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I see Farage, whose party just a week or so ago agreed an alliance with the TUV, has endorsed Sammy Wilson and Ian Og, who Jim Allister will be standing against. Jim is disappointed. Great to see him being shit on from a height

That's crazy.  Jim has been double-crossed.

Wonder what shade of gammon red that's turned him 

[would she go down the route of Health Minister at some stage]

This is the type of candidate that SF are 'going after' now I think.  Moving away, to a certain extent, from the old guard. Pat is new blood, if you pardon the pun!

If she is successful, would she go down the route of Health Minister at some stage? She would have a better knowledge that most of this portfolio.

Maybe some long term planning here but needs to get elected first obviously.

Snapchat might know more?

Can't see her trading being an MP for MLA.

Maybe Minister for Health in the Dail?

Ye had similar to that in 2022 and 90% of the GAA couldnt wait to dump it as it wasn't wanted.

Sources for this please...?

Congress 2022. It was 94.7% in fact.

The congress that was in Feb of 2022 was able to make an informed decision on the approach used in the 2022 Championship?

Some foresight there all right.

Ye had similar to that in 2022 and 90% of the GAA couldnt wait to dump it as it wasn't wanted.

Sources for this please...?


Just ran the rather incomplete attendance figures from wiki. Big gaps but averaging to remove them indicates little difference between 2022 and 2023.

2022 qualifiers avg = 10310
2023 group avg = 10821

2022 AI knock-out avg* = 49567
2023 AI knock-out avg** = 49666

*excluded the qualifiers from this and compared them to the groups

**excluded the preliminary quarter-finals from this to make it more like-for-like. They have a separate average of 14513 and would drag the 2023 AI knockout down to 36883

Getting rid of the provincial championships is stupid.

How a proponent of the idea thinks anyone is going to travel 200 miles round trip for say, Antrim vs. Offaly is beyond me.
[and thats only half way down the Island]

The journos have done more to screw up the game with their endless yapping going on decades.

It was them that insisted any defender tugging a jersey gets booked. Which meant the only alternative to managers to avoid getting wiped out by either losing defenders to the line or by allowing free scoring was dropping extra men back.

You'll not see any of them in a rush to admit to that though.


None in the corridors of power will have the balls to even propose trying for a year or two reverting back to a straight knockout to see what affect it has. Instead it'll be another mad scheme - probably adding further games or logistical juggling.

... and as for the general subject.

Representative democracy is a load of balls.

If the job of running the country were based on qualifications and interview, how many of them would even get beyond initial CV screening?


Something could probably be salvaged from it if there were two houses:
- elected house of commons to bring the will of the people to governance
- elected house of professionals (professional bodies electing technically adept individuals)

No bill can be passed into law without approval of both houses.


Funnily enough, no room there for lord and lady of the manor. Who have done f**k all but either lick the right arse or fall out of the right arse.

The Mickey Mouse degree thing is a good idea tbf

Would going to Oxford and studying Classics, ancient languages, literature, history, and philosophy be considered a Mickey Mouse degree?

Uni should teach you two things:
- how to research and learn independently of tuition
- knowledge in topics of immediate value in society

Far too many courses in far too many universities aren't worth two sh!tes for either.

If Oxford were churning out hundreds of graduates a year in ancient languages, then I'd suggest most of those graduates will find the topics covered useless; but because of the standards and expectations, they will have learned how to dig up information and learn in other matters through the rest of their life.

Probably fair to say that the average student could pick a better subject than the classics in somewhere like Oxford, but it should still offer enough transferrable skills to be useful.

When it comes to Penalties, normally a goalkeeper has to pull u out of a hole. Most penalties are scored, so keeper needs save a few. Armagh keeper kept repeatly going early, before the ball was kicked, left it easy for the kicker to go the other way. There always a 1 or 2 straight down the middle, best way to save a penalty is to stand u ground.

100%

Penalties usually fall into one of two categories.

(i) Well hit that you aren't saving anyway.
(ii) Utter dung very close to down the middle.

The missing category is of course (iii) the saveable penalty if the goalkeeper guesses the right way and is at full stretch.

But the volume of penalties that fall under (ii) are far more than (iii).

So stand your ground. Make the kicker work for it. They're even more likely to mess it up when you don't move.

Near Castlewellan is a slightly better location, but how likely would it be to get planning permission there? Look at the access road for example. A lot of drama made about the road to Ballykinlar, which is an A road and 5mins from Clough (and 15mins from Castlewellan).

It's 'A' shite road

Agreed its a shite road and its a bit of a misnomer to hide behind an arbitrary designation of "A" road.

The only significant problem with that location at the Finn is indeed the junction onto the main road which I'll freely admit is currently a crap one with cars flying over that brow coming from Castlewellan. But placing up smart signalling like this would go a long way to mitigating the problem. Other than that, hard to see the roots of any planning objections.

But lets not lose the forest for trees - that land is literally me querying propertypal this evening. More suitable have probable been ignored over the years to chase Ballykinlar and more suitable will probably coming up over the next few years too.

Potentially good news for Truth Hurts, East Down and Down in general;

https://www.irishnews.com/news/northern-ireland/councillors-overturn-decision-not-to-back-eu-funding-application-by-down-gaa-for-new-centre-of-excellence-AZVJTRKBYZF4BKUJLS2XERJZSQ/

Decidedly mixed feelings on this.


Short term, something is needed. Badly.
Medium term, its probably at a good price and on a sandy base to save some costs in drainage installation.
Long term, its a poor geographic location at the end of very bad roads.


Here is 17 acres of land just off the main Castlewellan Clough road.
Yeah, its ~£300k and you could probably fit in only 3 pitches. But in a ~£12m project, is 3% more worth it when your then located just off a main road slap bang in the (GAA) centroid of the county?


Its only a 25 year lease the county board have on the site. Amortised, thats ~£500k a year then the MoD could potentially pull the rug out from under you?

Who claimed you did dispute that Russia uses these cyber gangs for their own purposes?
In my and most others opinion, being complicit with the Russian based cyber gangs to reap havoc in Europe carries the same weight of guilt as the doer of the dastardly deeds.

So if you hire a builder to put up an extension, your responsible for what the same builder does for the fella down the road?

Donald Tusk warming that Europe is not prepared for war. Laughable five years ago but it's not beyond the bounds of possibility now with Putin well and truly untouchable in his own country.
Where does that leave Ireland, a geographic soft spot on the western fringe of UK and Europe?
Has NATO a blueprint somewhere to save Irelands ass for their own welfare?  And does Ireland know about it?

WHAT?!?!?

So the Russians with their extensive Navy are going to try and invade Ireland, a full EU member, putting themselves at the end of an enormously fragile supply  chain and piss off half of the US on both sides of congress/senate?

If any Russian ship managed to make it to Irish territorial waters I'd be amazed. If any managed to reach shoreline I'd be in a state of disbelief and if they lasted longer than a week before dying of half the USAF's missiles up their hole I'd die of shock.


Of course, the Russians aren't that stupid so would never even try. Not before already occupying all of continental Europe and probably the UK too.

Will he lose his knighthood?

Does it not make him fit in better with the rest of them?

Just another Sir Odious p***k who was honoured for his services to ass-licking the right hole.

Peaceful, where you lads been past 50yrs, Loyalists not accept it, end of. same way the IRA didn't in the 70's.The outcome will be no different, only in reverse this time.

Did you miss the as possible at the end?

joint rule would give loyalists a reason to return to arms

Zero interest in joint rule would just be a massive fudge for 50 years

Consider it a soft landing toward an eventual United Ireland.

In that context, a border poll is more likely to have them up in arms, and with joint rule, the soft unionists here (that is, those that could be swayed by economics) will have a better chance to see the potential benefits of a United Ireland as media focus moves from, or at least spits between, Westminster to the Dail.


I would consider formal joint governance a massive step toward making the transition to a United Ireland as peaceful and prosperous as possible.