Matt Cooper in the SBP this morning offers many 'if's' in the following, starting with the very first sentence. Many.
The Sinn Féin policy – if there is one – of aggressively pursuing actions is set to create enormous difficulties for the broadcast media. Will we have to record radio or TV coverage of political discussion in future, instead of doing it live, for fear of wrong comments being made in the heat of debate, honestly or dishonestly?
Will we be required to do excessive fact-checking on the fly, so to speak, rather than allowing a debate or interview to continue? Well-briefed as interviewers are supposed to be, there are times when we don't know the veracity of the claims being made.
It raises another major issue: if this is Sinn Féin's approach to the media when it is in opposition, then what will it do if it takes power? Will it take the same approach to RTÉ as the Tories have taken to Channel 4, for example?
If Sinn Féin in power finds that it is much harder to sort out the housing and health crises than it anticipates, and if it is reluctant to do too much messing with taxation for fear of scaring off American employers, could it engage in its own Irish form of the culture wars and make the media a scapegoat as it attempts to revise the reporting of recent Irish history?
From yesterday's Examiner, I know what he's trying to say, but he's not saying it properly.
Sinn Féin has shown that smart messaging and slick social media communications are vital in the modern political world, and has been very successful in deploying such tools.
The difficulty is that they are no substitute for serious policy agenda, which from Sinn Féin's perspective is sorely lacking.
However, if the Government keeps messing up in the way it has done, it won't matter. They will simply keep handing the advantage over to their rivals.
Surely from SF's perspective such a policy agenda isn't lacking, it's from other's perspective.
Meanwhile, Stephen Collins apparently doesn't believe there's a huge distinction between military, as distinct from other aid.
While we have not really been neutral since we joined the EU the official line has been to continue with the pretence that we are. The "solidarity clause" of the Treaty on European Union states that "if a Member State is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, the other Member States shall have towards it an obligation of aid and assistance by all the means in their power".
As former senior diplomat Rory Montgomery pointed out in a letter to The Irish Times last month, Ireland is bound by this clause although it is qualified by the guarantees given in advance of the second Lisbon referendum and incorporated in the Constitution, that exempt us being required to offer military assistance as distinct from other types of aid.
No lack of hyperbole in the following from the same paper.
As the world is up in arms over Elon Musk's acquisition of Twitter, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that our priorities have gone slightly awry. It seems the contempt we can marshal for an oddball billionaire far exceeds proportion; and our capacity for misdirecting fury stronger than ever.
Fury? Up in arms?
All other contributions welcome.
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