“It went really well”: an entirely expected new low for the Shinners

After meeting the titular head of British Imperialism Inc and giving her his best smile, McGuinness told reporters “It went really well” and claimed “I’m still a republican”.  He’s still a republican in the same way that Gerry Adams was “never a member of the IRA”, no doubt.

(The sharp-eyed might notice that I’ve now added a new category to the blog – toadyism.)

 

Queen handshake makes talks impossible: RNU on the handshake, the SF leadership and republican talks

The following piece was written by the RNU site administrator and appeared there yesterday (June 26):

The decision of the Sinn Fein leadership to meet the English queen during her Belfast jubilee visit defies all republican logic.

Firstly, any presumption that a handshake with an unelected monarch is necessary to show goodwill towards the Protestants of the north goes against even the most basic original republican teachings, in which Tone, McCracken and other Protestant leaders identified fiercely with the principles of equality, liberty and fraternity.

Elizabeth Windsor is a privileged and pampered English aristocrat, apparently granted Sovereign power by God himself; to suggest that Irish Protestants can only find a sense of identity through loyalty to such a figure is an insult to both them and the generations of activists who have fought to reverse this stereotyped notion of the ‘Ulster Protestant’.

Let us not forget, in the midst of this state-sponsored feel good factor, that Elizabeth Windsor is the

Belfast march in opposition to British queen’s jubilee visit

 

Current top 20

Excluding hits on the Home Page and About/Blog News categories, below are the top 20 pieces on the blog at present:

1. Politics and the rise of historical revisionism
2. Saor Eire – Marxist and republican
3. Women’s rights and the national struggle, 1916-1922
4. Remembering Máirín Keegan, 1932-1972
5. Interview with veteran socialist-republican Gerry Ruddy
6. The burning of the British embassy – 40 years on
7. The Easter Rising and the ‘blood sacrifice’
8. A history of the Provisional Republican Movement – part one of three
9. Remembering Peter Graham, 1945-1971
10. A history of the Provos – part three
11. Smashing H Block and republicanism today: an interview with F. Stuart Ross
12. Organising against the household and water taxes (and the septic tank tax too) – Newbridge
13. Chapter 4: The Home Rule Crisis
14. Recession and an Irish town
15. What’s behind the attack on Newbridge Credit Union?
16. Republicanism in the twenty-first century – report on a meeting
17. The changing nature of six-county society
18. A History of the Provos – part two of three
19. Hundreds attend Newbridge anti-home taxes protest
20. A view of the éirígí ard fheis

That handshake

Some republicans and some nationalists are very upset that Martin McGuinness will be shaking the hand of Betty Battenberg (or Windsor, or whatever her real name is) this week.

Personally, however, I don’t see any reason to complain.

The Provo leadership are handmaidens of British-political and capitalist-economic rule in the north.  Why not shake the British queen’s hand?  It’s the perfectly logical thing for these people to do.  Indeed, he may as well kiss the queen’s arse while he’s at it, so we can all see the real power relationship between the Brits and the Shinners.

The handshake also points up the partitionist nature of the Shinners these days.

In the north, their political position depends on

‘A prop for maintaining British injustice’: éirígí on Sinn Fein

The following statement was released Friday, June 22, by éirígí: 

éirígí’s Rúnaí Ginearálta Breandán Mac Cionnaith has responded to the decision by the Sinn Féin leadership to endorse a meeting with the British queen, Elizabeth Windsor, commander-in-chief of Britain’s armed forces.

Mac Cionnaith said, “The decision by Sinn Féin to meet with the British queen is not in the least surprising, unanticipated or unexpected. However, that decision needs to be examined in a broader context.

“The Sinn Féin leadership previously took the strategic decision to gradually and consciously move that party away from its former role as a vanguard of the anti-imperialist struggle in Ireland. That leadership has also proven itself, in recent times, to be a willing ally of modern neo-con imperialists by assisting the undermining and subversion of anti-imperialist liberation struggles in other countries.

“One calculated outworking of that strategic decision in domestic terms has been the unprecedented acceptance and copper-fastening of partition by that party, and its consent to continuing

New Perspectives on Republicanism in the 1960s – public meeting, Dublin, June 26

Ireland Institute Public Meeting:

New Perspectives on Republicanism in the 1960s

Speakers:

Brian Hanley
(Historian, author of The IRA, 1926-1936; The IRA – a Documentary History; and, co-author, The Lost Revolution)

Matt Treacy
(Historian, author of The IRA 1956-69: Rethinking the Republic)

7.30pm, Tuesday, 26 June 2012

IONAD AN PHIARSAIGH/PEARSE CENTRE
27 PEARSE STREET
DUBLIN 2

Ireland Institute, 27 Pearse Street, Dublin 2 / Institiúid na hÉireann, 27 Sráid an Phiarsaigh, BÁC 2.
Ph: (01) 6704606; email/ríomhphost: irelandinstitute@eircom.net; http://www.theirelandinstitute.com

Community action prevents eviction in Bluebell

Slightly adapted from the éirígí site:

For three days in early June, the people of Bluebell, a close-knit working class district on the banks of the Grand Canal in south Dublin, demonstrated what the word ‘community’ really means.

On Tuesday, June 5, the Byrne family asked their community for help, to prevent their eviction from their home of twenty years the following day (June 6). Despite the very short notice, the residents of Bluebell and surrounding areas turned out in force to answer the call for help.

When the bailiff from the Dublin City Sheriff’s office arrived, with Garda escort, on the morning of June 6 to evict the Byrne family he was met by a protest of over

The need for a united, revolutionary 1916 commemoration

I’ve commented before that one of the things that socialist-republicans could begin co-operating on is Easter commemorations. It’s good to see others are also advocating this. For instance, the person who set up the new Workers Republic blog posted a link in the About section of this blog and has a link on their blog to this one. I’m just about to put a link on this blog to Workers Republic. When I looked at that blog, the current lead article is this one, which I’ll reprint here in full. But I’d encourage readers to also go look at the blog, here:

Here in Ireland there are many 1916 commemorations that are held annually by various groups and parties, but unfortunately, only a very divided fraction of those celebrate it from a revolutionary point of view.

As we enter an even deeper economic crisis of uncertainty and destitution, the choke hold of capitalism continues to tighten its grasp among its hapless victims. What we are witnessing now, is how our history, both past and present, are inextricably linked together through struggle. And how that time and time again, capitalism continues to dominate over our very lives, everyday.

What’s needed is a united approach for an independent 1916 commemoration with a more revolutionary

PFLP statement on regional and international developments

Following a series of meetings both inside and outside Palestine, the central committee of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine released a statement on May 16 on regional and international developments; it can be read over on the Redline site, here.