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Lynx By Ten To The Power Of One Thousand Nine Hundred And Ten

 

A Morning Thought @ 3086

Gearóid Ó Loingsigh ☭ writing in Substack on 1-March-2026.

The English band Chumbawamba recorded a song called The Day The Nazi Died about how the Nazis never really went away.[1] The song references the Nazi leader Rudolf Hess, who was not executed following WWII but was instead held a prisoner in Spandau Prison until he took his own life at the age of 93. The song asks why when we were told that the Nazis had died did they all come out on the day Hess died, and points to the boardrooms of companies as maggots getting fat on the decaying flesh of capitalist society. They band were not wrong. Some of the Nazis and boards of companies that did not go away are now involved in the genocide in Palestine. Goosestepping as a military parade practice has gone out of fashion in most Western countries, but stomping on the peoples of the world is very much in fashion.

Many companies such as Porsche, Mercedes, Volkswagen and even IG Farben, the manufacturers of the gas used to murder millions in the camps, went unpunished after WWII. Some companies were even compensated for the damage to their factories. Lots of other German companies passed under the radar. Hugo Boss was never taken to task for making the Nazis look so sexy in their murderous swagger. And Allianz, the German insurance company that insured parts of the camps and the ghettos against fire and damage to their installations, survived intact. Apparently, they didn’t specifically insure the ovens or gas chambers, but the camps were a whole unit. Any part insured contributed to all of it running smoothly. Of course those who died in the gas chambers and were pushed like peat briquettes through the ovens were not covered, just the Nazi property. Hugo Boss can make no claims to being pressured, he was a member of the Nazi party before Hitler ever took power. He wasn’t betting on which horse won the race, he was the horse in the race.

Allianz likes to present itself as just another company that did business with the Nazis in order to continue functioning and that they had no choice. Krupps makes similar claims about its use of slave labour, saying they had to. That is a dubious claim when you look at their history. But also morally there is no basis to it. You always have the choice, some Germans lost their lives fighting the Nazis, not losing your money is hardly an excuse. What companies such as Allianz did is make a cost-benefit analysis. They calculated that not doing business with the Nazis would affect their profits, so they insured the camps but not the people pushed through the ovens. The company claims a certain naivety on its part about what was happening. But you can only take that at face value if you ignore that the director general of the company, the antisemite Dr Kurt Schmitt, resigned his post with Allianz in 1933 to become Hitler’s first Reich Minister of Economic Affairs, having previously turned down the post when it was offered to him by the Von Papen government before the Nazis took over. He had to step down for health reasons, but when he recovered he went back to Allianz to administer it. 

It also claims it made no money from the camps contract. This does not mean there was no money to be made, it means it wasn’t as profitable a contract as it thought, but it managed to get other contracts from the Nazis. If you read the company’s website you come away with the distinct impression that they would like us to think they were a victim of the Nazis and we should pity them. It turns out, because they were on the losing side and because the war didn’t go ahead as planned with Hitler steamrolling his way to Moscow, the war was not as profitable as it should have been for insurance companies. And in the following quote it is clear that 1943, following the Nazi defeat at Stalingrad, the tide turned not only in the war but in the accounts ledgers.

After Germany overran Poland in 1939, the business of the insurance sector became characterized by the risks associated with the war. Doing business in wartime meant obeying the principle of “minimizing new dangers and taking maximum advantage of new business opportunities.” The repercussions of the war were detrimental to business as a whole and at the end of the war, Allianz was on the brink of ruin. Even so, until 1943 the company had managed to increase its profits by a considerable margin.[2]

Even today the company whitewashes its record and states in glowing language that:

Kurt Schmitt’s energetic course of expansion in the 1920s had made Allianz the largest insurance company in Germany. In 1933, Schmitt became Minister of Economic Affairs in Adolf Hitler’s government. In 1935, he resigned from this post as he was unable to implement his political ideas and his health was failing. After his recovery, he returned to Allianz and in 1938 became General Director of Munich Re.[3]

No, not true, the Nazi stepped down because he had a heart attack, not over disagreements about economic policy. And though it is not stated, there is a sleight of hand which leaves you wondering whether he had disagreements over the treatment of Jews. This antisemite had no such disagreements with the Nazis at all. He was well known to them before they ever took power. He knew who and what they were. The company’s site is not that detailed about the period and there are lots of sleights of hands in how it presents information. For example, it is mentioned that the company opposed Nazi attempts to nationalise the insurance industry. But not because they opposed the Nazis, but because it might affect their profit margins.

But not even Allianz can completely deny reality. Their site does acknowledge that it began to come clean about its role following a lawsuit in the US against insurance companies and set up a study into its activities.[4] It did it, because it was forced to. Had they really been forced to insure the Nazis against their will they wouldn’t have waited till 1997 to start publicly owning up. They commissioned Dr Feldman a Jewish historian to look at their history. He quotes Schmitt as talking about the Nazi position on Jews as explained to him by Göring that:

I must honestly say, that I had no reservations about this line, for it cannot objectively be contested that in our public and intellectual life, beginning with the Reichstag, in the press, and also in many scientific faculties, in the legal field and above all in the Berlin banking business, the Jews had too strong and too loud and also an unhealthy influence.[5]

Feldman goes on to say of this that:

…it is important to recognize that the responsibility for the evils that he [Schmitt] and his organization [Allianz] were to experience and perpetrate during the coming years lay to an important extent in the fact that he (and others like him) shared a political culture and an anti-Semitic posture that made the coming and installation of the Third Reich possible.[6]

Of Schmitt, he says that:

Schmitt was rather more enthusiastic and active than his colleagues in pandering to the new order at this time. Not only was he prominently on display at the aforementioned Hitler birthday festivities, he also catered to the “socialistic” side of the regime while playing the public defender of employer interests with the new rulers as well.[7]

Now we have come full circle. The people who tried to profit from the Third Reich and the camps are once again involved in a genocide, not only as an insurance company but also as a direct investor. Allianz has invested USD 960 million in Israeli war bonds, or genocide bonds as they are more accurately known. In 50 years time, they might hire some Palestinian historian to write the history of collaboration in yet another genocide and their website might just say they had no choice but to maximise profits in line with their legal duty to their shareholders or some such rubbish. Last time, none of the Allianz board were sent to the gallows. They all did very well out of the war and the company went on to become not just Germany’s largest insurance company but a major player in the global insurance industry. It is as the Chumbawamba song says:

The world is riddled with maggots; the maggots are getting fat
They’re making a tasty meal of all the bosses and bureaucrats
They’re taking over the boardrooms, and they’re fat and full of pride.

This time, should we ever get a day of reckoning to cite the much abused quote from Karl Marx, we should make no excuses for the terror. They should have all their assets confiscated and they should meet their end hanging from a rope.

So if you meet with these historians, I’ll tell you what to say
Tell them that the Nazis never really went away
They’re out there burning houses down and peddling racist lies

And we’ll never rest again until every Nazi dies

References

[1] See

[2] See 

[3] See

[4] See 

[5] Feldman, G.D (2001) Allianz and the German Insurance Business, 1933-1945. Berkley. University of California Press p.58

[6] Ibid., p.59

[7] Ibid., p.66

⏩ Gearóid Ó Loingsigh is a political and human rights activist with extensive experience in Latin America.

The Nazis Never Went Away 🪶 Israel, Allianz And Holocaust Companies

Gowain McKenna ✍ with a poem.

The Conscious Rebel

In the homes of Ireland from North to South and East to West,

The Republic lies sleeping under the stairs,

By now surely comatose but somehow still living,

Awaiting some resurgence to spring anew,

If one should ever come,

♞♜♝

Dear Comrades,

The fault is not in the stars but in ourselves:

Have we succumbed to pawing over greasy tills,

To be thinking only of ourselves,

Our vision has narrowed to that of an Ant,

Being wedded only to the past,

Our failure was to not move with the times,

For this is not 1916, or even ‘81,

And today will it be worth another mother’s son?

To commemorate may be a fine and honorable thing,

But now we too must stand with the living, nay?

⏩ Gowain McKenna is a Belfast born engineer and musician. He has an M.Phil, MS.c and B.Eng in Aerospace Engineering, but has somehow found himself working in the marine industry in Co. Donegal Ireland, the place from which he now calls home. Visit his website.

The Conscious Rebel

Christopher Owens 🔖 Centres are vital for subcultures.

As a place to meet likeminded people, share life changing experiences, debate ideas and act as a beacon for those looking for an alternative environment, they are second to none. Beautiful things can happen in there, and you can change people's worldviews and behaviours. Look at Belfast’s own Warzone Centre as such an example.

Unsurprisingly, London had many similar places in the late 60’s through to the late 80’s. One place not seemingly discussed as much as others was the Centro Iberico even though it could trace its heritage to the Spanish Civil War. So full credit to Nick Soulsby for delving into the archives to offer up this tome which balances the politics and the subculture with aplomb.

Beginning with the tale of Miguel J. M García García and his participation in the fight against Franco, which sees him spending 20 years in prison after having a death sentence commuted to life imprisonment, his move to London after being released not only leads to a flurry of activity from the Anarchist Black Cross but also Britain’s only postwar paramilitary organisation: The Angry Brigade.

Thus began the first incarnations of Centro Iberico. Dedicated to supporting and fundraising for the new generation of anti-Franco operatives as well as acting as a hub for the Spanish exiles in London, things start to change when a group calling themselves the Sex Pistols start singing about anarchy in the UK. Then the death of Franco sees the place move into putting on gigs from the likes of Throbbing Gristle, Rudi as well as bands from the burgeoning anarcho-punk milieu.

With a quick pace, many clippings and interviews from attendees and band members, this is an excellent book that does a great job in demonstrating how volatile and potent the early 70’s were for London while also making it clear that there was a clear separation between the early members like Stuart Christie (a Scotsman who wound up on the run from the security services) and the likes of Crass (for whom INLA member Ronan Bennett would act as a link between the two worlds).

A brilliant read. And Ronan Bennett’s letter had me in stitches.


Nick Soulsby, 2026, Born of Struggle, Living in Hope: The Anarcho-Punk Lives of the Centro Iberico, 1971–1983, PM Press. ISBN-13: 979-8887441221

⏩ Christopher Owens was a reviewer for Metal Ireland and finds time to study the history and inherent contradictions of Ireland. He is currently the TPQ Friday columnist and is the author of A Vortex of Securocrats and “dethrone god”.


Born Of Struggle, Living In Hope 📚 The Anarcho-Punk Lives Of The Centro Iberico, 1971–1983

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of One Thousand Nine Hundred And Nine

 

A Morning Thought @ 3085

Tommy McKearney ☭ With Donald Trump drawing so much attention to his outrageous demands and acts of international piracy, it is hardly surprising that, with notable exceptions, little attention is paid in Ireland to problems caused by the European Union.


One exception is the CPI. Opposition to the European Union has been party policy since that capitalist bloc’s formation. For long, though, the Communist Party has been fighting an uphill battle against the overwhelming influence of the Irish ruling class, supported by its subservient media and a compliant political establishment. Yet there may be the prospect that this attitude could change, albeit not necessarily in a progressive direction.

In the meantime, though, we are told, on an almost daily basis, that the Republic’s so-called prosperity is due to its membership of the EU. So intense is the pro-EU propaganda that to challenge the received wisdom is to risk being deemed deranged at best. Seldom do we hear or read in the mainstream media that the Republic’s prosperity is not just precarious but ill-divided.

A recent report published by Oxfam Ireland[1] highlights the huge disparities of wealth in the 26 Counties. Its findings are stark: the top 10% of Irish households hold half of all wealth, with the top 1% owning 13%, and 11 billionaires collectively wealthier than 85% of the population combined. The charity describes such extreme inequality as a ‘policy failure’, pointing to budgets that worsen inequality.

The outworking of this grave inequality is there for all to see: almost 17,000 officially homeless and, according to the Simon Community[2], perhaps ten times as many living in what they describe as hidden homelessness. This is before mentioning the despair arising from a two-tier health service or the burden of education costs faced by working-class families.

Such extreme disparities of wealth, coupled with the lived experience of poverty and hardship, lead inevitably to discontent and anger. This deep frustration with the existing system has opened a door to the fascists, who are currently focusing on deprived working-class communities. However, and in spite of their determined efforts, these thugs are not having a major impact in terms of recruitment or electoral success. There is a danger, though, that this may change due to a number of factors. One major factor is membership of the EU, with its relentless insistence on free-market economics resulting in hardship for many.

Over recent decades, fascism has not had a coherent leadership in Ireland or more significant, societally powerful adherents. However, recent rulings emanating from Brussels may cause this to change. Two in particular: a decision last November to greatly reduce the Irish fleet’s fishing quotas and, especially, a drive now to ratify the Mercosur Treaty.

The first of these, reduced fish quotas[3], underlines the nature of Ireland’s difficulty with the EU. The Hague Preferences, a forty-year-old agreement apparently guaranteeing Irish access to its own waters, was abruptly swept aside by other member states with possibly devastating consequences for coastal fishing communities.

It is, nevertheless, the second issue, that of Mercosur, which carries the greater potential threat. This treaty is being driven by EU members, such as Germany, with large manufacturing sectors anxious to access markets in South America. In return, they are willing to tolerate cheap agricultural products being imported into the bloc regardless of the detrimental impact on European farmers’ incomes. Understandably, the powerful Irish Farmers Association is bitterly opposed to this treaty and already has the support of many TDs, including those right-wing independents led by Minister of State for Agriculture, Michael Healy-Rae.

Should Mercosur proceed as planned (and it most likely shall), it is bound to cause anti-EU sentiment to arise within an often conservative and powerful section of society. It may seem far-fetched to foresee the creation of an ultra-right, Farage-style ‘Ire-exit’ movement, but stranger things have happened.

Reflect briefly on the contents of a recent article[4] by the Financial Times’s US National Editor and Columnist Edward Luce. He wrote that Steve Bannon, Trump’s former chief strategist, is ‘… planning to open an Irish branch of Bannon’s War Room, his influential Maga daily podcast…’. In a recent interview, Bannon claimed to be looking for an Irish version of Trump. Moreover, in the same article, Luce quotes Robert O’Brien, Trump’s former national security adviser, complaining about Ireland’s left-leaning president, Catherine Connolly.

Taken together, these factors give cause for concern. Consider the effect of powerful, extremely wealthy right-wing American propagandists combining with a disgruntled Irish farming community and thereafter exploiting the misery of Ireland’s dispossessed. No leap of the imagination is required to envisage a drive to follow a course set by the Godfather-like figure in the White House. We have a precedent in that the first Fine Gael chairperson was an unapologetic follower of 20th-century European fascism.

None of which means, of course, that we should change our position vis-à-vis the European Union. There is, after all, a very healthy progressive element within contemporary Irish society. Look, for example, at the election of Catherine Connolly and the massive support for Palestine. It is, however, imperative that as disillusionment with the imperialist EU inevitably grows, this anger is properly directed. It is essential that we continue to encourage all to punch up and not down.

Tommy McKearney is a left wing and trade union activist.
He is author of The Provisional IRA: From Insurrection to Parliament.
Follow on Twitter @Tommymckearney

Capitalism 🪶 An Inhuman System of Exploitation

Anthony McIntyre ⚽For this one, Paddy and Jay didn't make it. 

While we were braving the chill of Drogheda they were sunning it up in Spain. I travelled with Ronan in our neighbour's car. He generously offers to take us there and back on those very rare occasions when Paddy is not available. His young son, who seems much more knowledgeable about soccer than the rest of us, made up the quartet and regaled us with an amazing amount of detail about the sport.

We split company at the stadium as our season tickets are for the Windmill Road side of the ground. The search procedure as we approached the turnstile was thorough. Normally for people my age it is a light pat down, even a pass. This reminded me of the rigorous daily British Army or RUC searches I had undergone on hundreds of occasions on the streets of Belfast. An Garda along with ground security seemed determined to get a grip on the flares that have all too frequently made their way onto the terraces and from there occasionally to the pitch.

This made big headlines for the sport, and adverse ones for Drogheda United, some of whose fans at a previous fixture at Oriel Park damaged Dundalk's newly laid artificial pitch through lobbing incendiaries onto the surface. The hope has to be that the descent of common sense and a concern for others, rather than the strict search procedure was what led to a flare-free game against Shelbourne. Well, at least from the Drogs fans. While I didn't see it or get a whiff of the fumes they emit, there were reports that a hand-held flare was ignited amongst the visiting supporters but was either extinguished or had burnt itself out before the kickoff.

At least for the match at Sullivan and Lambe we were allowed in. The four match ban arising from the Oriel Park flare-up applies to away games only. The club has had a hefty fine imposed on it, to boot.

Flares are not toys. They cause damage and injury as was so sadly evident from a twelve year old boy sustaining facial burn injuries at Oriel. They need to be cut out from fan culture altogether. Officials from the club, if they have not already done so, should engage in talks with the Ultras, whose primary purpose is to raucously support their team, not cause injury to supporters.

The game against Shels proved a lost cause for the Drogs. They scored too early, sat on the lead and ultimately lost it due to two second half strikes from the visitors. The Drogs, with two wins already under their belt for the season fell to a team who had not chalked up a victory until their visit to Louth.

When Brandon Kavanagh struck five minutes in, first there was trepidation, then confirmation that the Drogs would sit back. At one point I noticed six men across the back, leaving four to take part in a counter attack. No sign of urgency to provide much needed back-up.

There was not much in the way of attacking flair from the visitors in the first half, and when the whistle blew to end the first 45, there was relief that the home side had not conceded in the dying minutes of the first period when concentration can decline as the break approaches. That relief did not last long into the restart. Ninety seconds was all it took for the Shels to penetrate the Drogs last line of defence. At that point, the feeling began to settle on me that this would be three points lost.

And so it proved to be. A Harry Wood penalty added to Sam Bone'e earlier strike, doubling Shelbourne's goal tally. While only one in front it was enough to see the visitors lift all three points. Luke Dennison who was adjudged to have brought Sean Boyd down was not sent off. Coach, Kevin Doherty was not so fortunate. As a result of seeing red at the penalty decision he was shown red for venting his displeasure. 

The Drogs having played five, have taken seven points and dropped eight. Not quite the stuff of relegations rooters - they sit fifth in the table - but not a great start to the season.

⏩Follow on Bluesky.

Drogs ⚽ Shelbourne ⚽ Red

Caoimhin O’Muraile  ☭ The regime controlling Iran are/were a vile hate-filled gang of crooks who ruled in Tehran under the guise of religion and have terrorised the Iranian people for over four decades. 

The first nutter to take power after the Islamic revolution of 1979 was Ayatollah Khomeini after the western backed dictatorship of the Shah was overthrown. The Shah was as ruthless as the Islamic Ayatollahs but looked after western bourgeois interests which was why he was supported with no questions asked. When the latest Iranian leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed in an airstrike nobody should shed any tears.

However, the gang of thugs from Tel Aviv and Washington are little if any better than was Khamenei, and the legality of their attacks on the sovereign nation state of Iran are at best questionable. For Trump in Washington being a criminal breaking international law daily is no different to the professional house breaker plying their trade every night, it comes naturally. In Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu learned the art of genocide in the West Bank, Gaza and earlier in Southern Lebanon which he is attacking presently. This is not to mention charges of corruption levelled at him in Israel. Trump has made it clear, as he did in Venezuela, he will decide who takes over government in Iran after the Israelis and themselves have finished. It should be the Iranian people who decide their future, not Donald Trump.

It is my albeit qualified opinion Donald Trump is unstable, clinically or even criminally insane. One sentence he tells the Iranian people, in that unstable deranged sounding voice, to take control of their country. The next sentence, having told the people to take to the streets, he bombs the shit out of those same streets. The man is clearly unstable, for fucks sake get him locked away.

The Israelis have made it clear they want ‘regime change’, something the Americans deny is one of their goals. The following day that story changes as Trump starts ranting about who will take over the “government of Iran” and how he will “have a say in deciding who is the next government.” The thugs who assist Trump in his genocide - similar to Himmler, Goering, and Bormann assisted Hitler commit mass murder - are Vice President, J.D. Vance, US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, US Defence Secretary, Pete Hegseth, Jared Kushner - Trump's Son in Law - who has nothing to do with government but still goes on official government trips discussing state business, who is a businessman and one of Trump's right-wing propagandists. This may show how close the relationship is between big business and government in the USA. 

The question is, given this corporate relationship, is the present US regime a neo-fascist administration? One thug, Pete Hegseth, boasted; “all the Iranians will see as they look up to the skies will be US and Israeli airpower picking targets until they decide something different”. The Iranian people looking up to the skies are those Trump, on a good day, is encouraging to “take back their country”. Maybe Trump could drop bombs on them while they are attempting this task!!

The Iranians were in discussions with the Americans sorting out a deal over Iran’s nuclear programme when, while still in talks, the US and Israel struck. These talks were evidently a trick! It was the first Trump administration in 2016 who pulled out of a deal they were signatories to agreed back in 2015 under the previous Obama administration with Iran to curb their nuclear programme. The Iranians, the Europeans, Russia, China, and the USA were all in agreement with this deal when Trump, after taking up residence in the White House in 2016, just pulled the plug on the deal. No discussions with the Europeans or the Russians, let alone Iran, he just unilaterally decided it was a “bad deal”.

Scott Lucas of the University College Dublin (UCD) Clinton Institute stated:

I think we can establish the Israelis want regime change whereas the US want the leadership in Iran to accept two conditions then they can survive. One, they must give up their nuclear programme, civilian as well as military. Two, they have to agree to discuss Iran’s ballistic missile programme, in other words, the limits on numbers and size.

Trump claims the Iranians are or were close to developing a nuclear bomb. He has no evidence to support this apparently ludicrous claim as Scott Lucas stated, “Iran does not have a nuclear bomb, they are not even close to having a nuclear bomb or are they planning a nuclear bomb.” Has Trump made the whole nuclear bomb thing up? The Israeli and US airstrikes have hit a school killing many children making either Trump or Netanyahu, or both, child killers. Neither of these tyrants will lose sleep over this act of pedocide. Trump has ranted, in one of his worse moments; “we’re knocking the crap out of them” he told viewers on US television just after the school was obliterated! What kind of a monster is he, another Hitler?

Trump has been reportedly “scathing” with British Prime Minister, Keir Starmer. According to Trump Starmer has been “unhelpful” because he, Starmer, for once had the backbone to stand up to Trump, or so it seemed! Trump claimed the “UK has been very uncooperative” simply because Starmer questioned the legality of these attacks on Iran. Eventually Starmer relented, or gave half way, by ambiguously allowing the US to use British airbases for “defensive actions” which covers a ‘multitude of sins’ and can have many interpretations. 

The US President – of sorts – has (at the time of writing) told PM Starmer who is considering sending two Aircraft-Carriers to the Middle East; “we don’t need people that join wars after we’ve already won”. Keir Starmer instead of shitting himself at this rebuff by Trump should be dancing in Downing Street, at last shaking off the dictatorship sometimes called the “special relationship”, which it is not, with the USA! 

The US President continued using the language of a failed history student claiming Starmer “is no Winston Churchill”, referencing the wartime relationship between the British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, and US President Franklyn D Roosevelt. The circumstances during World War Two were completely different. Churchill wanted the US involved as allies in the war against Nazi Germany, and Roosevelt could not deliver due to election pledges. He was very apologetic but he had pledged to keep the US out of any “European wars” telling the US people; “your boys will not die in foreign wars”. This time it is Trump, as US President, who wants something from Britain so he can carry out illegal acts of terrorism. Donald Trump claims the so-called “special relationship between the UK and US is not what it once was.”

The most annoying aspect about this situation apart from having to listen to Trump's lies is the response of the European political leaders. They all appear shit scared of the tyrant, just as their predecessors were of Hitler who mocked British leader, Neville Chamberlain. Now Trump seems to be courting other more compliant European leaders including Germany’s Friedrich Merz, probably telling him he can offer a ‘special relationship’ now the British have become “uncooperative” - which the Chancellor will bite his hand off for. 

Why, oh why, do European leaders place so much importance on being well in with a criminally insane man? Twenty-Six County Minister for Foreign Affairs, Helen McEntee, having been asked “eight times” to clarify her position on the legality of Trump and Netanyahu’s attacks, “stopped short of calling the US and Israelis attacks on Iran a breach of international law” (Irish Daily Mirror 6th march). Perhaps the reluctance of the Twenty-Six County administration to really attack Trump and his cohort Netanyahu is to a certain extent understandable. We are a small country which is already forcibly partitioned by a larger regionally powerful neighbour to the east, perhaps the administration maybe worried about antagonising an even larger power, the USA, to the west particularly with a lunatic at the wheel! Taoiseach, Micheal Martin, and Tanaiste, Simon Harris, should definitely not go – but they will – to Washington for the Saint Patricks Day festivities. Consider such an invite equal to same from Vlad the Impaler! Do not associate Ireland with a mass murderer!!

Who will stop Trump and his partner in war crimes, Netanyahu? Trump has already proved he has no regard for so-called international law and he just ignores the United Nations. Remember Hitler and his contempt for the ‘League of Nations’? Appeasement after appeasement led ultimately to the Second World War. Trump has taken Venezuela, again dictating regime change, and who would succeed Nicolas Maduro, deposed using force by the US, then threatening to invade Greenland, and supplying the Israelis with ordnance to bomb Gaza. Hitler had invaded Austria, and Czechoslovakia before Poland in 1939 in much the same way as Trump has carried out his takeovers. 

Were the actions of Hitler used as a blueprint by Trump? There are comparisons, very stark comparisons, between Trump in 2026 and Hitler 1939! European leaders, in sharp contrast to their reactions to Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine, appear to tolerate and even agree with anything Trump does. Imagine if he decides his dislike of Keir Starmer is so great it is time for ‘regime change’ in London? Or, if the ‘socialists’ won a Presidential election in France who Trump disapproves of, what then? ‘Regime change’ in Paris? What of the Dublin government if Trump gets annoyed with the Dail? Time for Irish ‘regime change’?

Liberal democracy is dead in some of Trump’s immediate satellite neighbours and now he is doing so in the Middle-East. Europe could be next and to think differently is possibly storing up trouble. A European trade embargo on the US may be costly to the middle-classes but the US bourgeoisie would feel the heat as well. War is not a suggestion but trade barriers on Trump's USA are feasible. 

Something must be done and quickly before the whole world is under Trumps jackboot!! This is not a war it is the obliteration of a militarily weak country by a super power and their cohorts in Tel Aviv. Admittedly the Iranian regime are not good people, they are murdering bastards, but their overthrow is for the people of Iran not Donald ‘lunatic’ Trump! It is akin to gangsters falling out and the Saint Valentines Day massacre in 1929. The hoodlums in Washington and Tel Aviv have fallen out with the weaker but equally crooked gangsters in Tehran.

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

Trump, Netanyahu And The Iranian Regime 💣 Gangsters At War!

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of One Thousand Nine Hundred And Eight

 

A Morning Thought @ 3084

Jim Duffy ✍ Absolutely right. They needed to fire a shot across her bow.

They let Higgins away with things at the start, and he got away with murder. He'd make endless statements that were unconstitutional, speeches that contradicted Irish foreign policy, and frequently caused backlashes against Ireland.
 
In Nigeria, Islamist terrorists massacred a large number of Christian worshippers in a church. It made international headlines. The terrorists admitted their responsibility, and that it was motivated by religious hate. The Nigerian government confirmed all that. Higgins issued a statement sympathising, but neglected to mention that it was a religious hate attack carried out by a hard line Islamist terror group. Instead he suggested it was the fault of climate change!!!

There was outrage all over Nigeria at his comment. Christian leaders and Muslim leaders alike called on him to apologise and to call it what it was - a religious hate crime. A Nigerian Catholic archbishop appeared on RTÉ Radio 1's News at One to explain how offensive and hurtful the President's comments were, and called him to apologise.
 
Higgins' response was to stand over his wrong comments, and get angry when challenged on it.
 
When Higgins' letter to the Iranian president was released Higgins stated that he knew for a fact that it was leaked by Israel. He was 100% wrong. It was released by the Iranian Foreign Ministry on its X account. It was open that it had released it. It had nothing to do with Israel.
 
Journalists at a press conference in the UN, where for some reason he headed the Irish delegation at a Gaza conference (Irish presidents never attend UN meetings as they constitutionally are not part of the executive. God knows why the government let him go!) pointed out that he was wrong (Big mistake. Michael D loses it if told he is wrong), and pointed out the Iranian Foreign Ministry, not Israel, released the letter, and if he had checked the Foreign Ministry X account he would see it there.
Michael D completely lost the head, and began shouting, saying he knew for a fact Israel had released it to attack him.
 
The UN session was meant to focus world attention on Gaza, but instead the Irish president shouting at journalists made international headlines - to the fury of the Secretary-General. he ending up telling the government 'don't ever send that arrogant man over here again!'
 
The government was mortified but they had let him run riot for years. The media rarely covered his disasters in foreign affairs (and there were many) as they had a soft spot for him so stayed mum every time he fucked up.
 
So the government is right to slap down Connolly when she made an unconstitutional, ill-timed intervention. They do not want another out-of-control president riding rough-shot over the constitution and intervening in international affairs. 

Higgins did no end of damage to Ireland's international reputation, at various times offending all the Americas, Africa, Asia and the EU with stupid comments. They don't want Connolly to do the same.

⏩ Jim Duffy is a writer-historian.

Reining In The President

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