When one applies for planning permission in this country (when an individual without masses of money, I mean), they may ask a politician to put in a good word. Last year I managed to gain a meeting with a planner to discuss an application I submitted with my wife. She also asked some local politicians for some help but after the meeting with the planner we were assured all was ok. Imagine our surprise then, when some months later, the two local eejits came back and said they had dropped a few kind words for us and we would be successful. After we already were. After I had talked to a planner who hadn't even been approached at that stage anyway.
My point is that politicians often come out to speak about issues or talk of topics when they know they're on the way to being solved.
A few decent politicians came out yesterday along with Ken Loache to ask Shell to move the Solitaire along so that Maura Harrington might be allowed come off her hunger strike.
Therefore, I would imagine that the ship will move in the next few days and some less noble politician will come out and claim responsibility.
With any luck it will move but please do not believe any politicians from the main parties other than current supporters of Shell To Sea when they say they had an input.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Bomb Scare at Shell HQ
Publicity in Ireland and indeed worldwide for Shell at the moment is pretty bad.
The company is directly responsible (along with our government) for a woman being on hunger strike.
The captain of a pipelaying vessel due to lay your pipeline grew a concsience and turned back.
What do you do?
Who were the only ones to benefit from a bomb scare outside Shell HQ today?
Shell To Sea perhaps?
Maura Harrington?
The Erris people?
No, didn't think so.
The only ones who may gain from this is of course Shell themselves.
Conveniently, one of their police (I think they're called Gardai) found it. Probably after he put it there.
Anyone who thinks that anyone other than Shell or some wing of the government did this is quite foolish (Donegal anyone?).
Wake up and smell the coffee people.
Think about it just for one second before you digest your RTE news or the bog roll that is the Indo.
There's only one culprit here
The company is directly responsible (along with our government) for a woman being on hunger strike.
The captain of a pipelaying vessel due to lay your pipeline grew a concsience and turned back.
What do you do?
Who were the only ones to benefit from a bomb scare outside Shell HQ today?
Shell To Sea perhaps?
Maura Harrington?
The Erris people?
No, didn't think so.
The only ones who may gain from this is of course Shell themselves.
Conveniently, one of their police (I think they're called Gardai) found it. Probably after he put it there.
Anyone who thinks that anyone other than Shell or some wing of the government did this is quite foolish (Donegal anyone?).
Wake up and smell the coffee people.
Think about it just for one second before you digest your RTE news or the bog roll that is the Indo.
There's only one culprit here
Hunger strike in Mayo
Hi,
Since I last wrote on this a lot has happened.
It is not quite on the scale of Padraic Pearse saying that
"All has changed, changed utterly."
However, things have changed.
Firstly, I find it hard to delight in the decision by Maura Harrington to go on hunger strike.
I believe that the woman is intelligent and probably did not take this decision lightly.
I also believe that her family would be destroyed if she is allowed to die of hunger on the side of the road, ironically in a village where she sat in a bucket of a digger back 6 years ago.
What I find truly shocking about the whole situation is the fact that it had to come to this.
This country did not protect its' citizens but rather the workers of a multinational company with quite a poor record of health and safety (for locals not themselves). Police stated that they were there to protect both sides while they park their vehicles in Shell compounds in the area.
They chat with the Shell workers while shouting abuse and laughing at locals.
The army, police and navy were brought in huge numbers to ram this project down the throats of locals.
The mainstream media won't report on it unless Shell tell them to. Countless hours of footage of Irish people being kicked and beaten will not be discussed by the mainstream media.
The state broadcaster will not show it but will report stories of the most popular babies names of the year.
Not one state agency with responsibility for the environment has helped the locals.
Shell have gone across several SACs in their quest to bring this ashore. If you or I erected a hut on a SAC, we would be jailed.
So a woman goes on hunger strike to bring the issue to the attention of a nation, which has too many credit cards to care.
A woman goes on hunger strike to bring to the attention of the nation, the shameful giveaway of our oil and gas.
Maura, you are a heroine. You are a woman beyond reproach. You are a woman with morals that no Shell dollar can buy. I salute you for this. But I hope you do not die.
Since I last wrote on this a lot has happened.
It is not quite on the scale of Padraic Pearse saying that
"All has changed, changed utterly."
However, things have changed.
Firstly, I find it hard to delight in the decision by Maura Harrington to go on hunger strike.
I believe that the woman is intelligent and probably did not take this decision lightly.
I also believe that her family would be destroyed if she is allowed to die of hunger on the side of the road, ironically in a village where she sat in a bucket of a digger back 6 years ago.
What I find truly shocking about the whole situation is the fact that it had to come to this.
This country did not protect its' citizens but rather the workers of a multinational company with quite a poor record of health and safety (for locals not themselves). Police stated that they were there to protect both sides while they park their vehicles in Shell compounds in the area.
They chat with the Shell workers while shouting abuse and laughing at locals.
The army, police and navy were brought in huge numbers to ram this project down the throats of locals.
The mainstream media won't report on it unless Shell tell them to. Countless hours of footage of Irish people being kicked and beaten will not be discussed by the mainstream media.
The state broadcaster will not show it but will report stories of the most popular babies names of the year.
Not one state agency with responsibility for the environment has helped the locals.
Shell have gone across several SACs in their quest to bring this ashore. If you or I erected a hut on a SAC, we would be jailed.
So a woman goes on hunger strike to bring the issue to the attention of a nation, which has too many credit cards to care.
A woman goes on hunger strike to bring to the attention of the nation, the shameful giveaway of our oil and gas.
Maura, you are a heroine. You are a woman beyond reproach. You are a woman with morals that no Shell dollar can buy. I salute you for this. But I hope you do not die.
Monday, September 8, 2008
Drugs In Ireland
Last year represented the greatest amount of drugs seized, in monetary terms, In Ireland.
This was not due to the competence of the Gardaí or the Navy. No, this was due to the incompetence of some drug runners. Yet, we hailed it as a great blow in the war against drugs.
Well done lads. Pat yourselves on the back and take a long gracious bow. Did anyone know that a sniffer dog has found more drugs this year than the rest of the force put together?
What's worrying about all this is the fact that the value of the amount "found" last year in Cork shows how much was getting in past our dozy navy and cops anyway.
The drug dealers must be laughing now.
The government decides to send three navy vessels to police a few protesters in North Mayo. Also send in 200 or so of our finest plods in their boats. 3 out of 8 navy vessels available to this country are in north mayo being used against its' own people instead of doing their job and protecting this country.
Who is gaining from this? Why are the government so desperate to push this through that they use the navy and guards to beat their own people into submission at the behest of an Anglo-Dutch Company?
It's quite obvious someone somewhere got money. Ray Burke, Bertie Ahern, Frank Fahey, etc. But it still fails to answer the questions. Why do the government use the media to slur ordinary decent people in fear of their lives and intimidated and beaten by our police force?
Whatever the reasons, it is shocking to see this happen. Maybe official government papers released in twenty years time will tell us the truth. By then it will be too late for the people of Erris in Mayo, choking to death on poisonous fumes.
But hey, at least the drugs business will still be flourishing, eh?
This was not due to the competence of the Gardaí or the Navy. No, this was due to the incompetence of some drug runners. Yet, we hailed it as a great blow in the war against drugs.
Well done lads. Pat yourselves on the back and take a long gracious bow. Did anyone know that a sniffer dog has found more drugs this year than the rest of the force put together?
What's worrying about all this is the fact that the value of the amount "found" last year in Cork shows how much was getting in past our dozy navy and cops anyway.
The drug dealers must be laughing now.
The government decides to send three navy vessels to police a few protesters in North Mayo. Also send in 200 or so of our finest plods in their boats. 3 out of 8 navy vessels available to this country are in north mayo being used against its' own people instead of doing their job and protecting this country.
Who is gaining from this? Why are the government so desperate to push this through that they use the navy and guards to beat their own people into submission at the behest of an Anglo-Dutch Company?
It's quite obvious someone somewhere got money. Ray Burke, Bertie Ahern, Frank Fahey, etc. But it still fails to answer the questions. Why do the government use the media to slur ordinary decent people in fear of their lives and intimidated and beaten by our police force?
Whatever the reasons, it is shocking to see this happen. Maybe official government papers released in twenty years time will tell us the truth. By then it will be too late for the people of Erris in Mayo, choking to death on poisonous fumes.
But hey, at least the drugs business will still be flourishing, eh?
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
J'accuse
For some time I have, unlike the mainstream media in Ireland, tried to be objective on the issue of our (their) oil and gas. I have tried to give a balanced view on the beatings conducted by our so called Gardaí of ordinary decent citizens from a rural part of Ireland, where the crime rate was low at best before this project began. I still do not believe that any crime has taken place by protesters since but crimes can be invented - Donegal anyone?
The last straw for me came when the government sanctioned the use of the navy against its' own people. A despicable act in a truly disgusting country. This country is rotten to the core.
It is full of corrupt politicians who idiots continue to vote for. It is full of obnoxious morons whose greatest achievements are getting absolutely plastered on any given night.
Our towns and cities are rotten cesspools of drugs where rich and poor alike are united by common addictions.
Our transport infrastructure and health system are the joke of many a pub in Ireland (those that are still left in business).
But you know what? Irish people deserve everything they get.
They deserve the recession they receive where cutbacks of millions are called for when a trillion euro has been given away. Who shouts to complain? Just a few brave souls with the morals not to accept a few euro to shut them up in one of the most beautiful areas of the world.
To all you morons who have accepted money or jobs from Shell to build a murdering gas refinery - well done, may the money comfort you when your lungs can no longer breathe the air around you. Maybe you can sell your land and get out? But that house you built that should be worth €250000 can not be given away when that is built. Where do you go then in a time of recession? The bank for another mortgage with no collateral? Do the math.
I'd also like to give a big hello to the Greens in government, Gormless and Ryan. What a legacy to have left when you don't get voted in again - failed attempts to introduce new toilet and lightbulb initiatives.
Ireland, you make me sick.
No longer can I stand and support our soccer team or shout for our olympians. The Ireland I once was so proud of is long dead.
It's not just romantic Ireland that is dead and gone - The decent people on the island of a thousand welcomes has been replaced by ignorant morons who slap change down on shop counters and grunt at you when you try to get past someone in a crowded pub.
Ireland, I am an Irishman by virtue of my passport only because the Irishness I believed in is gone and gone forever.
Slán go Fóill
The last straw for me came when the government sanctioned the use of the navy against its' own people. A despicable act in a truly disgusting country. This country is rotten to the core.
It is full of corrupt politicians who idiots continue to vote for. It is full of obnoxious morons whose greatest achievements are getting absolutely plastered on any given night.
Our towns and cities are rotten cesspools of drugs where rich and poor alike are united by common addictions.
Our transport infrastructure and health system are the joke of many a pub in Ireland (those that are still left in business).
But you know what? Irish people deserve everything they get.
They deserve the recession they receive where cutbacks of millions are called for when a trillion euro has been given away. Who shouts to complain? Just a few brave souls with the morals not to accept a few euro to shut them up in one of the most beautiful areas of the world.
To all you morons who have accepted money or jobs from Shell to build a murdering gas refinery - well done, may the money comfort you when your lungs can no longer breathe the air around you. Maybe you can sell your land and get out? But that house you built that should be worth €250000 can not be given away when that is built. Where do you go then in a time of recession? The bank for another mortgage with no collateral? Do the math.
I'd also like to give a big hello to the Greens in government, Gormless and Ryan. What a legacy to have left when you don't get voted in again - failed attempts to introduce new toilet and lightbulb initiatives.
Ireland, you make me sick.
No longer can I stand and support our soccer team or shout for our olympians. The Ireland I once was so proud of is long dead.
It's not just romantic Ireland that is dead and gone - The decent people on the island of a thousand welcomes has been replaced by ignorant morons who slap change down on shop counters and grunt at you when you try to get past someone in a crowded pub.
Ireland, I am an Irishman by virtue of my passport only because the Irishness I believed in is gone and gone forever.
Slán go Fóill
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