8
POPSIrish Eyes are Smiling. And what a Smile. Good guys do win. After a successful amateur career, including winning the Walker Cup with the Great Britain & Ireland team in 1995, he turned professional later that year, joining the European Tour in 1996. He came to professional golf at a relatively late age, having qualified as an accountant and worked in the business for a number of years. He has spent a considerable amount of time both in the top ten of the Official World Golf Rankings and as the highest ranked European golfer, his best ranking being third, which he achieved following his second Open Championship victory. He has also played for Europe in four Ryder Cups; losing in 1999 but winning in 2002, 2004 and 2006 . He has also won the par-3 contest at the Augusta National Golf Club.
10
POPSThe Twelve Apostles and Bloody Sunday (original) Like America, we had out War of Independence followed by a bloody Civil War on the issue of independence. This was also in common with many other states that gained independence. We didn't gain full independence until 1948 when we took it without a shot being fired. We did lose 6 of our 9 counties of Ulster, our northern providence. Hopefully some day our "four green fields" will be reunited peacefully. By Bush&Co's definition all our leaders would have been terrorists like Nelson Mandela , just like your own revered insurrectionists/freedom fighters/terrorists/founding fathers. Our longest serving PM and president de Valera would have been executed along with the 1916 Rising leaders only he was born in America.
14
POPSPalestine: The State History Forgot Is it a joke of history that before there was the states of Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Syria, etc there was Palestine? Now they all exist and Palestine doesn't yet. You will read that there never was a Palestine from a certain quarter and how can you miss what you never had. How you know they are lying! They'll say that as they are all Arabs that there's enough room for them all. It's like saying that the Scots Welsh and Irish are all Celts and one state would do them all! Yes, there was a time when such thinking was regarded as valid. If we had the Age of Imperialism back then the Brits might validly have a claim on the USA and most of the rest of the world. In the present imperialism, if the existent holder of the gunboat diplomacy role, the USA, decided to sort out Palestine's present difficulties it could in a breath. Hopefully in a more honourable fashion that the last gunboat holder did.
5
POPS"Haughton's Drop", Hanging, Dublin Zoo, Darwin, Wallace, history Haughton House in Dublin Zoo is being restored to its ancient glories in honour of the great patron and scientist. On a visit to Bronx Park, New York he became a bit bored by the record of perfection which he received on all sides, so he enquired about the financial aspect of the institution: how did they pay for their obviously princely expenditure? So-and-so, he was told, but of course the main source of income was gate-money. “What ?” asked Haughton, “do you mean you charge people to get in?” “Of course; don’t you?” “Oh! no - we let them in free; then we enlarge one of our celebrated lions and charge them to get out! We do better that way.”
3
POPSHow The Greens Captured Energy Policy Other aspects of the Green argument have also collapsed. New discoveries off Brazil and in the Gulf of Mexico have nearly doubled international oil reserves, pushing backwards from the "peak oil" date. And global warming, that notorious by-product of "oil addiction," has faded to the point that its advocates are now reduced to threatening dissenters with prison. It has gone almost completely unacknowledged that with oil shale, offshore deposits, and new resources such as the hydrocarbon sludge deposits off B.C. and Alaska, the OPEC of the late 21st century is going to be right here. That's a goal worth working toward. Breaking the power of the Greens is yet another possible benefit. Energy reform is an egg and rock situation for the Democrats. From the old Irish proverb: "When the rock hits the egg, alas for the egg. When the egg hits the rock, alas for the egg."
6
POPSTrain drove over 2 Dead Drunk Men. "When the driver stopped, he saw two heads underneath the train." Well two heads are better than one or non. Note the sentence despite "the court hearing that one had 33 previous convictions while the other had 63 previous convictions." 5,000 plus Brazilian fans, most of them resident in Ireland, cheered Brazil to victory in the 80,000 capacity Croke Park.
7
POPSWhy The Brits Are Setting Terrorists Free It is surely no accident that this failure to grasp the true dimensions of the Islamic terrorist threat is so pronounced among the British elite. For these are the people whose education and careers embody the key attribute of Britain's liberal society – the belief that the world is governed by rational agents acting in their rational self-interest. The British ruling class just doesn't get religious fanaticism. That is why its judges and politicians are finding it so difficult to fight Islamic terror. Not just Britain but the whole world is less safe as a result.
7
POPSIrishman Angry at the Bush Junket Disruption! Willie has 'balls'. Few would publicly crisis the disruptive Bush. Doesn't he know that the grinning George is responsible for the torture of more humans than all Americans to date? Does he think that being Irish makes him immune to waterboarding. Surely as a aircraft man he knows of 'extraordinary rendition' where you are on permanent tour of the best torture prisons on earth. Even Shannon seems to be on the CIA itinerary according to Amnesty. And your personal politics or none is no disbarment. From Israel, to Egypt, to Iran, to Russia, to Africa, to Cuba, to Abu Ghraib, to Bagram, all are catered for. Fear of flying is sorted with drugs and huds, in best gangster fashion. There are no numbers yet on 'lost in flight' customers, but getting there. After all, this was a favourite method of disposal for the US trained South American juntas. "Lost at sea" is permanent and 'clean'.
7
POPSCanadian Wins Major International Book Prize De Niro's Game , which follows characters caught in the civil war in Beirut in the 1980s, is "a magnificent achievement for a writer writing in a third language," the five-member international jury said in its citation. "Its originality, its power, its lyricism, as well as its humane appeal all mark De Niro's Game as the work of a major literary talent and make Rawi Hage a truly deserving winner." The Beirut-born writer, who lived through nine years of civil war in the Lebanese capital before his family emigrated to Canada, called himself "a fortunate man. "After a long journey of war, displacement and separation, I feel that I am one of the few wanderers who is privileged enough to have been rewarded, and for that I am very grateful."