ANNUAL WOLFE TONE COMMEMORATION : Sunday , June 11 , 2006 , Sallins , Co. Kildare .
A bus for this Commemoration , which is organised each year by the Republican Movement , will leave from outside the old McBirneys/Virgin Megastore site on Dublin's Aston Quay at 12.45PM on the day : the Commemoration itself starts at 2.30PM .
The same bus will leave Bodenstown at 5.30PM that afternoon on its return to Dublin city centre . The fare is ten Euro per person .
For information on the death of Wolfe Tone , scroll through this piece (article starts on March 9 on that page) which was published on this blog last year .
" From my earliest youth I have regarded the connection between Great Britain and Ireland as the curse of the Irish nation , and felt convinced that , while it lasted , this country could never be free nor happy . My mind has been confirmed in this opinion by the experience of every succeeding year , and the conclusions which I have drawn from every fact before my eyes . In consequence , I was determined to employ all the powers which my individual efforts could move , in order to separate the two countries .
That Ireland was not able of herself to throw off the yoke , I knew ; I therefore sought for aid wherever it was to be found . In honourable poverty I rejected offers which , to a man in my circumstances , might be considered highly advantageous . I remained faithful to what I thought the cause of my country , and sought in the French Republic an ally to rescue three millions of my countrymen " . -Theobald Wolfe Tone .
MacGIOLLA's GUERRILLAS .......Fifteen years ago , the leadership of the 'Official Republican Movement' (now 'The Workers' Party') stated that their armed wing , the 'Official IRA' , went out of existence .
Today , the 'Official IRA' is alive and well and living mainly in Belfast and Newry . In the days when both organisations were operating in an overt way , the leadership of 'The Workers' Party' and the 'Official IRA' overlapped to a certain degree .
Tomas MacGiolla , the man who led the 'Official IRA' for the last twenty-five years has always maintained the position that the 'Official IRA' went out of existence in 1972 . But the 'Official IRA' still march on , not an army fighting the British , but as a fund-collecting agency .
DEREK DUNNE traces the roots of the 'Official IRA' and 'The Workers' Party' .
From 'IN DUBLIN' magazine , October 1987 .
The Workers Party own the 'Trevor Hill Drinking Club' in Newry , County Down , which is run by party members . In Belfast , they have clubs in Twinbrook , Turf Lodge , Short Strad , the Markets area , Cyprus Street and North Queen Street . The party also owns a bar in Bawnmore .
The Official IRA in Belfast still have a good supply of weapons ; they are heavily involved in racketeering , intimidation , extortion and blackmail . Two years ago (ie 1985) Karen Walsh attended a disco in Glinchin : Workers' Party election workers came in and started to pin badges on people - Karen Walsh made it clear that she did'nt want anything to do with them . When she emerged from the disco there were men waiting in the bushes outside : she was pistol-whipped and a breeze-block was thrown on her legs . Her screams brought local residents out and the men fled , but returned later and knocked at a few doors but left when they were confronted by residents .
A car belonging to John Lowry , a Workers' Party spokesman in Belfast , remained at the scene : local kids took election material from the car and burnt the material , and also did some damage to the car . A few days later , Jamsie McMullin was shot ad kneecapped by people claiming to represent the Official IRA . Following this , John Lowry said that the Workers' Party was not involved with the shooting and that any information should be passed on to the RUC.......
(MORE LATER).
SHANE ROSS : PLAYING THE ORANGE CARD .......From 'The Phoenix' magazine , February 1984 .
No By-Line.
The other 'big cog' in Shane Ross's electoral machine is his talented wife Ruth Buchanan , whose contacts in RTE and in the Church Of Ireland (she is the daughter of Archbishop Buchanan) are still important , and her input into the early campaigns was crucial .
Shane Ross is a glib social mixer "...full of all the necessary nonsense.." , says one associate , and very popular in the bar at Leinster House . He and P.J. Mara , Charlie Haughey's aide , are as thick as thieves . Politically , though , Ross is something of a mixed bag , regularly proclaiming his independence from party interests yet leaning towards Fine Gael: he has pushed through or initiated motions in the Seanad on extradition , divorce and Garret Fitzgerald's 'Constitutional Crusade'.
But much though he may cherish , and broadcast , his ability to raise issues sensitive to party politicians , one gets the impression that the realities of politics are lost on him.......
(MORE LATER).
REPUBLICANS AND YOUTH . From 'IRIS' magazine , November 1983.
By Jack Madden.
For years emigration existed as the easy way to forget youth : the unemployed and 'malcontents' could always be expected to leave the country , and to leave the political system which had betrayed them , unchallenged . From birth to emigration the needs of youth were ignored , while an exam-orientated education system geared (and continues to gear) children towards expectations which the State could not fulfil .
Nowadays , with emigration no longer an option , many youth - on leaving school and being confronted with the trauma of the dole queue - are drifting into a morass of apathy , or at best into an undirected hostility towards society .
This antagonism , unfortunately , extends to all political parties , left and right , and it has been helped by the consistent failure of a radical movement such as Sinn Fein to show that an alternative is possible which will be beneficial to today's youth.......
(MORE LATER).
