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September 25 - October 08, 2020
Affairs of the Nation
FRENCH GO FOR BAILEY — AGAIN
THE SUPREME Court will rule next month on the appeal by Ian Bailey against the High Court endorsement of the latest French extradition warrant against him. Last year PJ Walsh,... Read more »
PIRATED DELANEY BOOK
THE BOOK, Champagne Football – which reads more like a can of stale lager being poured over ex-FAI boss John Delaney – by prolific Sunday Times journalist Mark Tighe and... Read more »
BLUESHIRTS BROKE
A HARDENED electorate will hardly weep, but Fine Gael is facing a financial crisis, partly because of Covid-19 but also because of post-election factors and even resentment among the ranks.... Read more »
KINAHANS VS DISSIDENTS
Failure to burn the getaway car after the murder of dissident republican Michael Barr eventually led to the apprehension and jailing of two key Kinahan cartel hitmen. Barr was shot... Read more »
MICHAEL CREED’S LEGACY
IRELAND’S NEW 10-year Agrifood 2030 strategy is in breach of national and EU law and “will expose the department and the state to multiple legal actions”, according to a devastating... Read more »
NEW BROOM AT ‘SINDO’
What’s in a name? That’s a question that Alan ‘New Broom’ English has likely been pondering since taking over at the Sunday Independent. With that in mind, the departure of... Read more »
FEXCO’S COVID ADVICE
FEXCO chief executive Denis McCarthy, son of Fexco founder Brian McCarthy, recently revealed a hitherto unknown medical bent as well as a Donald Trump-like approach to Covid-19. And he expressed... Read more »
TRUSTING CYBER CRIMINALS
SURPRISINGLY LITTLE attention was paid to the cyber ransomware attacks early this year against at least two Irish universities – NUI Galway and Maynooth University – as well as dozens... Read more »
Pillars of Society
PROFILE: GER LYONS
THERE IS a friendly saying in racing circles along the lines of ‘the worse the jockey, the better the trainer’ and there are plenty... Read more »
The Young Bloods
YOUNG BLOOD: TOMMY BOWE
Ever since long-term stalwarts Mark Cagney, Sinéad Desmond and Aidan Cooney departed from Ireland AM, the Virgin Media breakfast show has gone through a... Read more »
Fit to Print?
UCD/‘IRISH TIMES’ PR
A COPY of UCD’s 2020-2021 Alumni magazine recently accompanied each edition of the Irish Times – 50% owners of Gloss Publications, publishers of Alumni – and its 106 pages of... Read more »
KEVIN MYERS’S LITTLE JOKE
A PROVOCATIVE statement from Merrion Press, publishers of Kevin Myers’s recent apologia, Burning Heresies, claims the author “was sacked from the Irish edition of the Sunday Times for allegedly anti-Semitic... Read more »
EVOKING PIPPA’S PRICES
ASSOCIATED NEWSPAPERS (Ireland), publishers of the Mail titles and Evoke.ie, appears to have become exasperated with social influencers, like Pippa O’Connor and others, who have been channelling advertising revenue away... Read more »
Last Refuge
FF REBELS GROW IN NUMBERS
DESPITE THE overall poll numbers, there will be no heave against Fianna Fáil leader and Taoiseach Micheál Martin until a semblance of post-Covid and Brexit stability descends. But if the... Read more »
ALAN KELLY VS DECLAN KELLY
WHAT A fascinating public relations appointment health minister Stephen Donnelly has made by hiring “the global CEO advisory firm” Teneo to remedy the chaotic Covid messaging coming from his department.... Read more »
PHIL HOGAN LIVES
THE BACKSTAGE machinations and paybacks behind the election of Senator Joe O’Reilly as leas cathaoirleach of the Seanad would provide a good script for a political drama. To begin with,... Read more »
Hush Hush
BRITISH-IRISH PATRIOTS
FRANTIC SPECIAL Branch briefings to security correspondents last weekend about growing fascist-linked street violence produced reams of congratulatory copy in the media. Much of this dwelled on how much knowledge... Read more »
COLLUSION DENIALS
THE UNIONIST Belfast Newsletter last week cited unnamed senior police sources as rubbishing the Unquiet Graves film broadcast on RTÉ last Wednesday week. Much of the film centred on the... Read more »
Bog Cuttings
BOG CUTTINGS
‘Gone Buck Mad’ Thomas Thornton (46) of Moneymore, Drogheda, pleaded guilty to a number of charges in Drogheda District Court, including possession of cannabis, the non-display of insurance while driving,... Read more »
Fowl Emissions
GREEN PARTY TEST
AFTER A torrent of negative publicity before and since joining the coalition, the Green Party urgently needs some good news stories if its political fortunes are to be revived. Months... Read more »
GREENWASHING PETROL
It’s a sign of the changing times when an Irish petrol retailer is promoting its ‘green’ credentials. Applegreen claims that “carbon released from our PowerPlus fuels is 100% offset by... Read more »
The Hot Air Brigade
THE HOT AIR BRIGADE
He knows more than anyone across the board, from all these different facets of music industry across different eras. So whatever he comes out with, people have to respect, because... Read more »
High Society
WAITING ON SHEIKH HAMDAN
ASSORTED RACEHORSE owners and breeders are unlikely to be looking forward to the upcoming sales season. The pandemic has obviously scuppered the chances of the usually social outings but this... Read more »
BARRY CONNOLLY’S BIG MOVE
INTERESTING TO see the name of Barry ‘Red Bull’ Connolly associated with one of the biggest residential property purchases of the year, in Sandycove, south Co Dublin. Meanwhile, Connolly’s Foxrock... Read more »
MAURICE O’CONNELL’S SPIRIT
FEATURED IN the ‘My Favourite Room’ section of the Sindo’s Life magazine recently was the great great great-grand-nephew of Daniel O’Connell – one Maurice O’Connell, or Sir Maurice O’Connell as... Read more »
Behind the Scenes
SI’S SMALL CAST
WITH SCREEN Ireland splashing more ‘development’ cash on another tranche of Covid-dependent producers, following its earlier ‘strategic slate development’ effort, it turns out that the board remains little over 50%... Read more »
VIRTUAL AWARDS
BACK IN July, Áine Moriarty’s Irish Film & Television Academy announced the nominees for this year’s (and last year’s) IFTA film and drama awards. The announcement stated, “The Academy is... Read more »
Sport of Kings
STICKY JAM
NORTHERN IRISH-trainer Ronan McNally trains only a handful of horses, but his runners have attracted their share of attention from authorities over the past 18 months, in particular his prolific... Read more »
HEFFERNAN MAKES HIS MOVE
THE NEWS that Irish Champions Weekend took an U8m hit when held behind closed doors was sobering but, in racing terms, there were winners as well as losers. The O’Brien... Read more »
Books
AFTER THE SILENCE- LOUISE O’NEILL (RIVERRUN)
ALTHOUGH promoted as a “twisty page-turner” murder mystery, Louise O’Neill’s much-publicised book is steeped in zeitgeist and dominated by disturbing power struggles within abusive relationships. Having written successfully about these... Read more »
Moneybags
WHAT’S THE POINT OF BALMORAL INT LAND?
AT THE top of the boom in 2006, the McCann brothers, Carl and David, spun a property vehicle out of Fyffes – Blackrock International land, now Balmoral International Land –... Read more »
UNIPHAR’S SHARE PRICE IMPOSSIBLE TO JUSTIFY
IT WAS surprising that Uniphar could float off in July last year and nearly double its share capital, raising €135m at €1.15 a share. The company’s shares have more than... Read more »
The Hot Water Brigade
ABDULAZIZ’S TRANSPARENCY
THE PHOENIX Thoroughbreds debacle rumbles on and, several weeks after dropping the bombshell that the big-spending racing operation was exiting British racing with immediate effect, it was left to the... Read more »
PETER QUEALLY’S PANDEMIC
WITH the media’s focus firmly on the worsening pandemic situation in Dublin in recent weeks, meat plant owners were probably glad of a respite from unwelcome PR – albeit an... Read more »
BEN DUNNE’S PREMIER PROBLEMS
SPARE A thought for Ben Dunne, who hasn’t been able to open his gyms since March and has now lost a keenly fought planning battle with Premier Inns. As far... Read more »
GREG O’NEILL’S UNQUIET LIFE
TWITTER ERUPTED at the revelations contained in the RTÉ documentary Unquiet Graves about British army murder gangs on both sides of the border. Goldhawk’s eye was caught by something else... Read more »
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