Ireland needs new thinking and a new constitution.
In his pep talk to the assembly David Cameron said nothing new. He told us yet again that the constitutional issue is settled. David should try selling that to the dissidents or if Sinn Fein members were surveyed on the matter how many would agree with the Prime Minster? But the constitutional issue is alive and active in Limavady. Boyd Douglas displayed a Union Jack in the council chamber and setting the cat among the constitutional pigeons reduced the chamber to disarray. The Assembly functions on the fallacy that the constitutional issue has gone away in the GFA. This agreement joins at the hip left wing Marxist Republicans with right wing Monarchists. This toxic constitutional cocktail would be poured down the sink in any other democracy but here a hoodwinked people have to drink it because our numbskull sectarian politicians can’t serve anything more palatable.
What is missing in Ireland is new thinking about the country. We have Republicans flogging the dead horse of an all Ireland Republic while Union Jack Unionists flog the dead horse of a United Kingdom. Both have been doing this for over 200 years. Isn’t it time the beasts were declared dead and buried? We now find that a young Sinn Fein Mayor of Belfast is displaying in the City Hall the failed Republicanism of the United Irishmen along with the failed 1916 Proclamation that partitioned the island. This young man is an arch Irish conservative without a new thought in his head. There is unashamed new thinking which sees the sectarian British/Irish problem as constitutional, the constitution needing reform in a new constitution expressed in The National Government of Ireland Act modernising the Kingdom as a Federal Kingdom for all. Where there is no new thinking the people perish. In the deadwood of old conservative thinking, people like Ronan Kerr perish.
Michael Gillespie
Monday, 13 June 2011
Socialism
Socialism and Ireland.
There are those in Sinn Fein who dream of a Socialist Republic in Ireland but the track record of Socialist Republics in the world isn’t good. At one time there was the USSR and there remains North Korea and Cuba. Those who dream of a Socialist Republic for Ireland are Sinn Fein conservatives. These people may say they are Marxist not conservatives but one can be a Marxist and a conservative. Stalin was a Marxist and a conservative who would countenance nothing other than the control of the USSR by the politburo of the communist party. How ever change came to the Soviet Union in Gorbachev’s new ideas of glasnost and perestroika. Democracy followed but this democracy is now corrupted with criminality. Change always needs new ideas. Change came to the Church in Luther’s new ideas on Christianity. Sinn Fein is devoid of new ideas.
This is not a rebuttal of Socialism but questions the package in which socialism is delivered. For those in Sinn Fein who dream of Ireland as an off shore Cuba in relation to Europe such a package would not be acceptable to the Irish people. Socialism in the package of a liberal democracy would be acceptable. The constitutional monarchy of Sweden is a prime example. Sweden is the wealthiest and most egalitarian country in the world due to the progressive insightful policies of successive socialist governments. Ireland as a liberal democracy within a Federal Kingdom constitutional monarchy could emulate Sweden and become a wealthy egalitarian society to be cherished by the people.
Michael Gillespie
There are those in Sinn Fein who dream of a Socialist Republic in Ireland but the track record of Socialist Republics in the world isn’t good. At one time there was the USSR and there remains North Korea and Cuba. Those who dream of a Socialist Republic for Ireland are Sinn Fein conservatives. These people may say they are Marxist not conservatives but one can be a Marxist and a conservative. Stalin was a Marxist and a conservative who would countenance nothing other than the control of the USSR by the politburo of the communist party. How ever change came to the Soviet Union in Gorbachev’s new ideas of glasnost and perestroika. Democracy followed but this democracy is now corrupted with criminality. Change always needs new ideas. Change came to the Church in Luther’s new ideas on Christianity. Sinn Fein is devoid of new ideas.
This is not a rebuttal of Socialism but questions the package in which socialism is delivered. For those in Sinn Fein who dream of Ireland as an off shore Cuba in relation to Europe such a package would not be acceptable to the Irish people. Socialism in the package of a liberal democracy would be acceptable. The constitutional monarchy of Sweden is a prime example. Sweden is the wealthiest and most egalitarian country in the world due to the progressive insightful policies of successive socialist governments. Ireland as a liberal democracy within a Federal Kingdom constitutional monarchy could emulate Sweden and become a wealthy egalitarian society to be cherished by the people.
Michael Gillespie
Sunday, 12 June 2011
Change
To find true peace the Irish will have to change.
Sinn Fein is now considering having the franchise extended to N. Ireland for the election of a Republican President. The party should first take on board the constitutional realities of Ireland. With the GFA which Sinn Fein signed up to, Ireland is divided into two statelets the one foreign to the other. In light of that the proposal for a form of joint sovereignty for Ireland is as nonsensical as proposing a joint sovereignty for the Iberian Peninsula with a joint Portuguese Republican president and a Spanish monarch. Had articles 2 and 3 of the Republic’s constitution not been withdrawn a rational case could have been made for joint sovereignty and the extension of the franchise for the election of a Republican President to N Ireland but since the crafty British aided by woolly headed politicians in Dublin had the articles removed the two statelets in Ireland are now clearly foreign to each other. This constitutional mess has been created by Tricolour Republicans and Union Jack Unionists.
To clear up the mess will require new thought and an acceptance that the traditional conservative thinking in both communities will have to change. It is said that the Irish are a very conservative people but to have change both communities will have to become receptive to new ideas and be open minded. Tricolour Republicanism and Union Jack Unionism will have to accept the necessity for the change of U.K. constitution to a Federal Kingdom constitution giving a new constitution for An Éire Nua peopled by Na Gaeil Nua who accept the Crown as Head of State. Clinging to traditional conservative thought on both sides leads only to intercommunal conflict and sectarian division.
Michael Gillespie
Sinn Fein is now considering having the franchise extended to N. Ireland for the election of a Republican President. The party should first take on board the constitutional realities of Ireland. With the GFA which Sinn Fein signed up to, Ireland is divided into two statelets the one foreign to the other. In light of that the proposal for a form of joint sovereignty for Ireland is as nonsensical as proposing a joint sovereignty for the Iberian Peninsula with a joint Portuguese Republican president and a Spanish monarch. Had articles 2 and 3 of the Republic’s constitution not been withdrawn a rational case could have been made for joint sovereignty and the extension of the franchise for the election of a Republican President to N Ireland but since the crafty British aided by woolly headed politicians in Dublin had the articles removed the two statelets in Ireland are now clearly foreign to each other. This constitutional mess has been created by Tricolour Republicans and Union Jack Unionists.
To clear up the mess will require new thought and an acceptance that the traditional conservative thinking in both communities will have to change. It is said that the Irish are a very conservative people but to have change both communities will have to become receptive to new ideas and be open minded. Tricolour Republicanism and Union Jack Unionism will have to accept the necessity for the change of U.K. constitution to a Federal Kingdom constitution giving a new constitution for An Éire Nua peopled by Na Gaeil Nua who accept the Crown as Head of State. Clinging to traditional conservative thought on both sides leads only to intercommunal conflict and sectarian division.
Michael Gillespie
The Constitution still rules the election roost.
During the campaigning stage of the election there was the spin that politics here are now about bread and butter issues. This was poppycock. There was a nationalist/Republican green sectarian constitutional vote along with a unionist orange
sectarian constitutional vote. The sectarian constitutional nature of the campaign came to the fore with Tom Elliot’s outburst about a foreign nation when in Omagh. Legal purists may argue using the British Nationality Act1948 and the Irish Act 1949 that Tom is wrong but these acts simply bring the law into line with the reality that the Irish and British people don’t regard each other as alien. But Tom was simply expressing the popular loyalist perception that the Republican Tricolour is the flag of a foreign nation. The Acts noted do nothing to dispel that popular loyalist perception and the Irish Tricolour is as foreign for them as the French and Italian tricolours. Once I had to post a parcel to Dublin and I expressed surprise at the cost. The clerk explained that Dublin is in a foreign country and that was the reason. It costs the same to post a letter to Donegal as to Germany or Moscow so if the Post Office treats the Republic as foreign why shouldn’t Loyalists? The culprits in dividing Ireland into two separate foreign statelets are Republicans not Loyalists. I know Republicans who regard the Queen as foreign and if Martin Maguinness doesn’t why won’t he meet her? All in all the constitutional conflict still rules the roost in Omagh. Tom Elliot has a low opinion of Sinn Fein. There are many like Tom in both communities. In a free country why can’t such people express their opinion? The British/Irish problem is deeply rooted in the Constitution and can only be resolved in a full-blooded reform of U.K. Constitution to a Federal Kingdom Constitution.
Michael Gillespie Derry Federal Unionist-Early Sinn Fein
During the campaigning stage of the election there was the spin that politics here are now about bread and butter issues. This was poppycock. There was a nationalist/Republican green sectarian constitutional vote along with a unionist orange
sectarian constitutional vote. The sectarian constitutional nature of the campaign came to the fore with Tom Elliot’s outburst about a foreign nation when in Omagh. Legal purists may argue using the British Nationality Act1948 and the Irish Act 1949 that Tom is wrong but these acts simply bring the law into line with the reality that the Irish and British people don’t regard each other as alien. But Tom was simply expressing the popular loyalist perception that the Republican Tricolour is the flag of a foreign nation. The Acts noted do nothing to dispel that popular loyalist perception and the Irish Tricolour is as foreign for them as the French and Italian tricolours. Once I had to post a parcel to Dublin and I expressed surprise at the cost. The clerk explained that Dublin is in a foreign country and that was the reason. It costs the same to post a letter to Donegal as to Germany or Moscow so if the Post Office treats the Republic as foreign why shouldn’t Loyalists? The culprits in dividing Ireland into two separate foreign statelets are Republicans not Loyalists. I know Republicans who regard the Queen as foreign and if Martin Maguinness doesn’t why won’t he meet her? All in all the constitutional conflict still rules the roost in Omagh. Tom Elliot has a low opinion of Sinn Fein. There are many like Tom in both communities. In a free country why can’t such people express their opinion? The British/Irish problem is deeply rooted in the Constitution and can only be resolved in a full-blooded reform of U.K. Constitution to a Federal Kingdom Constitution.
Michael Gillespie Derry Federal Unionist-Early Sinn Fein
Loyalist Ireland
Lets Include Protestant Loyalist Ireland.
In the letter 5th March J A Barnwell Dublin quotes Parnell thus: -
“No man has the right to fix the boundaries to the march of a nation.”
History in Ireland has demonstrated these words to be rhetorical bombast. Ireland as it is now constituted is not a nation (and isn’t likely to be) but is comprised of two statelets a 26 county statelet constituted as a Republic and a 6 county statelet constituted as being under the Crown. In this quote from Parnell J A Barnwell is trotting out the outworn shibboleth that Parnell was a Republican. Parnell was a Home Rule constitutional nationalist and if he had been offered a government for Ireland under the Crown he would have grabbed it with both hands. The same could be said of Pearse prior to the lunacy of 1916.
J A Barnwell favours self determination (so do I) but which self is to determine the destiny of Ireland? Is it to be a Catholic Republican self alone? Like all Republicans J A Barnwell has a blind spot when it comes to Protestant Loyalist Ireland. They don’t seem to exist but they do. Has that community not got the same right to determine the destiny of Ireland equal to Catholic Republicans? A hard-nosed politician would concede that they do. Since the Protestant Loyalist community in Ireland should have equal rights in determining the destiny of the nation then the reformed Crown will have to be part of it as Head of State of the Sovereign Nation of all Ireland within a Federal Kingdom. That is pragmatic realism far removed from the Republican dreamland of J A Barnwell in Dublin.
Michael Gillespie
In the letter 5th March J A Barnwell Dublin quotes Parnell thus: -
“No man has the right to fix the boundaries to the march of a nation.”
History in Ireland has demonstrated these words to be rhetorical bombast. Ireland as it is now constituted is not a nation (and isn’t likely to be) but is comprised of two statelets a 26 county statelet constituted as a Republic and a 6 county statelet constituted as being under the Crown. In this quote from Parnell J A Barnwell is trotting out the outworn shibboleth that Parnell was a Republican. Parnell was a Home Rule constitutional nationalist and if he had been offered a government for Ireland under the Crown he would have grabbed it with both hands. The same could be said of Pearse prior to the lunacy of 1916.
J A Barnwell favours self determination (so do I) but which self is to determine the destiny of Ireland? Is it to be a Catholic Republican self alone? Like all Republicans J A Barnwell has a blind spot when it comes to Protestant Loyalist Ireland. They don’t seem to exist but they do. Has that community not got the same right to determine the destiny of Ireland equal to Catholic Republicans? A hard-nosed politician would concede that they do. Since the Protestant Loyalist community in Ireland should have equal rights in determining the destiny of the nation then the reformed Crown will have to be part of it as Head of State of the Sovereign Nation of all Ireland within a Federal Kingdom. That is pragmatic realism far removed from the Republican dreamland of J A Barnwell in Dublin.
Michael Gillespie
A Refferendum
Ireland should follow Scotland’s constitutional Path.
In a T.V. interview Alex Salmond stated categorically that he envisaged an independent Scotland with the Crown as head of state like those other independent nations in the modern world that have the Crown as head of state. In this Alex Salmond is stating clearly that he is a constitutional nationalist not a Republican. With that distinction a suggested referendum for Scotland’s independence should take the following form: -
Do you wish Scotland to be a sovereign independent nation with
(a) The Scotland Constitution Act as its constitution making the Crown Scotland’s head of state?
(b) A Republican Constitution with a president as head of state?
For a nation to be a nation it must have an agreed constitution. The Irish have been in conflict over the constitution for centuries. In a referendum for all Ireland identical to the suggested Scotland’s referendum Ireland should replace Scotland and The National Government of Ireland Act should replace the Scotland Constitution Act. The referendum should be counted separately in the 6 and 26 counties. The Queen’s state visit to the Republic is a step in the right direction but to unite and stabilise Ireland an agreed constitution will require the acceptance of a reformed elected Crown as head of state in an all Ireland within a Federal Kingdom. There is more on a Federal Kingdom at www.authorhouse.co.uk by typing my name into search.
Michael Gillespie Federal Unionist-Early Sinn Fein Derry
In a T.V. interview Alex Salmond stated categorically that he envisaged an independent Scotland with the Crown as head of state like those other independent nations in the modern world that have the Crown as head of state. In this Alex Salmond is stating clearly that he is a constitutional nationalist not a Republican. With that distinction a suggested referendum for Scotland’s independence should take the following form: -
Do you wish Scotland to be a sovereign independent nation with
(a) The Scotland Constitution Act as its constitution making the Crown Scotland’s head of state?
(b) A Republican Constitution with a president as head of state?
For a nation to be a nation it must have an agreed constitution. The Irish have been in conflict over the constitution for centuries. In a referendum for all Ireland identical to the suggested Scotland’s referendum Ireland should replace Scotland and The National Government of Ireland Act should replace the Scotland Constitution Act. The referendum should be counted separately in the 6 and 26 counties. The Queen’s state visit to the Republic is a step in the right direction but to unite and stabilise Ireland an agreed constitution will require the acceptance of a reformed elected Crown as head of state in an all Ireland within a Federal Kingdom. There is more on a Federal Kingdom at www.authorhouse.co.uk by typing my name into search.
Michael Gillespie Federal Unionist-Early Sinn Fein Derry
New Thinking
Ireland needs new thinking and a new constitution.
In his pep talk to the assembly David Cameron said nothing new. He told us yet again that the constitutional issue is settled. David should try selling that to the dissidents or if Sinn Fein members were surveyed on the matter how many would agree with the Prime Minster? But the constitutional issue is alive and active in Limavady. Boyd Douglas displayed a Union Jack in the council chamber and setting the cat among the constitutional pigeons reduced the chamber to disarray. The Assembly functions on the fallacy that the constitutional issue has gone away in the GFA. This agreement joins at the hip left wing Marxist Republicans with right wing Monarchists. This toxic constitutional cocktail would be poured down the sink in any other democracy but here a hoodwinked people have to drink it because our numbskull sectarian politicians can’t serve anything more palatable.
What is missing in Ireland is new thinking about the country. We have Republicans flogging the dead horse of an all Ireland Republic while Union Jack Unionists flog the dead horse of a United Kingdom. Both have been doing this for over 200 years. Isn’t it time the beasts were declared dead and buried? We now find that a young Sinn Fein Mayor of Belfast is displaying in the City Hall the failed Republicanism of the United Irishmen along with the failed 1916 Proclamation that partitioned the island. This young man is an arch Irish conservative without a new thought in his head. There is unashamed new thinking which sees the sectarian British/Irish problem as constitutional, the constitution needing reform in a new constitution expressed in The National Government of Ireland Act modernising the Kingdom as a Federal Kingdom for all. Where there is no new thinking the people perish. In the deadwood of old conservative thinking, people like Ronan Kerr perish.
Michael Gillespie
4
In his pep talk to the assembly David Cameron said nothing new. He told us yet again that the constitutional issue is settled. David should try selling that to the dissidents or if Sinn Fein members were surveyed on the matter how many would agree with the Prime Minster? But the constitutional issue is alive and active in Limavady. Boyd Douglas displayed a Union Jack in the council chamber and setting the cat among the constitutional pigeons reduced the chamber to disarray. The Assembly functions on the fallacy that the constitutional issue has gone away in the GFA. This agreement joins at the hip left wing Marxist Republicans with right wing Monarchists. This toxic constitutional cocktail would be poured down the sink in any other democracy but here a hoodwinked people have to drink it because our numbskull sectarian politicians can’t serve anything more palatable.
What is missing in Ireland is new thinking about the country. We have Republicans flogging the dead horse of an all Ireland Republic while Union Jack Unionists flog the dead horse of a United Kingdom. Both have been doing this for over 200 years. Isn’t it time the beasts were declared dead and buried? We now find that a young Sinn Fein Mayor of Belfast is displaying in the City Hall the failed Republicanism of the United Irishmen along with the failed 1916 Proclamation that partitioned the island. This young man is an arch Irish conservative without a new thought in his head. There is unashamed new thinking which sees the sectarian British/Irish problem as constitutional, the constitution needing reform in a new constitution expressed in The National Government of Ireland Act modernising the Kingdom as a Federal Kingdom for all. Where there is no new thinking the people perish. In the deadwood of old conservative thinking, people like Ronan Kerr perish.
Michael Gillespie
4
Ireland Needs a closer Link with the Crown than a one-off Visit
Ireland needs a closer link with the Crown than a one off visit.
It will come as a relief to a partitionist Dail Eireann and a partitionist Dublin that the Royal visit seemingly gives the Royal assent to the border. But the assent will only be partial for as long as there remains no-go areas for her Majesty in the districts of the Falls in Belfast and the Bogside in Derry within the Kingdom. Should the day come when Her Majesty does a walk about in these districts with the people waving Union Jacks and proffering red white and blue posies to the Royal person with the blessing of Martin Magennis and Katrina Anderson while the cathedral choirs of St Peter’s and St Eugene’s chorus-- Rule Britannia-- in the background then partition in Ireland is there for keeps.
That of course is a ridiculous scenario but it isn’t ridiculous to say that the Catholic community in Ireland is brainwashed with Tricolour Republicanism and the Protestant community in Ireland is brainwashed with Union Jack Unionism and as long as that is the case the border will be a bone of contention on the island. When the day comes when both communities are freed from the mental shackles of this sectarianism and thus freed both communities accept a reformed Crown as Head of State of the Sovereign Nation of all Ireland within a Federal Kingdom then and only then will the border be obsolete and the sickness of sectarianism be eradicated from the Island. To achieve this Ireland needs a closer link with the Crown than a one off visit to Dublin.
In having the Republic join the Commonwealth is insufficient and will do nothing to eradicate sectarianism.
Michael Gillespie
It will come as a relief to a partitionist Dail Eireann and a partitionist Dublin that the Royal visit seemingly gives the Royal assent to the border. But the assent will only be partial for as long as there remains no-go areas for her Majesty in the districts of the Falls in Belfast and the Bogside in Derry within the Kingdom. Should the day come when Her Majesty does a walk about in these districts with the people waving Union Jacks and proffering red white and blue posies to the Royal person with the blessing of Martin Magennis and Katrina Anderson while the cathedral choirs of St Peter’s and St Eugene’s chorus-- Rule Britannia-- in the background then partition in Ireland is there for keeps.
That of course is a ridiculous scenario but it isn’t ridiculous to say that the Catholic community in Ireland is brainwashed with Tricolour Republicanism and the Protestant community in Ireland is brainwashed with Union Jack Unionism and as long as that is the case the border will be a bone of contention on the island. When the day comes when both communities are freed from the mental shackles of this sectarianism and thus freed both communities accept a reformed Crown as Head of State of the Sovereign Nation of all Ireland within a Federal Kingdom then and only then will the border be obsolete and the sickness of sectarianism be eradicated from the Island. To achieve this Ireland needs a closer link with the Crown than a one off visit to Dublin.
In having the Republic join the Commonwealth is insufficient and will do nothing to eradicate sectarianism.
Michael Gillespie
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
