Most of the readers of this Blog will know that I do not care very much for Creative Ambiguity. I prefer to think that (allegedly for the Common Good) the Good Friday Agreement was sold to nationalists on the basis that it was the stepping stones to a United Ireland and to unionists (less successfully) on the basis that it was a series of obstacles to a United Ireland. Lies. Lies. Lies
Over on Slugger O’Toole, Gerry Lynch, Slugger favourite and former Alliance Party staffer and candidate reaches much the same conclusion. He specifically blames DUP and Sinn Féin.
He does not blame SDLP (my party) or his (Alliance)……that lets both off the hook too easily. Of course nobody around the Good Friday table at Stormont thought that a few years down the line that the DUP and Sinn Féin would be in charge of the process. It was not supposed to be like this.
It was snake oil…..but the medicine might have worked if the medicine had been applied properly. Clearly it hasnt. Creative Ambiguity has undermined the Peace Process…rather than strengthening it. I have said this for a long time. The Good Friday Agreement is now in critical condition and on life support. Time for someone to say that there is no hope for it.
Clearly people will worry about the alternative. But I wonder if we have reached the stage where we can just move on and not have any “politics”. Just let the PSNI arrest drug dealers, anti social hoods and smugglers……..without regard to their connexions or power to “bring the whole process down”. It is worth the risk.
Welcome though Gerry Lynch’s stance is and he makes a case for the Census underpinning potentially long term stability……it is surely linked to the attacks…..disgusting attacks on the Alliance Party.
The Alliance Party has effectively become Brian Faulkner’s reduced unionists (UPNI) and Trimble’s reduced unionists. It has filled the vaccuum of being THE liberal unionist Party while Nesbitt’s UUP heads further to the Right. Nothwithstanding the individual cases of harassment of individual Allaince members in the past…….Alliance has generally been below the radar of attack.
Frankly in the past, Alliance have survived and done well out of politics by pretending that they are not really political……just a low calory version of the political party you hate most.
Keeping An Eye On the Czar of Russia 
FJH,
I read that piece and your own above. TBH, I agree wholeheartedly with Derry Dave over on Bullshit Mountain; the commentators and MSM are getting out of hand at the moment.
Ed Curran over at the Bele Tele was pushing the same nonsense as well which is all rather convenient on both of their parts seeing as the VAST majority of the symbols in the North are of a unionist flavour. Essentially what he is saying is ‘oh Nats, please don’t raise your heads above the parapet and ask for equality of esteem or for Irish symbols and culture to be given the same respect as existing ones or some knuckle draggers will have a spaz attack’ or have I missed something here?
The census figures are only one part of what is going on. We have a crisis in unionism at the moment and rather than their pols and the police holding them to any kind of serious account we still have all this talk of ‘dissidents’ (they’ve been fairly quiet of late or is that just me?) and equivocating the shameful desecration of a Protestant church near Gleneavy where Nats openly condemned these actions with the riots over the fleg and during the summer; it beggars belief that ‘serious’ commentators are able to do this free from sanction.
Do I feel we have a problem up at the Assembly? That depends really on whether or not I had managed my expectations now doesn’t it. Too many have not and during this depression everyone is seeing the limitations of the democratic process. Some issues need to be resolved over cultural identity and parity of esteem, however, I suspect they will be parked until Sept 2013.
FC. I stopped watching the local BBC news and UTV news as well back in April when they were going ape over the whole Titanic borefest. They expected everybody to join in even though they must have known that the shipyard where it was jerrybuilt was a sectarian hole, They fall hook line and sinker for this whole ‘new N Ireland guff and boy did this last week prove that on stilts, but i don’t suppose they’ll take that on board, so I packed them in. Never looked back
Well this the thing. In the 1960s/1970s (and long before) the old RUC and BBC/UTV were fully signed up to the Stormont agenda.
And in 2012 it is no different. The PSNI wont rock any boats. And neither will TV news.
Everything I say today is coming thru a haze of Lemsip induced Stupidity. I am either dying with the flu (my version) or have some “man flu” . I think Alliance cant really be asked hard questions about themselves until the dust settles and the attacks on them have stopped. They are probably already asking themselves and each other hard questions. Some of them seem shell-shocked and angry (Long). Some like Ford just look shell-shocked. But I wonder what kinda conversations the top 25 people in Alliance are having with each other.
I still remain convinced that they screwed up badly last week. Had any of those six councillors known what the reaction would be………would they really have made that decision? Part of the dust settling might be resignations.
In part…..there is some special pleading in Gerry Lynch’s piece on Slugger. The Alliance Party has slipped too often under the radar. “Vote for us……we are not really political” and yet they are the cutest hoors around the place.
So the attacks on them have shocked them to their core.
Its par for the course that an Orange Hall be attacked in Mid Ulster. Or a GAA Club in South Antrim……but an Alliance Party office is unprecedented in my view. They have thrived on being reactive and apolitical……….and last week they did something extremely political……..and the bye ball extended to them in Bangor, Carrickfergus and on the Newtownards Road has backfired in spectacular fashion.
Oh there is definitely a lot of dust to settle and around 30 months before an election so a lot can change in the mean time.
I wrote about SOT/Bullshit Mountain becoming somewhat interesting again, however, my gripe being that ‘serious’ journos gave Robbo et al kudos over the whole ‘Kafflik Outreach’ rather than seriously challenge it.
I also noted in a reply to Hobo that when these same people are largely shown up to have made a massive mistake they go into something of a defensive mode and try and pin the blame on Nats as they are small ‘u’ unionists after all. This is where I see Gerry’s piece fitting in. Again, it says that Nats have to suck it up and not ask for parity of esteem on cultural issues as it is so toxic. We know why this is; his party/’constituency’ is being physically attacked for compromise and he doesn’t like it and that is perfectly understandable given the circumstances.
The only problem is this; Nats and especially young Nats such as myself whilst we want to compromise with our neighbours are simply unwilling to compromise/bend over backwards licking the boots of people unwilling to really compromise unless someone larger sits on them and pressures them on certain matters, whether it is the Irish Language and education or symbols, nor should we (this is a reason, IMHO, why the SDLP lost a lot of votes and we all know the knickname it was given for that).
He and many others try and say ‘they’re only pieces of cloth, they mean nothing’ and he is right and wrong all at once. They clearly mean something, otherwise APNI wouldn’t have been involved in the vote and they (symbols) wouldn’t have been used to be rammed down the throats of Nats in the past. To say they don’t mean anything is rank stupidity and ignorance on his part.
As for APNI fall out, I honestly do not know. I suspect there are more Catholics in East Belfast than before and they will vote for Naomi I would imagine. Further, a lot of people who have abstained may come out to register their disgust with the riots, but I honestly don’t know, I can see great reasons why she may lose or win.
Will the TUV contest the seat? Will we have a UUP contender? All things to throw in the mix of course but far too early I think.
BTW, hope you get well soon FJH a chara, 2am here, I’m off to bed.
Oiche mhaith
Good and interesting article Mr Fitz,
Hope you are recovering well
I am hanging together by a thread Mr Dub.
One more clean shirt will do me..as they say.
FJH I’m glad I got the flu jab now[a fortnight ago], Hope you’re up and about again in short order. the sluggerites will be getting withdrawal symptoms at your absence.
Your previous thread didn’t pass me by. The choice of candidate will be crucial, Have you considered it 😉
Europe and Me??? Now theres a thought.
I dont like Europe……..and dont start me on the Belgians.
Im not that good with farmers either.
To be honest…..Im not that great with people.
But if I detect a groundswell of support for me…I will allow my name to go forward.
Farming Belgians……gits to the man!!!
I found it interesting that the media bought the phantom threat against Poots and Donaldson. Nolan gave the latter 10 minutes on it and then switched to whether DUP policy was or was not to support protests, saying that Robo said they were to stop.
It seemed to catch Jeffrey out, guessing he thought he was on for just the sob story (as well as Alliance members, SF members also had death threats this week) but in fairness to Nolan, he pushed Jeff for an answer. I think the answer was that he supported protests, hard to tell http://audioboo.fm/boos/1109157-dup-jeffrey-donaldson-reacts-to-latest-death-threat-against-him and Jeff had to resort to “my life has been threatened (unsubstantiated by police)” when pushes, as you can hear.
Again, in fairness to UTV, there wasn’t a mention of it on the teatime news although the BBC is reporting that some guy has been arrested for threatening Robinson. It’s all getting very confusing, as desperation often does. After 8 days, Marty has finally spoken this evening about the situation and quite strongly too but why so long?
Tonight, unionists ( I think recent events show we can disregard the distinction normally applied) tried to make an incursion in the Short Strand but were faced down by police https://twitter.com/chrislindsay_/status/278932299305857024/photo/1/large https://twitter.com/chrislindsay_/status/278931029094440960/photo/1/large in large numbers. With a unionist majority gone in BCC and yesterday’s census result re. Belfast, why is their any tolerance of unionist complaints of the obligatory reference bag to the flegs vote when describing unionist violence? It stands alone at this point, a beast on it’s own 4 legs. From where it was born is no longer that relevant and should be referred to and reported as such, just unionist violence.
I suppose this is the first time Alliance have been in the “front line” and its natural politicians in other parties will be thinking “what about me? ….I have been under threat for years.
Hard to say how serious to take Poots & Donaldson.
Robinson….a man has been charged.
You have my Vote!!!!!
I can’t believe Gerry wrote this:
“Let worried Unionists and Loyalists get used to a Northern Ireland that is only 48% British. That statistic, on one level, only encapsulates what has happened over the last 20 years and yet it also rewrites all conventional understandings of what this place is. It will not kill any of us if the Belfast flag decision was the last such dramatic change for a decade. Let the younger and less tribalised to come to a decision on these matters in the fullness of time.”
Apparently the solution is to sit astride the world screaming stop. Seriously? Politics is not a game for the faint hearted, and it isn’t for people who don’t turn up. Losers happen, and they are as likely to be CNR as PUL, unless you want to ignore the dismal state of some Nationalists boroughs. Things have to work themselves through, painfully if need be. Loyalists will need to find their place in the new world, or be crushed. I say that with no emotion: it’s just a fact. Nationalism already largely pulls its punches – nationalist controlled councils could have tricolours flying around NI, for a start.
The suggestion of a border poll is also flawed for two reasons:
1. The current status quo suits the Catholic “Northern Irish”. McIlroy is presented as a poster boy, but he empatically isn’t representative. Most of those people aren’t proud to be British and waving the Ulster Banner. They are apathetic or ambivalent to the British emblems and have varying degrees of sympathy to Irish emblems. They’ll probably vote in any border referendum conservatively, and on their pockets. Best scenario for them? Strong nationalist background representation (majority if possible) and a UI parked until it suits them. That is where our gentle drift is taking them – how is everyone missing this? It’s also a myth there are 0 Prods in this group, or somewhere very similar by the by.
If you disagree here, you have to answer the question “Why do the SDLP keeping getting whipped?” with some sort of sensible answer. They should be lording it, on these trends.
2. It will very much destabilise. 25% Irish only, bit more if you include irish and Northern Irish. Unless you are in Derry. Or Newry. Or Strabane. Or anywherein a ring around the West. Then it’s either a majority or in the high 40s. And you have to say the Northern Irish there are highly likely going to lean Irish. So if we have
1. A decisive No for the forseeable
2. A big contiguous area with a yes.
Then repartition shoots up as a possibility, and dissidents will begin to claim that while they don’t speak for the people of Ireland, they certainly do for the people of Derry. People forget how fragile the current settlement is. They are used to it now. But it wouldn’t take much to upset the house of cards.
Other things to shout about: ridiculous assertions about auorums, the union flag being non sectarian and what nationalists signed up to in 1998, but it’ll have to wait another time.
I think theres two things here.
Alliance are shell-shocked and clearly hurt.
But the other thing is the Census…..and letsgetalongerists making the best of it.
Put the two together and youve got Gerry Lynch’s post on Slugger.
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