Thursday, 17 March 2011

Happy Saint Patrick's Day

God Save The Queen. After all, Her Majesty's Treasury has saved the Irish. No wonder that they are planning to receive her quite so rapturously later in the year. Will she be accompanied by her Chancellor of the Exchequer, the man who bailed them out, the heir to an Ascendancy baronetcy, who if asked directly might very well say that he was Irish, as his boss might very well say that he was Scottish?

And so much, between the last Saint Patrick's Day and this one, for any idea that Ireland has a special place in the heart of America. What on earth has taken the Irish so long to work that one out? All the way back in 1965, Ted Kennedy - yes, Ted Kennedy - made immigration from Ireland all but impossible, flooded America with Hispanics and Asians who were far cheaper to employ than the Irish had become, and thus greatly eroded both America as an English-speaking country and, since most people in Latin America are not orthodox Catholics, the position of Catholicism and of the Catholic Church in American life. His most significant opponents had largely Scots-Irish Protestant electorates.

6 comments:

  1. Outstanding post.

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  2. such a fantasting post. liked it.. and happy Patrick day to all!!!!

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  3. Paddy Pascagula18 March 2011 at 10:35

    Eh? The UK only put up just under 10% of the money you innumerate twit. Your creepy imperialistic rantings are a source of much hilarity!

    You stride the British Isles metaphorically in leather breaches and high heel boots trying to thrash the "colonies" with your cat-o-nine tails whilst going "ooooo" - in your dreams.

    Erin Go Bragh!

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  4. No return to your strange fantasies about "Uncle Sam's special friend", then? Funny, that. Oh, and as perhaps I should have written last night, the strange infatutaion with the EU seems to have been brought to a pretty conclusive end, too.

    Economically and culturally, you have never left the Union. You never will. You never can. No part of these Islands can. That is just the way that things are, no matter what the political structures, although those that refelct reality should be preserved if at all possible.

    All of which you know perfectly well.

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