Return of the mattress

There have been many great comedy duos over the years, Morecambe and Wise, Fry and
Laurie, the two Ronnie’s, Reeves and Mortimer even, but none come close to the comic
talent writing the new hit sitcom, the Irish economy, oh yes, let me introduce you
to Cowan and Lenihan.

It’s a perfect partnership, Cowan writes the scripts, it took a few years to
perfect, and then Lenihan acts them out and between them we have the farce of the
century.

Lenihan of course now is taking over the writing, giving Cowan more time to play
crazy golf and do guppy impressions at the ploughing championships, and we wait with
baited breath for the next instalment of the recession busting budget, though don’t
hold your breath too long, if passed performance is a bench mark, you will be dead
from suffocation long before he learns to count never mind save the day.

Public spending is of course going to be cut, no more medical cards for all the
over seventies, if you have a bit of cash sitting you can just damn well go and buy
your own tablets, after all you probably use more tablets than the average ecstasy
user and you are just costing the HSE far too much money. The HSE can of course
afford to pay out over €700M in extra payments to staff but would leave you lying on
a trolley, paying for your own tablets and weighing your incontinence pads to save a
bit.

Minister ‘I can’t count past ten’ Lenihan also took a bit of a swipe at Joe Duffy
over his programme which questioned the safety of Irish financial institutions. It
seems his critique has called up mass hysteria and panic in the populace not known
since Brian Cowan and Mary Harney chose the same moment to walk over the Ha'penny
Bridge.

Let’s face it there is a credit crunch on, which means that the Irish financial
institutions don’t trust each other, why should we have anymore faith in them than
they have in themselves.

With that in mind there has been a rush on in the sales of mattresses as people
follow Bertie Aherns example and return to keeping their money stuffed inside soft
furnishings and out of the eye of the inland revenue, sorry I mean where it will be
safe from your bank imploding.

It does appear that there is one place where the credit crunch has not hit home,
Debenhams, in a single visit to the department store you are assured to be asked a
dozen times whether you would like to take out a new credit card. The Scotsman’s
credit crunch survival advice would therefore be, head to Debenhams, get a credit
card and buy lots of mattresses, but do it quick before the special mattress levy is
brought into place on the 14th.

A Green And Pleasant Land

It may have been noted from past writing that I am in no way a great fan of the bun
eater extraordinaire that is Mary ‘politically defunct’ Harney, but it is with a
hint of sadness that we note the fall of the Progressive Democrats. Not that I have
any favour with the policies of the now dead PD’s, but neither have I any favour
with the policies of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Labour Party, Socialist Party, Sinn
Féin, or the Green Party.

What is a shame is that a party which was at least begun with a political agenda
is closing up shop, and a party with its grounds in quasi-religious, lentil eating,
whining, Arran jumper wearing, 4 x4 scratching ideals remains in government.

Residents of Tralee will have noted, as the think tank season draws to a close,
the smell of day old tofu has hung heavy in the air, as it always does when John
‘gormless green’ Gormley and his merry band come to town.

So what pearls of wisdom, solutions for the countries crisis, or great political
thinking have come from the mung been infused atmosphere, which is the Green Party
annual strategy meeting?

Surprise surprise, the focus is to be on public transport, the fact that they are
against building any decent roads on which to have this recession beating policy to
run on hasn’t dissuaded them from the same age old bleating.

When Minister Gormley was asked about his stance on the reintroduction of third
level fees he replied, ‘I am not in the habit of giving personal views nor am I in
the habit of answering hypothetical questions.’ So John what is a politician
supposed to do, oh I forgot as a Green you are supposed to wear waxed jackets and
toe the Fianna Fáil line.

It is with a tear of laughter in my eye that I watched footage of the post think
tank walk about. Only the most bereft of a sense of humour could fail to become
mildly incontinent at the sight of the Minister in an overly tight Kerry jersey man
handling a football with all the grace of a man hauling bricks. Obviously his time
with Bertie Ahern has not been a total washout, though he perhaps could have
listened more intently to his betting advice, with the loss of €20 on the All
Ireland Football final he will have to come up with a different excuse should any
brown, of course recycled, envelopes should land on his desk.

It is a worry however with the new found popularity of the Greens since entering
government that their membership has risen from 2100 members to around 2800, this
thankfully though is still slightly less than the average number of crab lice found
in an infestation.

It seems though Mary that all is not lost, John has stated that members of the
PD’s would be very welcome within the ranks of the Greens, though you may want to
think hard about the offer, as it probably comes with the proviso that you convert
to Satanism, sorry, I meant vegetarianism.

Not in my back garden

There are many things that people seem to accept having in their back garden that I
wouldn’t like. Shopping trolleys, for example, or garden gnomes, and even caravans.

Most are fairly easy to get rid off, apart of course in some circumstances, the
caravans.

There are many other things you wouldn’t like, figuratively speaking, in your
back garden.

Nursing homes, particularly if you live down wind, or you don’t like escapees
knocking you on the door, and offering you scones.

Drug dealers, not unless you like watching gang warfare out your bedroom window,
or you’re a member of the Dáil looking for Charlie, and I don’t mean McCreevy.

Churches, unless you have made the decision not to have children.

Haulbowline, unless you are John Gormley, as he thinks it’s safe, you are Willie
O’Dea, who obviously thinks that his ridiculous moustache will work as a filter
against pollution, which being the case it is a shame the filter doesn’t work the
opposite way as an excrement filter, or you have made the decision that you would
like children, but you would prefer them to have two heads.

The Large Hadron Collider, unless you are not one of the complete maniacs who
think they will be sucked into a tiny black hole, though if you are not reading this
now then we have been.

The hottest thing at the moment that some people don’t want in their back garden
is the Corrib Natural Gas Project, the Shell to Sea protesters probably feeling
fairly disappointed that a baby black hole didn’t form and suck the whole thing into
oblivion. It would have of course sucked all the protesters in with it, but with
current events, perhaps they would feel it was an acceptable sacrifice.

I am of course referring to the latest turn of events from the protest with Maura
Harrington’s hunger strike.

Protest is a healthy thing, as history has shown, dreadful things can be done by
individuals, corporations and countries where it has been possible to suppress
protest from people.

There is perhaps a fine line between protest and fanaticism, animal rights
protesters have long since stepped over that line, along with pro-life protesters,
with the announcement of Maura’s protest that line for the Shell to Sea protest is
being pushed to breaking.

Shell probably has a few options coming from Maura’s demands.

They could sit the Solitaire where it is for ‘repairs’ until such time as Maura
is too weak to continue and is forced to eat, or the worst were to happen, which is
quite frankly, a momentous waste of life.

They could send it back quickly, do a couple of weeks work, send it out of Irish
waters for a couple of weeks to allow Maura to get some food inside her, then return
and finish the job.

They could just work away, hope that they finish before major permanent damage is
done to Maura, she comes to her senses or her family or fellow protesters convince
her to stop.

They could also admit defeat and stop the whole thing altogether, which isn’t
very likely.

None of the options are good, but then neither is the push from protest to
fanaticism.

Maura, please, you have made a point, step back from the fanatics road, get out
of the car, have a ‘Big Mac’ and pick up the placard.

Scotland the brave

What is Wimbledon anyway? I never knew, never watched it, except of course for the
women’s finals, and that was only for the bit of nipple action from Venus. But now I
have.

I have also taken some strange interest in cycling. Not actually doing it, but
watching them go round in circles. Which you must agree, is a particularly boring
thing. Not so, there has been Scottish success, and so it becomes interesting.

I have recently found out that there is a US open, I always thought the US was
open 24/7 but no, it’s a tennis competition for goodness sake.

It appears there is a US open in golf as well, so many opens I knew nothing about,
and so many things to find patriotic, let’s face it, darts, snooker and curling
where getting a bit repetitive.

So yes I did watch Wimbledon, to a point, and I will watch the US open final, in
tennis, I’m not so patriotic that I could possibly watch golf, but it’s all a bit
sad.

There is nothing wrong with being patriotic, but it is far too easy for
patriotism to spill over into racism and bigotry. And it seems none so more than
within sport, or more, using sport as an excuse.

For some strange reason, football fans seem to be the worst offenders. We have
knife wielding idiots fighting with each other in the name of football, and some
strange idea that Rangers and Celtic have some religious significance, they don’t,
they’re only football teams.

You also have the myriad of Irish football supporters, who not only think that
football tops are an acceptable piece of clothing, which they aren’t unless you are
playing or watching the game, but also find no duality in supporting English teams,
but would support Robert Mugabe if he was playing England at tidily winks.

I would be the first to gloat to my English friends if Scotland beat England at
any sport, as I would gloat with my Irish friends if the same where to happen. I
wouldn’t if they got beaten by anybody else.

Let’s put the sport back into sport, and remove the bigotry, otherwise the
Football World Cup will stoop so low that it will be as bigoted as the evil that is
the Eurovision Song Contest.

Pity the little children

The little darlings have returned to that boot camp that is customarily known off as
school. Depressed after a summer of rain, floods and crap on you tube.

Pity not those children, more pity the parents who are putting their little
darlings through Ireland's version of free education. Of course they are allowed to
walk through the gate of the school for free, and the teachers themselves don’t tend
to send an invoice home with the children each Friday, not unless they have used any
paper during the week.

Bat O’Keeffe is now in charge of what has to be the Ryan Air of education
systems, you’re never quite sure what it’s going to cost you, and mid term, a
barrier free toll both could be set up outside the pupils toilets, and all you could
do about it is pump diuretics the night before.

You could save a bit of money using passed on books, but no, the consortium that
is the education system and the providers of textbooks like to change a couple of
words each year, new edition, that will be forty Euros please.

You could shop wise when buying the uniform. No sorry, the school dictates where
you can buy that, and normally at over extended rates.

But at least the education is top standard, and our devoted teachers are
providing the best for each and every student that passes their desk. That being the
case, why are grind teachers and grind colleges making so much money.

So Bat, yes, if you must, reintroduce third level fees for the students that can
afford it, no fees hasn’t made the take up of third level education any greater
amongst the socially disadvantaged, and plough the money into the basic education
system, perhaps those that can’t afford national school, never mind third level,
might get a fair crack at the whip.

But I have digressed from the poor children I was thinking off. Pity the poor
children born of the frog king himself, Paul McCartney, for in a household that has
no problem meeting the cost of a decent education, they are blighted by that most
foul disease of the vegan who thinks it’s a good idea to force their children down
that road.

It is at least a bonus that your father will have enough money to have state of
the art dentures made for you, and employ bone specialists to straighten your
withered limbs from the debilitating conditions you are destined to contract from
his decisions.

Yes, pity the little children, the little children who will transfer to become
little adults because their parents think perceived cruelty to animals is worse than
cruelty to children.