Five Reasons Why Sarah Palin Will Elect President John McCain

If there is anything other than weeping, gnashing of teeth and rending of garments tonight in the headquarters of the Democratic Party of the United States of America then that Party is in even worse trouble than it already appears. If they are tearing their hair out at least they realise the task ahead; if they are not, they’re in for an even greater tonking at the polls because they don’t know what’s going to hit them.

When the Democrats shot themselves in the foot by not picking the best candidate for the job, Senator Clinton, your thoughtful correspondent and avaricious watcher of world affairs invested a small sum at 7/4 on a McCain win. Now that Senator McCain has destroyed any chance of a post-Convention bounce for Senator Obama by sensationally nominating Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska as his running mate, An Spailpín Fánach is reasonably certain that, barring catastrophe, John McCain will be the 44th President of the United States.

Palin’s nomination is a masterstroke, a move of genius, and a reminder that the Republicans play the political game better than anybody else. The Democrats, by contrast, are innocent as spring lambs. If they were a more reality based group, they would realise that while the Clinton family might not be The Waltons, Senator Clinton represented the Democrats’ greatest chance to beat the Republicans in the election. Senator Clinton had been working on this for thirty-five years and there is no defeat, no setback, no humiliation that she did not overcome. This meant that she was bullet proof, bombproof and flame-retardant for everything, everything, that the Republicans could throw at her.

What was her reward? She was smacked in the small of the back by her own, by a man who has done nothing except talk about himself (the fundamental emptiness of the Obama candidacy is exposed by Charles Krauthammer in the Washington Post this morning rather better than I could ever manage. You go, Chuck). Senator Clinton even said it herself – she had prepared for everything except the prospect of being seriously challenged for the nomination. By the time she realised the danger and recalibrated her guns, it was too late.

The Republicans, by contrast, are fully alive to the danger, and have had time to prepare their arsenal. It will be substantial, as today’s masterstroke proved.

What has the nomination of Sarah Palin, Governor of Alaska, done in terms of the Presidential race? It has done five things.

Firstly, it denied a post-convention bounce to Senator Obama after the Democratic Convention in Denver. It’s an interesting thing too about Senator Obama, and something the Democrats themselves must have noticed – every time Senator Obama was expected to finally sweep Senator Clinton away in the Primaries, she always came back. He’s always threatened, but never delivered. With the press fawning over his every move, Senator Obama should be ahead, not be neck and neck in the polls – he needed the bounce as much as John Kerry did four years ago (for all the good it did Kerry, of course). Now that’s gone – this weekend will be all about Senator Palin, who she is, her career, her favourite cookie recipes, and endless soul-searching from the feminist movement about where a sister’s duty lies.

Which is victory number two for the McCain campaign. RTÉ’s very able Washington Correspondent, Robert Shortt, said on the nine o’clock news just now that it would be naïve to expect all of the Clinton Democrats to switch sides for a sister, and this is correct. But some of them by golly will, and this is enough for the Republicans. They know they won’t win over the bloc, but they will break it up, and that’s just as good.

The third victory of the Palin nomination is that she will neutralise or destroy the Democrats’ Senator Biden in the Vice Presidential debate unless she is an utter dummy, which is unlikely. Senator Biden, you may remember, is an uninspiring figure whose only purpose was to be Obama’s heavy when the fighting got dirty. Biden was to wield the knuckle-duster. But he can’t do that if he’s debating with a woman. Cultures don’t change overnight, and the spectacle of a man trying to bully a woman will have only winner when the voters are making up their minds – especially the white blue collar voters who are left so very cold by Senator Obama. And if Governor Palin takes Senator Biden in the debate, instead of just holding her own – well, my goodness.

The fourth victory of the McCain campaign is one that was missed by Robert Shortt on the Nine O’Clock News, and by Krauthammer in the Washington Post’s snap reaction pages. Both men maintain the fact that Governor Palin is three years younger than Senator Obama will negate the Republicans’ attacks of inexperience against Obama. But experience isn’t about age, it’s about achievement. While Senator Obama has done nothing, Ms Palin has governed Alaska. For a little less than two years, granted, but she has had hands-on gubernatorial experience.

No Senator has been elected President of the United States since John F. Kennedy in 1960; everyone else has been either a former VP, an incumbent or a Governor. Nixon and Reagan were Governors of California, Jimmy Carter was Governor of Georgia and Bill Clinton was Governor of Arkansas. So, instead of giving the Democrats an let-off on the experience stakes, the Republican ticket is even more experienced, not less. Krauthammer’s point about Sarah Palin’s being a heartbeat away from the Presidency damaging the McCain campaign is negated somewhat by the fact that Dan Quayle was Vice President for four years.

The fifth victory is a superficial one, but significant none the less. And that is that Senator McCain now looks younger, because any man in the company of a good looking woman always looks more vital. It’s not terribly rational, but the human condition is not always governed by the rational. During a weekend when the Democrats should have been listening to their engines revving, they’ve only found out just how terribly high the mountain ahead is to climb.





Technorati Tags: politics, US President, US Election, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, John McCain, Sarah Palin

Oidhreacht Ronnie Drew

Foilsíodh leagan an ailt seo i Foinse, nuachtáin seachtainiúil na Gaeilge i rith an deiridh seachtaine, agus táim buíoch go leor dóibh. Táimid go léir ár ndualgas a dhéanamh ar son Ronnie bocht, agus eisean imithe anois ar slí na fírinne.

Suimiúil go leor, i rith na seachtaine, féachaint ar cad a scríobhadh faoi shaol agus shaothar Ronnie Drew, ceoltóir, cainteoir agus croí mór na Dubliners. Bhí an tuairim amach go mbeidh pléaráca a chuireadh níos láidre ná pléaráca Tim Finnegan féin, an tógálaí ar a chlú a sheinneadh Ronnie Drew féin comh minic.

Rinne Ronnie Drew a chuid féin faoina fhinscéal féin. Ba bhreá leis scéal a insint faoi uair ar bhuail sé le Patrick Kavanagh ins na seascaidí, ach níorbh fhéidir leo deoch a fháil toisc nach raibh tigh tábhairne i mBleá Cliath ann gan coisc ar cheachtar nó an mbeirt acu.

Ach bhain níos mó le saol agus saothar Ronnie Drew ná an t-ól. Tá trua agam ar an lucht óg, nach bhfuil aithne níos fearr acu ar Ronnie Drew ná seanfhear baol tinn nó an t-amhrán ainnis sin, The Ballad of Ronnie Drew. Bhí Ronnie Drew níos laidre ná sin, agus mairfidh a chlú go deo mar ball den lucht a thóg ceol na hÉireann slán nuair a bhí sé i mbaol a chailliúnt go deo.

Bhí an t-ádh le mo ghlúin féin gur chonaiceamar agus chualamar Ronnie Drew agus na Dubliners ag deireadh na h-ochtóidí, nuair a líonadh a sheolta arís agus siad ag seint leis na Pogues. Is cuimhin liom go maith - agus is féidir an scannán a fheiceáil fós ar You Tube beannaithe - nuair a bhíodar ar Top of the Pops i 1987 ag seinm The Irish Rover. Is cuimhin liom fós freisim titim mo chroí nuair a d'fhágadar an ardán agus tháinig Curiosity Killed the Cat in a n-ionad. A léitheoir, cé atá ag éisteacht le Curiosity Killed the Cat anois?

Ach ní raibh ann ach blás a n-iar-ghóire. Chun tabhachtach Ronnie Drew agus na Dubliners a thuiscint i gceart, caithfear dul siar chuig na caogaidí, aimsir bhocht dhuairc in Éirinn. Seinneadh an ceol sa Chlár agus i gCorca Duibhne fós, ach ní raibh aon meas ag an bpobal mór ar a cheol agus a n-amhráin féin.

Ansin, an t-athrú; bhí an t-ádh dearg ag an gceol gur tharla an aiséirí cheoil tíre i Méiriceá, agus nuair a tháinig an scéal abhaile go raibh ceathrair Gaeil ó Thiobraid Árann agus Ard Mhaca ag canadh Brennan on the Moor i Halla Carnegie, Nua Eabharc, thit sé ar na Gaeil seans go mbaineann níos mó leis na sean-amhráin ná an ganntanas agus an bochtanas agus an drochshaol.

Bhí an tír réidh a h-amháin féin a ghlacadh, agus ba iad na Dubliners na buachaillí a bhfillfeadh iadsan ar áis dí. Bhí sár-cheoltóirí ag na Dubliners i John Sheehan ar an bhfidil agus Barney McKenna ar an mbainseo, rud a chabhraigh na seancheoltóirí, na fir a choinneáil an ceol beo, na Dubliners a ghlacadh mar cheoltóirí, fir ina mbeadh an ceol slán ina seilbh. Bhí Ciarán Bourke sa Dubliners mar fear mór an chultúir, a chasadh amhráin Gaeilge leo roimh a theip a shláinte air. Bhí duine de na n-amhránaí is fearr riamh acu i Luke Kelly, agus bhí Ronnie Drew acu.

Ní raibh an guth is binne riamh ag Ronnie Drew, ach thug an guth searbh garbh sin bua do na Dubliners nár dtabharfadh guth níos binne, agus is í sin an fhírinne. Nuair a chloistear guth Ronnie Drew ag seinm faoi fhir ag obair ar bhóithre Shasana, nó ar an seanbhean sin Dicey Reilly a bhí tógtha go dona leis an ól, bhí fios agat gurbh é an fíorscéal atá le cloisteáil agat. Tar éis na céadta bliain ag tabhairt meas don duine seo nó an duine siúd, ba é Ronnie Drew Gael a ndéarfadh "seo mo ghuth féin, agus mura dtaitníonn sé leat teigh chun an diabhal a mhic."

Fear misneach cróga ab ea Ronnie Drew, a sheas nuair a raibh fonn ag an tír ar dhaoine a sheasamh ar a son agus ar son a cultúir. Níl eolas againne ar saol slí na fírinne, ach má tá an ceart ann sa domhain seo chugainn nach mbíonn ann i gcónaí sa domhan seo againne, tá Ronnie agus Luke agus Ciarán, agus Bob Lynch bocht freisin, ag seinm arís le chéile. Agus guím freisin go mbuailfidh Ronnie le Paddy Kavanagh bocht, file mór na tuaithe, agus go ngeobhaidh siad tigh oscailte dóibh tar éis an tsaoil.





Technorati Tags: Gaeilge, ceol, cultúr, Ronnie Drew, The Dubliners, oidhreacht, comóradh

Bertie Ahern and the Road to Croker

It was with no small amount of trepidation that your faithful historian of contemporary Irish life settled himself into his armchair last night to watch – or sit through – The Road to Croker on RTÉ 2 last night, presented by former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern.

It seems plain that the show’s original premise was that Dublin would be safely in the semis by the time the show went on air, so RTÉ would be able to use Bertie in the most beloved of their GAA “angles,” the Dub in rural Ireland. You can imagine them pitching it, can’t you? “It’ll be just like Witness, that Harrison Ford movie, about the city guy lost in the country, but instead of Amish, we’ll have, you know, boggers.”

And so it came to pass, Tyrone having knocked Dublin on the head last Saturday notwithstanding. A navy and blue outfitted Bertie made his regal entrance, and asked “who better to have by your side than two high ranking generals from Heffo’s army?” before introducing James Keveaney and Patrick Cullen.

Who better, indeed?

Let’s put this in perspective. Imagine, for a second, that you’re a current Cork footballer. You’re on the second violin to the hurlers for your entire life, and now the rise of Munster rugby could wipe you out entirely. You’re a Munster Champion but, looking back on that day in July, it’s only beginning to dawn on you that you may have been sold a pup.

And on the eve of what is almost certainly your last run out in the Championship, you have to sit through a load of old blather about Dublin in the rare old times? This is 2008 – Heffo’s army is about as relevant as George Armstrong Custer’s.

How very depressing. The history of shows like The Road to Croker has always been a sad one. There is a part of An Spailpín that is irresistibly drawn to them, because they are aimed right smack at his demographic. But it’s a sad truth that Irish television, and especially RTÉ, knows very little about how to handle the Irish rural experience. Why don’t they get John Waters involved, or that guy that wrote Pure Mule? Instead, we just get the same old soft chat that hasn’t changed since Liam Ó Murchú.

An Spailpín has been haunted by something Derek Davis said on one of those Sunday brunch shows on the radio the weekend Brian Cowen was elected. “The Dublin media don’t understand rural Ireland,” said the big man. “They never understood Reynolds and they won’t understand Cowen.”

The GAA programs like The Road to Croker and Up for the Final are evidence of this. An Spailpín is convinced that the reason for Des Cahill having a career at all is because he is seen by RTÉ panjandrums as someone who can speak to the country bumpkins, just as the Victorians treasured the polygot ability of Sir Richard Burton – a chap who could speak bongo-bongo but didn’t actually go native (although they were never quite sure about Burton).

Bertie Ahern is a natural replacement to Cahill in this regard. Ahern’s support of the Dubs was portrayed in the press in terms of wonderment, like a sporting version of Tourrette’s. The place to see and be seen these days in the capital is the RDS for the Leinster rubby. It was never Croke Park. The rubby fans are only there under sufferance, bussed safely back and forth from Ballsbridge. Like Oisin home from Tír na nÓg, their feet must never touch the Northside. The notion of a man who had never committed farming and actually wanted to be in Croke Park is beyond comprehension.

And so the show stumbled along, helplessly bound by its limits. There was a marvellous but cruelly brief VT piece about the Gaeltacht club itself, including some comments from a Frenchman atá ina chónaí sa cheantar agus Gaeilge bhreá bhríomhar aige, bail ó Dhia air, and a joke VT about the history of Croke Park with the usual blather about the rugby. But the interview with the witty Paul Flynn of Waterford was a missed opportunity, the sharpshooter competition is thin enough gruel, and it all petered out harmlessly with some more blather from P Sé himself and a token preview of the game on Sunday.

Cork got their first mention of the show at sixteen minutes past nine. It’s not easy feel for a Corkman, but this was no way to treat a team who are playing in August in Croke Park, even if they are Bolsheviks. An Spailpín’s naughty angel was hoping that the show would show a sense of humour at the last by having Bertie perform his famous whip around as the titles rolled, his customary party piece at such functions according to press reports of earlier in the year, but no joy. Ah well. Maybe next time.

FOCAL SCOIR: Anybody notice anything about that link for The Road to Croker up the way? Says it all, really. Sigh.





Technorati Tags: Ireland, culture, RTÉ, TV, GAA, Bertie Ahern, The Road to Croker

So. Farewell Then, Ronnie Drew

How shocking it was to hear this afternoon that Ronnie Drew is gone at last at the brave age of seventy-three, a little over a year since the passing of Tommy Makem. We knew that he was ill, but there’s an awful finality about death, a never no more that brooks no argument.

Ronnie Drew has been a public figure in Ireland for over forty years. That’s a long time. Is it possible that every generation has their own Ronnie Drew? In the recent documentary September Song, made by his son Phelim, Ronnie Drew was surprisingly dismissive of his legacy, even the notion of him having a legacy in the first place. “I never did anything much,” he kept saying during that lonesome film.

A generation may now know him only as the feature of that recent travesty, the wretched and depressing Ballad of Ronnie Drew – what other evidence have they? The Dubliners got very old in the past decade, and Ronnie Drew no longer toured with them. Their last recording of significance had Paddy Reilly replacing Ronnie Drew as the band’s frontman. To fully understand Ronnie Drew and his role in Irish life, if there is such a thing as Irish life, it’s necessary to excavate further.

Ronnie Drew and the Dubliners came into the consciousness of my generation – children of the 1970s – when they appeared on the Late Late Show tribute to the Dubliners in 1987, twenty-one years ago. Ronnie Drew and the Dubliners themselves were initially apprehensive about the program, not least as it was made only three years after the death of Luke Kelly, the Dubliners’ greatest talent. In Luke’s absence, Ronnie Drew became the personification of the band, their grit and attitude, and they enjoyed a return to the bigtime when they returned to Top of the Pops, twenty years after their first appearance, to guest with the Pogues on their version of The Irish Rover.

The Pogues saw The Dubliners as their trailblazing forebears, in terms of singing and drinking. It’s hard to say if the Dubliners themselves ever really knew what to make of the Pogues; they certainly didn’t see themselves as handing on any torches to Shane McGowan et al.

Ronnie Drew was unconcerned with his legacy; he seems a man that just didn’t want to go back working for the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. The Dubliners were one of the acts in the Phoenix Park welcoming back the Irish soccer team after either the 1990 or 1994 World Cup. After a song, Ronnie Drew quipped that the crowd were to tell their Mammies and Daddies that The Dubliners would be playing in the National Stadium later in the week. Whereas the crowd should have answered in one voice “no, Ronnie – we’re here to see you, and to inherit and gladly accept the birthright that you’re passing on to us.” But they didn’t, of course. They never do.

Come West Along the Road, RTÉ’s magnificent and essential archive program about Irish traditional music, featured The Bothy Band last Friday, and presenter Nicholas Carolan remarked that some acts are so revolutionary that it’s hard to recognise just how revolutionary they are, as the revolution has become the accepted norm. If that was true of the Bothys, how much truer is it now of The Dubliners?

When we think of Irish traditional music, we think of ballad groups. But prior to The Dubliners, there were no ballad groups. There was John McCormack, Ruby Murray and the Batchelors, and that was it. Music was being played and sung as it has been for generations in Clare and Corca Duibhne and places like that, but nationally, it didn’t exist. It took the international folk boom of the sixties, and the success of the Clancys and Tommy Makem in America, to legitimise Irish music to the Irish nation, and the blessing is that it happened at just the right time.

A confluence of talents – Seán Ó Riada, the Clancys and Tommy Makem, The Dubliners, Donal Lunny, Christy Moore and others were all in the right place at the right time to breathe new life into the old forms, and to save the music just as surely as the language is lost. Irish singing was always done solo – to sing to accompaniment of guitar, banjo and fiddle was no less revolutionary in the staid sixties that the Pogues’ London punk infusion of twenty years later.

How revolutionary were the Dubliners? Ronnie Drew always said that America didn’t know what to make of them – the suits suggested they weren’t weirdoes, but the beards man, the beards! Had the G-Men heard that, a few weeks after Nelson’s Pillar was blown up by the IRA to commemorate the Rising in 1966, The Dubliners brought the Admiral’s head on stage with them at the Olympia, they might have needed more than suits to get the band their US visas.

In a national context, before Ronnie Drew formed The Dubliners, there was nothing. Ciarán Mac Mahuna said he’d meet fiddlers down the country who used to hide their instruments, and he had to coax them to play. Ronnie Drew and The Dubliners destroyed that stigma forever, and this is why he and Luke and Ciarán are together again now in that little piece of paradise that is reserved solely for heroes of the Gael.

I don’t know what plans RTÉ have to commemorate Ronnie Drew’s passing; I just hope the national broadcaster doesn’t let the nation down. Just repeating September Song would be bitterly disappointing. A repeat of the Late Late Show Tribute to the Dubliners would be more in keeping the momentous nature of Ronnie Drew’s passing – the show had an air of “beloved entertainer” about it which was one of Gay Byrne’s few weaknesses, but the performances remain outstanding and vivid in the memory.

What would be really wonderful, however, and what would perhaps go furthest to clearing away the cobwebs and showing just how revolutionary the Ronnie Drew Folk Group and The Dubliners were, would be a broadcast of O’Donaghue’s Opera, insofar as it can be broadcast.

O’Donoghue’s Bar on Merrion Row, D2, was the seedbed of the Irish traditional and folk revival in Dublin in the 1960s, and a short film was set there based on the ballad “The Night Before Larry Was Stretched.” The short highlights that exist on You Tube are startling and remarkable forty years on, and feature a young Ronnie Drew – how raven black is his beard! – as the eponymous Larry. Reader, imagine what it was like to be in the midst of it at the time, and there, at last, we'll have found the true Ronnie Drew.

Ar dheis Dé go raibh anam uasal Ronnie Drew, laoch mór an cheoil, agus go tseinne sé ceol binn bríomhar na nGael go sioraí lena gcomráidithe Luke agus Ciarán, atá imithe roimhe agus atá buailte go léír le cheile arís i bhFlaithis.








Technorati Tags: Ireland, culture, music, Ronnie Drew, The Dubliners, appreciation, obituary

Jo'Burger? No'Burger!

An Spailpín Fánach has a lean and hungry look. Because cooking for oneself is generally more trouble than it’s worth, your faithful narrator is constantly on the lookout for places to eat in Dublin – not the high end Paddy Guilband effort but someplace where you can go in, drop ten sheets and not be hungry anymore. This is more to ask than may be immediately obvious.

Over one month ago, certain ladies, whose level of cosmopolitan chic is to mine as Chateauneuf-de-Pape is to Buckfast tonic wine, told me of a restaurant in Rathmines. A house where one could dine on the finest of burgers while reading back issues of the Bunty magazine. It is called Jo’Burger.

And so it was thither that An Spailpín repaired on Monday, June 30th last. I entered, and found it was true what they said about the Bunty – the menus are printed on old comic annuals from the 1970s, and as such are cool as. I smiled an impressed smile and shouted a burger, coke and chips.

Things started going pear-shaped when the waiter brought my coke. My silver canned Coke.

“Sorry boss,” I said, “I asked for regular, not diet.”

“This is the house cola,” said the waiter. “We don’t serve Coke or Pepsi.” Because it’s beneath us, you oik, was the unspoken implication.

Oh dear. I studied the can. Made from nuts. Never a good sign. A took a slug. It reminded me of the little bottles of Tesco cola you could get for ten pence when Tesco’s was still Quinnsworth, only flat. A grim and ominous foreboding swept over me, as I stared into the kitchen, wondering at what would emerge.

The waiter emerged, bearing before him a wooden salver containing an enormous apparatus. Was this the burger? Well, yes and no.

The apparatus looked big, but that was because under the bun and on top of the actual burger was a great big leaf of lettuce. Which is great, if you ordered it. An Spailpín, as mentioned above, ordered the burger. What the hell was I meant to do with the other thing? Farm it?

The Jo’Burger charter stipulates that their burgers are never flattened, to keep them moist. Not flattening them also helps people not notice that what they are, chiefly, in their primary characteristic, is small. It’s a tiny burger under a lettuce duvet that would smother Thumbelina. It’s a joke. You can see it up in the picture above, thanks to some kind Flickr photographer. Where’s the beef? Sadly, the beef exists in the nominal plane; the deal in Jo'burger is not the food but the scene. This could explain its currently popularity, as Dublin has long been a poseurs' town.

And, as is so often the case, the sickest joke was the price of the medicine. Over ten sheets for a four ounce burger, fries and a “coke” sir. The lady behind the counter saw how much greenery remained on my plate behind me. Was everything to sir’s satisfaction?

You know how it is. You hate to tell them. We’re still grateful that the blight hasn’t been back since 1847. So I said oh yeah, sure, I guess I’m not as gone on greenery as some people.

“We like to accommodate all tastes,” smiled the bean a’tí, taking the full price. Except carnivores, she didn’t add. An Spailpín left, head down, dejected and dragging the feet.

On the other side of the world, there is a famous bar in Chicago, IL, USA, called the Billy Goat Tavern. A burger costs about three US dollars, and you can have a beer for five bucks. A photograph of same sits happily on your right hand side currently. Eight dollars for a burger and a beer - five yo-yos, give or take. Now you tell me hungry reader – who’s zooming whom?





Technorati Tags: Dublin, culture, food, Jo'Burger

Minding Lovely Derval at the Olympics

The Games of the XXIXth Olympiad will officially commence at eight o'clock tomorrow evening, and the mind of the Irish nation has but one issue bouncing around in the brain – who’s going to mind our lovely Derval O’Rourke and her among all those hopped up buck eejits who fancy their chances with Ireland’s sweetheart in the notorious Olympic village?

Derval O’Rourke first won the nation’s heart when she won the World Indoor Championship of lepping in Moscow about two years ago. She hasn’t won too much since, God love her, and we might be well advised against holding our breath this time out either, but no matter. When Derval won in Moscow she unleashed on the nation the most beautiful smile seen in Irish sports in about twenty years. Cormac Bonnar, former full-forward for Tipperary in the eighties, had a lovely smile as well but he had only about three teeth left in his head – timber takes no prisoners in Tipp, you know. Lovely Derval has the full set of choppers, and when she turns on full beam she wins every heart within swooning distance.

Poor Derval will be busy in China. Not only has she to prepare for the hurdles in the light of yet another injury scare, but An Spailpín Fánach has it on good authority that she promised Seán Óg Ó hAlpín fifteen sets of Mao’s little red book with matching Chairman hats for delivery to Páirc an Chrócaigh by Sunday morning at the latest. They bonded over the breakfast rolls doing those Spars ads, you know. Seán Óg’s plan is that if the wild cats of Kilkenny are tearing Cork asunder coming into the final twenty minutes of hurling, Seán Óg can tip the wink to Dónal Óg and they can all go on strike again. Sure won’t Frank sort it all out later?

With all that on her plate, as well as her own training and preparation, it’s vital that no smartarse son of a bitch goes bothering Ireland’s sweetheart in the Olympic village, every damned one of them full to the gills of calf nuts and amour. It behoves the honour of every member of the Irish Olympic Team to protect lovely Derval, and to soften a few coughs while they’re at it. God knows, they’ll be doing nothing else anyway.

An Spailpín Fánach proposes a tag team strategy. Firstly, the Irish national champion boxer at Light Heavyweight, Kenneth Egan, should be appointed lovely Derval’s official IOC accredited minder and chaperone. He should take the book of Ruth as his light and inspiration, saying to Derval “whither thou goest, I shall also go,” and following that rule to the letter. So some wise guy who’s only over for the dressage will find Big Ken a horse of a different colour. Big Ken has a jaw like the front bucket of a JCB, God bless him – he won’t go down aisy.

But in case he does, or Derval, in a moment of weakness, succumbs to some flash Harry who can cycle a BMX – a BMX! – bike better than anyone else, Plan B comes into action. Plan B is to have Derval room with Siobhán Byrne.

Not only is La Byrne very beautiful, but the Ohio State Buckeye is the first Irish fencer to qualify for the Olympics in sixteen years. So, when Mr BMX slinks his way back to the flat, Siobhan simply reaches for the sabre under the bed and runs the dirty rat through. She then gets on the phone to Big Ken and gets him to dispose of the body, by ating it if he has to. By rights, Siobhán’s duties should also include giving Derval a good telling off, but what force could withstand Derval’s beautiful beam? Best to just run the sword under the tap and say no more about it.





Technorati Tags: Ireland, sport, Olympics, Derval O'Rourke

World Champion in the County Mayo

Forty eight short hours after Mayo’s humiliation in Croke Park, a stunning rebuttal. Yesterday, a Mayoman won the Trout Fly World Cup on Lough Mask, raising the proud green and red colours high once more.

Séamus Kelly of Cloghans, Ballina, fished for five days on Mask before being crowned Champion. Today’s Irish Times story quotes the World Champion as having “caught my two fish close to the Inisowen Rocks on a Green Deer Sedge.” An Spailpín Fánach doesn’t have a clue what that means, but there’s a picture of the cup in the paper - it looks a good big one, and that's good enough for me.

Hats off to Séamus Kelly for putting hair back on the collective chest of the county. Up Mayo!







Technorati Tags: sport, Mayo, fly fishing,
Lough Mask, Séamus Kelly

If Expectations Get Any Damper Mayo Are in Danger of Drowning

An Spailpín Fánach is flattered once more to be allowed the pages of the Mayo News to give his two cents on the end of another bitterly disappointing Championship campaign for the county Mayo. The problem of losing All-Irelands no longer seems as bad when you can't get to them any more.

The speculation about John O'Mahony leaving is depressing. The biggest mistake that O'Mahony made in dropping Ciarán McDonald was in not having any better to replace him - who now would take over from Johnno? Poor John Maughan doesn't seem half the ogre now. Remember the great days in Tuam in July and Croke Park in August? And there was a hot barrel of tar in every town in the county Mayo waiting for him by the time Mayo lost to Kerry in 2005. Eaten bread is soon forgotten.

William Shakespeare, whose contribution to Gaelic games scholarship is all too often overlooked, writes in his twenty-third sonnet of

"... some fierce thing replete with too much rage,
Whose strength's abundance weakens his own heart."

Remind you of anyone? The constant quest for Sam, and having been so near so often so recently, has maddened minds in the County Mayo, and desire has overcome perspective. Mayo people have trouble living in the now; unlike the man on Broadway in the old song, we don't take the day for what it's worth and do the best we can.

But now we have nothing but now as the Dream of Sam dies for another year. We shall make the most of our own Championship, cheer for whomever in the All-Ireland and emerge once more in early spring with the iris and the snowdrop. Muigh Eo abú go deo.






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