Affairs of the Nation Archives

AFFAIRS OF THE NATION

MARY ROBINSON’S SACRED COWS

November 18, 2021

FORMER IRISH president Mary Robinson made headlines around the world for her emotionally charged interview at the Cop26 conference in Glasgow in which,... Read more »

DRINKAWARE’S BAR BILL

November 18, 2021

AFTER NUMEROUS and lengthy delays, the latest phase of the Public Health (Alcohol) Amendment Bill came into effect last week, notably introducing significant... Read more »

Budget Jack Chambers Nicki Minaj B’Tselem Phil Hogan UCD IRTA DIGI Katy Brown Rory Godson Pallonji Mistry Shark Hanlon Frances Ruane Taste of Dublin Listowel Writers’ Week Paddy Curran Harvey Norman Anton Savage Paul Hourican Enda O’Coineen PfP Red C Poll IFTA Ben Gilroy Luke Comer Sue Spence Fingleton Aubrey McCarthy Matt Cooper Parker Green Danny McConnell Gayle Killilea Maura Derivan Ed Honohan INS Arts Council EDAF Emuse Rosslare Golf Club Mairead Casey Colm O’Rourke Stephen Connolly Peter Aiken John Malone Tom Barry Anthony Halpin Ian Kehoe Kevin Bakhurst Geraldine O’Leary Dennis Horgan RUSI Gareth McAllister Ryevale House Joe Macken RUC Omagh Patrick Connolly Paddy Cosgrave The Ditch Newstalk Fake Tan Fred Logue Ian Paisley Sean O’Riordan Margaret Sweeney Jay Bourke Ellie Kisyombe Francesca McDonagh Ted Cunningham National Space Centre An Irish Goodbye Oscar Robert Quirke Ciara Kelly Executive Women Gathering Doug Taylor Florian Haufe Robbie Henshaw Bill Shipsey Breaking the Silence L’Ecrivain Ronan McNally National Lottery Michael Roche Energy Action Balls.ie Newspapers VAT Abbey Theatre Patricia Madden Irish Banking Culture Board Randox Aoife Gallagher Book Dalai Lama Trinity Trevor White RTÉ Chairperson Shane Houlihan Noel Smyth IKC Bob Geldof Landlord Ireland Neutrality Ukraine

JOE MCHUGH’S STRATEGY

November 18, 2021

JOE MCHUGH’S threat to resign from Fine Gael – which party made him a minister twice – if the mica protesters don’t get... Read more »

SHANE ROSS’S BANKING ACCOUNT

November 18, 2021

LAST WEEKEND, Shane Ross took a pop at those he claimed had escaped the sort of abuse poor old Sean Fitzpatrick got as... Read more »

BERTIE AND THE ‘REAL’ PEACEMAKERS

November 18, 2021

WHAT A waspish speech Bertie Ahern made when launching former junior foreign minister Conor Lenihan’s biography, Albert Reynolds, Risk Taker for Peace, last... Read more »

UK LABOUR HUNTS DOWN POET HIGGINS

November 18, 2021

THE BRITISH Labour party, post Jeremy Corbyn, has been in the process of purging left-wing elements from its ranks and even though he... Read more »

BATTLE ROYAL: LORD LOUIS’S DIARIES

November 18, 2021

THE BRITISH government is engaged in a battle royal to conceal the historical papers of the queen’s uncle and former navy admiral, Lord... Read more »

ANNUAL 2021: GOLDHAWK’S AWARDS FOR THE PASSING PARADE 2021

November 18, 2021

Declan Kelly THE 2021 Crisis Management Award of the Year goes to Dancing Declan Kelly – the former head honcho of Teneo –... Read more »

THE ABBEY’S €700,000 DRAMA

November 4, 2021
WITH THE arrival at the Abbey theatre during the summer of Catríona McLaughlin (artistic director) and Mark O’Brien (executive director), the stage was set... Read more »

O’BRIEN VS ZUCKERBERG

November 4, 2021

DENIS O’BRIEN has had a busy couple of weeks, selling off a chunk of his Digicel group to the Aussies and also finding... Read more »

STEFANIE PREISSNER’S PROFITS

November 4, 2021

IT IS increasingly hard to avoid Stefanie Preissner these days (for anybody who might want to), with two separate radio stations opting to... Read more »

MATT DEMPSEY GOES GREEN

November 4, 2021

TIME WAS when Matt Dempsey, former editor of the Irish Farmers Journal and a Kildare farmer himself was the champion of dairy and... Read more »

PHARMACISTS’ STRONG MEDICINE

November 4, 2021

WITH A Covid-19 vaccine booster campaign on the table following the recommendation from the National Immunisation Audit Committee earlier this week, Dermot Twomey... Read more »

CORRECTION

November 4, 2021

IN THE Phoenix edition, October 8, 2021, an article entitled ‘LEGAL SAGA NEAR AN END?’ referred to a 15-year-old legal battle between Bernard... Read more »

‘DIPLOMAT’ DAVID GOODALL

November 4, 2021

NATIONAL UNIVERSITY of Ireland Press recently published The Making of the Anglo-Irish Agreement of 1985 by British diplomat David Goodall – chief driver... Read more »

AINE FLANAGAN’S SAFE BET

November 4, 2021

THE MOST unusual transaction was belatedly reported in Aaron Rogan’s recently published book, Punters: How Paddy Power Bet Billions and Changed Gambling Forever.... Read more »

JILL MAHON’S SUSTAINABILITY

November 4, 2021

WITH CLIMATE change the topic du jour there was no little interest in the recent appointments to the Climate Change Advisory Council (CCAC),... Read more »

IRISH-RUSSIAN MILITARY CONFLICT?

November 4, 2021

THE DEPARTMENT of Foreign Affairs (DFA) website warns Irish citizens to avoid travel to the Central African Republic (CAR) due to its “extremely... Read more »

SINN FÉIN’S SECTION 31

November 4, 2021

A RACY account of the two most dramatic jail breaks in the history of the state – the 1973 helicopter escape from Mountjoy... Read more »

ISRAEL VERSUS SALLY ROONEY

October 21, 2021

SALLY ROONEY’S pro-Palestinian boycott gesture has been lambasted by predictable players – the Israeli embassy, former justice minister Alan Shatter and others –... Read more »

THE COBBLESTONE’S NEW TUNE

October 21, 2021

MUCH HAS been written about the fondness for the Irish traditional music pub the Cobblestone in Smithfield’s North King Street, now the subject... Read more »

BIG TECH, BIG PR

October 21, 2021

AS WHISTLEBLOWER Frances Haugen’s revelations provoked some US politicians into declaring war on Facebook, the tech giants must have taken comfort from the... Read more »

BUMPY RIDE FOR ROSE HYNES

October 21, 2021

IT WAS reported at the weekend that the chair of the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) Rose Hynes criticised former transport minister Shane Ross... Read more »

NOEL KELLY’S NEW LOOK

October 21, 2021

AFTER A turbulent year for ‘agent to the stars’ Noel Kelly’s business, there has been a restructuring of the NK Management group that... Read more »

MONICA LEECH’S COSTS

October 21, 2021

THE COURT of Appeal’s full ruling in the Monica Leech’s challenge to the quantum of legal fees due to her former solicitors has... Read more »

GROUCHO MARX’S CLUB

October 21, 2021

THE HEADS of our new technological universities (TUs) are facing a dilemma worthy of Groucho Marx, who famously said he wouldn’t join any... Read more »

BAR COUNCIL BAR

October 21, 2021

IRELAND’S SOLICITORS have yet again had their inferior status confirmed for them by the superior legal eagles – ie barristers – of the... Read more »

GARDA GUARD SSPX RESISTANCE

October 21, 2021

THE MOST striking aspect of recent revelations about the extremist SSPX Resistance group and its activities in Ireland is not the involvement of... Read more »

MICHEÁL MARTIN’S DOUBLE-JOBBING AG

October 7, 2021

IT WAS good to finally hear from the taoiseach Micheál Martin on the generous leeway afforded to his attorney general Paul Gallagher in... Read more »

‘IRISH TIMES’ HACKS’ COMRADELY REVIEWS

October 7, 2021

GOOD TO see the Irish Times literary corps dropping the modest posturing and indulging instead in honest-to-God literary praise of each other’s personal... Read more »

PARTITION ROW: COVENEY GOES AWOL

October 7, 2021

THE ‘IRISH TIMES’ was chief among those who blamed both sides in the President Higgins partition row for not sorting it out long... Read more »

WHAT IS OUR FOREIGN POLICY?

October 7, 2021

AS ‘PHOENIX’ readers will know, Iveagh House mandarins have for years been determined to move away from the traditional Irish policy of neutrality.... Read more »

BANK OF POPPIES

October 7, 2021

INTERVIEWED BY the Sindo’s Samantha McCaughren recently, Bank of Ireland CEO Francesca McDonagh emphasised her Irish background with references to her Irish antecedents.... Read more »

LEGAL SAGA NEAR AN END?

October 7, 2021

A 15-YEAR-OLD legal conflict between Louth couple Bernard and Viola Bingham and their former solicitor Barry Sheehan began in 2006 and recently reached... Read more »

WE’RE FRACKED

October 7, 2021

WILL THE government, despite its Green component, capitulate in face of the relentless campaign by energy companies to import fracked gas? When John... Read more »

NO SUCH THING AS A FREE JUDGESHIP

October 7, 2021

FEARS THAT public exposure of the guest list at a Fine Gael fundraising dinner for legal eagles would undermine rather than enhance their... Read more »