority) British or Scottish origins with a distinct cultural, linguistic and religious identity. Such a program should include an absolute commitment to regional autonomy in the north-east post-reunification, with a regional legislature, executive, police service, etc. and checks and balances in place to assure the British or Scots-Irish minority of their continued well-being. There also needs to be the outlines of a “Marshall Plan” for the north-east (and former border counties) in a Reunited Ireland to revive and energise the local economy, backed by the governments of Ireland and Britain, the EU, et al.
The problem is getting all the nationalist parties in Ireland to sign up to such a plan, if even only in theory. We don’t have a John Hume to push for a new “New Ireland Forum”. However if SF and the SDLP could establish a reunification policy paper between themselves and then lobby in Dublin the there is at least something to sell to Unionists – or post-Union Unionists.
One might argue that the current arrangements in the North are a dry-run for reunification. So far they are less than promising. But probably not all that far from where we may actually be in the early years of reunification. When the transition comes it is going to be turbulent. Very. That is inevitable. Peter Hitchen’s recent prediction of Irish soldiers trying to pacify Loyalists rioters on the streets of a future Belfast is at least possible (likely?).
I do strongly agree that SF, which I would slightly more favour than the SDLP, is being less than sophisticated in its dealings t’up north. And its record in regional government is fairly poor. Nationalists want jobs, want prosperity, want good education and health services, etc. But they also want an explicit recognition of their Irish nationality and wish to see that reflected around them. It is, inevitably, a zero sum game. We are more of a north-western Belgium than a Switzerland.
Phew, nothing like a bloody good row between some seasoned contenders.
Great stuff gentlemen, keep it going!
Good stuff, one week after the flags event a bit of analysis is being supplied.
Leaving aside the attacks on the Alliance party for a moment the rest is simply the battle a day we were promised and should expect when you have 2 power blocks trying to maximise their (quasi constitutional) political gains for their own side with Alliance inevitably being blamed for falling on one side or the other whenever they are called in to decide the outcome.
Unfortunately for Unionism the logic of the Peace Process coupled with improving Nat demographics means there will be more CityHall scenarios in the pipeline and more propaganda victories for the boys in Green. The fact that the boys in Red White and Blue are having so much difficulty with adjusting to this reality makes it all the easier for the opposition to deal with their own difficulties. What is perhaps surprisng to some(well me anyway) is that such a smart operator as Robbo doesnt see this – or perhaps he does and is simply intent on dealing with Wee Davey first (possbily swallowing up with Nesbo in the process) before moving back to dealing with the real enemy SF.
FJH, Mick,
this crazness is what keeps all anoraks of the poltical variety interested and must be reflected in you ‘hits’ and what makes Ulster such a compulsion for us (anoraks) all?
Can’t add a word to that Sammy
As we both know you put a lot of store on propaganda (one reason why you’re permanently banned from Slugger… 😉
But tell me, you say “there will be more CityHall scenarios in the pipeline”.
How many would you say? Or is that secret?
Obviously the wrong kinda propaganda.I tend to think that Andy Pollak is a propagandist. Yet he is given a lot of space on Slugger.
Not even in the same class as Sammy.
Mick,
As you have personalised your reply to me(many playing again) I will offer my defence.
I think any fair reading of the last words I spoke as (Samuel Mc Nally) on Slugger would fairly conclude that I was remonstrating with you for your misrepresentation of the facts in a very controversial case and especially with your failure to correct or acknowledge your mistake.
On the substantive point, it is reasonable to suggest that those who led the insurgency against the Union with Britain and who have now opted for the democratic route will (as they are legally entitled to do) endeavour to hollow out that Union from within and that this course of action will not best please those who see themselves as British. Quite how this will play out in terms of symbols, marches, media, social occasions etc remains to be seen but with ever improving numbers in the sectarian headcount in all likelyhood we are likely to have more of the same.
I think you may be allowing your dislike of my ‘style’ of comment (which you perceive as propaganda) to obscure or perhaps to deflect form what is actually being said.
..and talking of ‘secrets’, as I enquired above, does this time of increasing tension get strongly reflected in the ‘hit’ figures on Slugger?
Just a word about Stats at times of tensions. Probably an unfair comparison because this Blog is comparatively low key and Slugger O,Toole is basically the market leader as a discussion board.
Today has been the highest number of views I have ever had….and I would estimate that the past seven days have all been in the top ten or twelve.
Numbers are not everything of course. But it is now totally impossible to reply to individual comments.
Sammy,
Your style is to is constantly repeat the same point over and over and not to engage in conversation. You don’t get black carded for one incident. In over ten years there are less than ten card holders, and you are one.
Mick,
just to remain off topic for the moment, I would suggest that a large percentage of the reptiiton was in response to your encouragement for the repetitive mis-analysis (which subsequent events have confirmed) by PB on the subject of the transfer of police and justice powers . It was a period of blatant propagndising and arguably Slugger’s poorest hour(year).
On the subject of cards, the abuse dished out to poor Sammy Mc Nally during this period (a matter raised by other posters) would suggest that a few more cards might have been in order and not just to the boul Sammy’s good friend ‘Moderate Unionist’. But I dont underestimate the diffiuclty in trying to regulate Slugger and all things considered keeping it down to 10 is quite an achievement.
….regarding ‘engaging in conversation’ , I was enquiring (now for the third time) if this was period of greatly increased activity on Slugger ?
I think so, judging by the rise in quality of the conversation over there, I’d say we had an influx of new blood and some valued old hands. Bar flies less in evidence. 😉
Hmmmm.
I always love it when someone (Fick) gives us his tuppence. What amazes me more is that people engage with it, but alas it is fun.
Regarding a Salmond character in the North, that is an amazingly funny idea. This ‘nation’ was created by way of an ethno sectarian head count and will most likely become part of the South in much the same manner. Is this Wolfe Tone-esque Republicanism? Hell no it’s not but it’s the reality on the ground.
As for going back on topic. I see what Walker is doing there but he is kidding himself and many other voters, further he is afforded a larger weight to his opinion in a little blog bubble than what he has in the real world where come the next election cycle he shall be proved wrong yet again.
As for this talk of being ‘liberal’ in Northern politics, it is interesting enough but something of a waste of time. Few parties do not have some kind of blood on their hands (the SDLP and Alliance are really the only ones of the big 5 I can think of) whether it is SF with the obvious, DUP with Ulster Resistance or the UUP when it controlled the RUC, UDR, B Specials and then further supporting these guys and loyalist paramilitaries in some cruel kind of outsourcing arrangement (or early Thatcherism privitisations as I like to think of them).