Interested in maladministration. Estd. 2005
RTEs Sarah McInerney ? Fianna Fail supporter? Anthony
Joe Duffy is dishonest and untrustworthy Anthony
Robert Watt complaint: Time for decision by SIPO Anthony
RTE in breach of its own editorial principles Anthony
Waiting for SIPO Anthony Public Inquiry >>
Indymedia Ireland is a volunteer-run non-commercial open publishing website for local and international news, opinion & analysis, press releases and events. Its main objective is to enable the public to participate in reporting and analysis of the news and other important events and aspects of our daily lives and thereby give a voice to people.
Deptartment of Psychiatry is so corrupt that when David Stephen says "The Government can do anything... Wed Aug 14, 2024 11:41 | dop
Julian Assange is finally free ! Tue Jun 25, 2024 21:11 | indy
Stand With Palestine: Workplace Day of Action on Naksa Day Thu May 30, 2024 21:55 | indy
It is Chemtrails Month and Time to Visit this Topic Thu May 30, 2024 00:01 | indy
Hamburg 14.05. "Rote" Flora Reoccupied By Internationalists Wed May 15, 2024 15:49 | Internationalist left Human Rights in Ireland >>
Bank of England Staff Told to Share Pronouns and Use ?Gender Neutral? Language Sun Sep 01, 2024 09:00 | Will Jones Bank of England staff have been told to share their pronouns at the start of meetings and use "gender neutral" language when speaking to customers.
The post Bank of England Staff Told to Share Pronouns and Use “Gender Neutral” Language appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Government?s Private Schools VAT Raid ?Risks Costing Taxpayer £1.8bn? Sun Sep 01, 2024 07:00 | Will Jones The Government?s VAT raid on private schools risks costing the taxpayer up to £1.8 billion as parents cut their work hours once their children move into the state sector, a report has found.
The post Government’s Private Schools VAT Raid “Risks Costing Taxpayer £1.8bn” appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
News Round-Up Sun Sep 01, 2024 01:04 | Richard Eldred A summary of the most interesting stories in the past 24 hours that challenge the prevailing orthodoxy about the ?climate emergency?, public health ?crises? and the supposed moral defects of Western civilisation.
The post News Round-Up appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Domestic Abuse Charity Allows ?Men Who Identify as Women? to Apply for £47,000-a-Year ?Women-Only? R... Sat Aug 31, 2024 15:00 | Will Jones A domestic abuse charity has been criticised for encouraging "men who identify as women" to apply for a senior £47,000-a-year "women-only" post.
The post Domestic Abuse Charity Allows “Men Who Identify as Women” to Apply for £47,000-a-Year “Women-Only” Role appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Ed Miliband and Chris Stark Have Just Admitted They Have No Clue What They?re Doing Sat Aug 31, 2024 13:00 | David Turver Ed Miliband and Chris Stark have asked National Grid for fresh advice on how to achieve Net Zero electricity by 2030. In other words, they've just admitted they have no clue what they're doing, says David Turver.
The post Ed Miliband and Chris Stark Have Just Admitted They Have No Clue What They’re Doing appeared first on The Daily Sceptic. Lockdown Skeptics >>
Voltaire, international edition
Voltaire, International Newsletter N°97 Fri Aug 30, 2024 12:14 | en
The New Iranian Foreign Policy Fri Aug 30, 2024 12:12 | en
Press lies about the Venezuelan presidential election, by Thierry Meyssan Tue Aug 27, 2024 06:59 | en
Voltaire, International Newsletter N°96 Fri Aug 23, 2024 15:28 | en
China chooses international law, distances itself from Israel and reunifies the ... Fri Aug 23, 2024 15:18 | en Voltaire Network >>
|
Bush has found a stupid, drooling gun dog in this craven Irish government
national |
anti-war / imperialism |
opinion/analysis
Tuesday March 16, 2004 11:20 by Diarmuid Doyle - The Sunday Tribune
![Report this post to the editors Report this post to the editors](../graphics/report.gif)
Article first published in Sunday Tribune on Feb 1, 2004
LASTMarch, at the annual poodle show in the White House, the Taoiseach Bertie Ahern stood proudly beside the American president and purred. "The world acknowledges the United States, with its immense power, and its status as a beacon of justice and liberty, as a leader with the United Nations, " Ahern said, his little tail wagging like a dachshund just rescued from a puppy farm. His message was simple.
Ireland stood shoulder to shoulder with Bush and his regime in its planned invasion of Iraq. The reasons were simple too. Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and simply had to be disarmed.
Both Ahern and foreign affairs minister Brian Cowen, the lapdog-in-chief of what passes for Irish foreign policy, were always very specific about their support for the invasion of Iraq, and for allowing armed US troops to pass through Shannon airport on their way to Baghdad. They didn't just go along with America, on the basis that Ireland and the US are traditional friends, or because they thought the Bush regime was an international bully which would urge American multi-nationals to withdraw from Ireland unless we did what we were told. They accepted, embraced and developed upon American reasons for doing so.
"Our goal is the disarmament of the Iraqi regime by peaceful means, " the Taoiseach said in the White House that March morning, implicitly accepting American claims - made in the United Nations and outside - that chemical, nuclear and biological weapons existed.
"The brutal regime in Iraq poses precisely the kind of threat to international peace and security that the UN was created to deal with." The Taoiseach had been even more loyal the previous month when he claimed that Colin Powell's speech to the United Nations had "provided the world with clear evidence that Iraq had secretly produced weapons of mass destruction. . . I think the report is strong and clear, " he said. "I think they Saddam's government know now that time has practically run out. Hopefully the Iraq regime might listen." As we now know, and as many reliable experts said at the time, Iraq had no WMDs, was not a danger to the rest of the world, and was in no need of disarmament. "I don't think they existed, " US weapons inspector David Kay said the other week, following his resignation as the head of the Iraq survey group. "I think there were stockpiles at the end of the first Gulf War and. . . a combination of UN inspectors and unilateral Iraqi action got rid of them. I think the best evidence is that they did not resume large-scale production." Asked by an interviewer from Reuters whether he thought that the Iraqis had at some point destroyed a large programme of chemical or biological weapons development, Kay replied:
"No, I don' t think they existed." Asked what had happened to the stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons that everyone expected to be in Iraq, he again replied: "I don't think they existed." We know too, from the just-published biography of Paul O'Neill, Bush's former treasury secretary, that from the moment the defeated George Bush had been awarded the presidency by the supreme court, he was looking for excuses, reasons and pretexts for war. "That was the tone of it, " O'Neill says. "'Find me a way to do this'." We are also aware, thanks to assistant defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, that the weapons of mass destruction issue was chosen by the Bush regime "for bureaucratic reasons" and we have been told by Richard Perle, one of the architects of the regime's Iraq policy, that "international law. . . would have required us to leave Saddam alone".
And so they broke international law. All the reasons given by Bush for the invasion - and by extension, therefore, all of the regular yaps of support from Ahern, Cowen, Mary Harney and others - were based on lies, carefully constructed, planned in advance, cynical untruths.
The US government will have to deal with the consequences, if there are to be any, of leading thousands of people (including hundreds of its own citizens, not to mention one Irishman) to their deaths in an unjust war, but Kay's remarks are important for us in Ireland too. We are not a banana republic, despite the manner in which some of our leaders behave, and we are entitled to a foreign policy that is based on some kind of morality, some kind of honesty, some kind of thought and some kind of philosophy.
Are we now at a point in our development that we will accept any lie, hang onto any untruth and embrace any dishonesty, simply because the US asks us to? Is our independence entirely lost to us? Do we have any backbone? Is everything to be about pragmatism and nothing to be about principle?
Supporters of the war have been changing tack of late and now argue that because Saddam has been removed, the invasion was justified. I seem to recall the Taoiseach saying something of that nature recently. But even that reason is looking a bit thin these days. During the week, the New York group, Human Rights Watch, which was condemning Saddam's atrocities when he was being supported by the United States, argued that the war could not be justified as a humanitarian intervention because Saddam was not endangering the lives of large numbers of his people when the invasion began last March.
"The lack of large-scale killing is a decisive factor in rejecting the use of military intervention in Iraq, " said the group's executive director Kenneth Roth. "Such interventions should be reserved for stopping an imminent or ongoing slaughter. They shouldn't be used belatedly to address atrocities that were ignored in the past." Damned by its moral cowardice, and by its fear of the responsibilities of independence, the Irish government backed an illegal (see Richard Perle) and unjust (see David Kay) invasion of Iraq. By the time of the next poodle show in March, would it be too much to ask that the opposition try to bring it to heel?
|
View Comments Titles Only
save preference
Comments (8 of 8)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8Tony Blair is to be honoured with the annual award of the American Ireland Fund, which will be presented by Mr Bertie Ahern (a previous recipient of the award) to the Ulster Secretary Paul Murphy. IMHO the peace work he is being rewarded for is cancelled out by the waging of illegal war in Iraq and the use of lies as proof that the war was justified.
According to Kathy O’Sullivan writing for `The Kerryman', it looks like the remote town of Sneem in County Kerry may well be the location of the upcoming EU-US summit. Since the online version of the newspaper requires a username and password combination, I've cut-and-pasted the contents of the article here:
"THERE were strong indications this week that the US-EU summit in June, which is to be attended by US President George Bush, will be held in the Kenmare area. The Kerryman understands that Sheen Falls Lodge in Kenmare and the Parknasilla Hotel in Sneem are the likely venues for the summit. The annual summit is being hosted by Ireland as it currently holds the EU Presidency.
It is understood rooms for up to 700 people were block booked in hotels in Kenmare and Killarney for the dates of the summit, June 25 and June 26.
President Bush is to fly into Shannon Airport with an entourage of up to 700 for the summit and it is understood he will be brought by helicopter to Kenmare.
The summit would result in one of the tightest security operations ever to take place in the country amid heightened fears for the President’s safety from various terrorist organisations. It is understood President Bush is landing in Shannon for security purposes as US officials believe it will be easier to ‘lock down’ Shannon Airport.
A high ranking Fianna Fáil source told The Kerryman, US officials were initially keen to hold the summit in Shannon, however the officials have since been persuaded to opt for a more scenic location for the purpose of photo-shoots.
It is understood that from a security point of view Dublin was never an option when deciding where to hold the summit as the likelihood of an anti-war protest was strongest there, something President Bush’s re-election campaign are particularly keen to avoid.
Assistant Manager of the Sheen Falls, Bríd McCarthy refused to comment when contacted by The Kerryman, while the Manager of the Parknasilla Jim Feeney denied that the summit was being held in his hotel.
President Bush will not be the first US President to visit Kerry. President Bill Clinton’s visit to Ballybunion in September of 1998 received much positive publicity both at home and abroad. He also returned to Ballybunion after leaving the White House.
While President Bush is also a keen golfer, he is not expected to play any of Kerry’s renowned courses while in the county."
Time to start organising for the demo of the decade
Bush smooched with Ahern today and announced plans to come to Dublin in June. This is an insult to the Irish people, because Bush is only fishing for votes, and because he thinks we will not demostrate in large numbers against him. Let's prove him wrong!
WASHINGTON - President Bush (news - web sites) used a St. Patrick's Day ceremony Wednesday to announce he will go to Ireland in June for a summit with the European Union (news - web sites).
Bush and his wife, Laura, were presented with a bowl of shamrocks by Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern. Ireland assumed the EU presidency on Jan. 1 and Ahern is hosting the summit in Dublin.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040317/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_2
1. Laugh at him.
2. Do not look into his eyes.
3. Do not listen to his voice.
4. you might like to hum a happy tune instead.
Bertie well you are lost as you know,
so bring him to the Kingdom of Kerry and there will be still chance to redeem your soul over a game of Golf which traditionally you must lose.
Can you count the Patents on Shamrock?
and they have taken the opportunity.
eurghghghggh.
Twas 'orrible.
heads, tentacles, scourge, flail, pony, gnash gnash, and that sweet smell.
Jayzhus Bertie, what did you do to yourself?
Prejudice is one thing, enlightenment another, education yes truly has it's value, but some things, some things you just do not assist.
bertie said protests would be bad for ireland.
He gave two reasons
1. Might be bad for Inward investment
2. Irish Americans do not like it or understand it - it being anti Bush anti war feeling in Erron. I think he is confusing the AOH and Irish - Americans myself.
So economic bribery and obfuscation is Bertie's Tactic.
I think Aznars fate has made him more than a little nervous.
A pact between Sinn fein, Labour, Greens (and any others interested in the notion) in advance of Bush visit )and in advance of all the upcoming elections of different types) that they would only govern in a coalition which (1) withdrew the use of Shannon from the US Military and (2) held a referendum to inscribe neutrality in the constitution would get those boots a quaking I'd wager.
I don't believe though that without lots of pressure those parties would be likely to enter into any such commitments with the electorate. Despite the fact that all three paraded their anti war credentials on TV lately announcing they would protest the bush visit.
Ask them about it next time you see them.
You know what, I think the best thing that could happen Ireland would be a Left Labour/Green/SF coalition government. OK, it would be hell for 4 years as they destroyed the economy, took unemployment to 50%, brought back mass emigration, reduced American-investment and tourism to zero. But, hey, after 4 years the country would be so sick of them, we wouldn't have to worry about them for 100 years.
all that unemployment people could spend their time writing on indymedia. Together we can make it happen