All posts by Dr Declan Hayes

Irish Christian Brothers: Reflections on the End of a Tradition

I recently visited Ireland's main burial site for the Christian Brothers; it is in Baldoyle's Dublin Road at the back of their former residence, which is now a block of luxury apartments. Access to it is gained by arranging in...

/ 09/04/2022

People Before Profit: NATO’s Fifth Column in Ireland?

People Before Profit (PBP), Ireland's left-wing establishment joke party, is one of the many casualties of the Ukrainian conflict. Their problem is their circus acts of shedding crocodile tears for refugees and other victims of war have, in the hot...

/ 29/03/2022

What to do with Seán Russell?

Leo Varadkar is correct. We do need conversations about the statue of Seán Russell, the vandalism of the Booterstown plaque to Kevin O'Higgins, the vandals' Glasnevin victory, the Nenagh and Drumcondra monuments to rapist Martin Hogan, the statues in Crossmaglen,...

/ 20/03/2022

Chelsea and the Oligarchs: England’s Second Battle of Stamford Bridge

The City of London's shock blitzkrieg against Chelsea FC, who are currently the reigning European and world champions, will totally transform English football into something football fans will never stomach.  Red-carding Chelsea's owner, Israeli citizen Roman Abramovich, because of his...

/ 13/03/2022

Modern Ireland’s 1914 Moment

Though it looks like Co Clare are playing in an all-Ireland double, Ireland's all-pervasive yellow and blue flags are not there to wish The Banner County's finest the best. Rather, they are there to support the wildly corrupt Ukrainian government...

/ 09/03/2022

The Case to Cancel Ulysses

Even though Ulysses is situated in Dublin on Thursday, June 16th, 1904, the day author James Joyce first dated Nora Barnacle, the sooner our politicians call one of their rigged Citizens' Assemblies to consign that date, that author and that...

/ 04/03/2022

Whither Irish Neutrality?

The current war in Ukraine is, we are told, Europe's biggest since the Second World War. Bigger, we are told, than the wars of the Yugoslav succession, when NATO handed the Slavs' historical homeland over to their pliable Albanian gangsters,...

/ 01/03/2022

Is the Trinity Seanad Race Already Sewn Up?

Nominations are closed, ballot papers are being posted and the University of Dublin's 2022 Seanad by-election is on.  It is a large field of 17 candidates, with representatives of minority communities, family therapists, former ambassadors, Continuity Greens, Dissident Greens, students,...

/ 25/02/2022

Flat Earth Thatcherism: Has Economic Liberalism Sunk the Irish State

When the late Margaret Thatcher told Woman's Own magazine that there is no such thing as society, she could just as well have been referring to present-day Ireland, where Thatcher would be considered quite progressive by her acolytes in Sinn...

/ 19/02/2022

Belfast: Sectarianism Through Rose Tinted Glasses

Belfast, Kenneth Branagh's semi-autobiographical movie about being a Protestant in Belfast at the outbreak of the Troubles, has been nominated for seven Academy awards, one of which will almost certainly go to British Quaker Dame Judi Dench for playing the...

/ 16/02/2022