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Hi Folks,

Not a fanatic soccer fan myself but Im going to Aviva next Sunday for the Austria match ... (there's 2 of us going)

Im from the North so I dont know whether to take the car or the train..

Someone said if I took the car I could go through the port tunnel and possibly park at Clan Na Gael football ground .... Not even sure it would be available or free as its a Sunday..

Ive only ever been to Aviva for Rugby before and it was always on a Saturday and usually got the dart out to it..

Any advice would be much appreciated  (btw, "dont go" isnt an option  )

Will SF repay Jeremy Corbyn for his hospitality in Westminster and support when every other party shunned and expelled them by taking their seats in a hung parliament to put him into No.10? 

With a potential and not unrealistic 6/7 MPs, SF could either form the timing point for a introduction of a Corbyn government by voting with him or allow the return of May by their absence.  Which would be the best scenario for them?  Probably favour return of May to ensure a hard Brexit and the re-establishment of the border to create the focus for continuous political agitation.

However, given SFs inability to advance a concrete plan for a UI to take advantage of it and given the actual practical aggravation which a hard Brexit might cause to their voters, north and south, they cannot quite advocate a hard Brexit.

If the Tories lose there won't be a hard Brexit.

Labour's negotiating team of Corbyn, Keir Starmer, Emily Thornberry and Barry Gardiner is miles better than the Tories team of Theresa the Trump appeaser, David Davis, Liam Foxhunter and  ;DBoris Johnson .

Both in an intellectual sense and in terms of existing relations with other major European parties. Labour hasn't burned its bridges with Europe like the Tories have done and Europe will be much more open to a Labour negotiating team.

The Labour team would be going to negotiate.

The Tories variously think they're going to fight a war/engage in an infantile Twitter trolling session against Europe.

They're clueless on Brexit, and that's supposed to be their "strong" issue?! 

Given that Labour are now running rings around them on their "strong issue", what does it tell you about the rest of the Tories' policies?

They're a fooking joke.

The same Emily Thornberry who said the other day they couldn't export food to Australia as it would "go off"? Aye intellectual powerhouse by the sound of it

A lot of dairy products go off pretty quickly.Can't be flown. Fresh meat too. NZ exports frozen stuff.
Most UK food exports go to the EU. And they won't be able to find replacement markets for a lot of the stuff.

I'm not disputing the correctness of this but I'd like to see a breakdown per country of where UK food exports go. I imagine most to Ireland as UK foodstuffs don't have a great reputation in nations with a greater history of fine cuisine like France or Italy.

Personally, I think Brexit will bring minimal change. Take food products as a prime example. In France, Italy and other wine producing EU countries you can get a very good bottle of wine for a couple of euro. In the UK, you're looking at at least ten pounds and even then it's invariably of the quality a Frenchman or an Italian would pour down the drain. I can't imagine wine producers are going to want to lose access to a market where they can sell substandard versions of their products for vastly inflated prices.

Re food stuffs .... Just one example of a huge issue that Brexit would bring to Farmers over here is the fact that GB would probably have to do deals with the Americas which would lead to the importing of very cheap beef etc.. ... even though its not allowed at present it would be then .. and its full of mad dog catweeazle dust 

Farmers = Fooked
Consumers = Fooked (but temporarily happy cause its cheap!!)

[never]

How much is this World Cup going to cost?
and how much do we have to pay World Rugby?

think of all the grassroots multi-sports facilities that could be developed across the country for the same amount
lunacy

Yeah, imagine if we accidentally got to host it twice in a row  ...  Dustin the Turkey would have to be put forward to construct & deliver the application for the next one .. and then we'd never win it again 

Did anyone see the debate amongst the South Belfast candidates on 'The View' last night?

I thought it was completely dominated by O Muilleoir who completely owned Pengelly when she started to try to corner him re the Manchester bombing, asking him to apologise for the IRA Manchester bomb....to which he replied it was a bit rich her asking that when her father had been importing weapons to NI for loyalists....OUCH.

And how does any of that help or pass as politics ? It's like groundhog day

Ask Pengelly...

It was whataboutery at its highest level but Pengelly had it coming to her after trying to corner Máirtín Ó Muilleoir on the Manchester bombings....
That aside I think McDonnell did nothing to enhance his chances, UUP nice but irrelevant, Alliance girl was decent enough and wasn't going to bullied by the pro lifers in the audience.
All a bit meh, but leaps and bounds better than our sitting MP, Jim expenses Shannon FFS.

McDonnell is a disaster ... He is the only Nationalist who seems constantly capable of coming across even more smug & condescending than the DUP !! ... and that takes some doing..

Did anyone see the debate amongst the South Belfast candidates on 'The View' last night?

I thought it was completely dominated by O Muilleoir who completely owned Pengelly when she started to try to corner him re the Manchester bombing, asking him to apologise for the IRA Manchester bomb....to which he replied it was a bit rich her asking that when her father had been importing weapons to NI for loyalists....OUCH.

And how does any of that help or pass as politics ? It's like groundhog day

Ask Pengelly...

I know but it's fckn depressing, I don't watch any of those local politics shows anymore because of this nonsense

Yeah but what was he supposed to do .. let her rant away and say nothing ?

The DUP will bury their head in the sand and ignore what is blatantly coming. The other picture I posted from slugger got a reply from a guy who claims to be a liberal unionist labour supporter living in England with a background in statistics and quite honestly it was staright out of the DUP handbook of denial. Basically all those non-religion and others from the census are lapsed Protestants and Unionists - unbelievable horseshit. The Catholic growth is all due to immigrants who couldnt give a stuff about Irish nationalism no mention about the equally high number of Protestant born outside the UK etc etc etc basically in complete denial

I'd say there is a fair sprinkling of Poles etc who will now take out British citizenship (post Brexit), but might well not be big fans of the the DUP notwithstanding their use of their new British passports at polling stations. The DUP Brexit idiocy both give these people a reason to end up on the voting register, and to use their vote to get out of the UK back into the EU!!

The Unionists never never learn. That giant of the political scene, Robin Swann, has characterised calls for special post-Brexit status for North as a 'back door bid to unite Ireland', when of course any rational political thinker would see it as the exact opposite, a measure of flexibility to prevent the whole thing pulling apart.

Unfortunately thoough, nationalism is represented largely by SF who are entirely incapable of putting forward a credible economic model for the way forward, so these small minds will not be called out on their nonsense.

Is that really it, .. they just wont let themselves believe its happening ? ... thats funny about yer man saying that all the increase in Taigs is down to immigrants .. how mad is that ..Good Grief 

Ah well, they're their own worst enemy !!

The evolution of the 6 county population

Thats excellent ... whens that from exactly ? .. i..e what date are these figures from & are they from a census or what?

At this link it says 2014

http://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=241162.0

I imagine this is based on the 2011 census, which would imply that things had already moved along a bit.

Yeah I guess it must be from 2011 ... Do the DUP not look at this sorta stuff ... why the feck are they STILL so intransigent, I mean what do they think is going to happen here ... Any sensible group would try and make friends but I guess they just cant help themselves .. ffs

It shouldn't really be such a hardship to "share" the bloody place should it, but I guess when youve had it your own way for so long, its hard to give that up .. whats the next step for them .. I wonder what they're thinking ?

The DUP will bury their head in the sand and ignore what is blatantly coming. The other picture I posted from slugger got a reply from a guy who claims to be a liberal unionist labour supporter living in England with a background in statistics and quite honestly it was staright out of the DUP handbook of denial. Basically all those non-religion and others from the census are lapsed Protestants and Unionists - unbelievable horseshit. The Catholic growth is all due to immigrants who couldnt give a stuff about Irish nationalism no mention about the equally high number of Protestant born outside the UK etc etc etc basically in complete denial

The dup will bury their head in the sand as distinct from the Provos who bury the whole body

Be quiet Ruth  .. there's people actually trying to discuss stuff here .. there's a good girl !!

This is a far better representation of demographic shift again using the 2011 census. Saw it a while back for each county and someone on slugger posted this image for the whole of Northern Ireland. The other big milestone that has already happened (end of last year) is that the number of people from a Catholic community background is now greater than those from the Protestant community background.

Ouch !!!

The evolution of the 6 county population

Thats excellent ... whens that from exactly ? .. i..e what date are these figures from & are they from a census or what?

At this link it says 2014

http://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=241162.0

I imagine this is based on the 2011 census, which would imply that things had already moved along a bit.

Yeah I guess it must be from 2011 ... Do the DUP not look at this sorta stuff ... why the feck are they STILL so intransigent, I mean what do they think is going to happen here ... Any sensible group would try and make friends but I guess they just cant help themselves .. ffs

It shouldn't really be such a hardship to "share" the bloody place should it, but I guess when youve had it your own way for so long, its hard to give that up .. whats the next step for them .. I wonder what they're thinking ?

The evolution of the 6 county population

Thats excellent ... whens that from exactly ? .. i..e what date are these figures from & are they from a census or what?

Lost a lot of respect for Corbyn when he did that "no seats" on train stunt, so showed how much of a man of the people he was by sitting on the floor between carriages.

Yeah that was a silly stunt but if its the biggest issue you have with him then he mustn't be too bad...

and it was just that, a stunt ... He was only attempting to highlight a daily issue that season ticket holders in GB face EVERY single day .. and that cant be denied..

No he said he was highlighting a wider issue when he got caught red handed, at the time it was being shared left right and centre on Facebook and the like, without the full story.

Yeah thats what I said 

"He was only attempting to highlight a daily issue that season ticket holders in GB face EVERY single day "

he would have been better doing it when he "actually" had no seat but its hardly a capital sin .. it was a stunt !!

[I actually stopped watching rugby in the 2000's]

Now that is the response of a WUM.  So kids will somehow stop following Ireland and the provinces as they haven't been successful??? Slipping off the pace at the 6 nations - you really don't have a clue do you. Did you start watching rugby in the 2000's.... Or maybe you remember when actually did struggle. On this warped rationale of yours then kids from 25+ counties in Ireland should stop following their county as they haven't a hope in hell of winning anything in the near future and I include my own in that!!

Am I factually incorrect? Did I start personalising the argument? In the 2015 6 Nations we won 2 games, this year we were beaten by Scotland, a game we were well expected to win. I actually stopped watching rugby in the 2000's, (having followed it since the late 70s), a bit fed up with the whole Sky-ification of the sport.

My main point is that we have dropped back a lot from the peak glory days of O'Driscoll, 2009 Grand Slam et al, thus Irish rugby's profile is lowered and is less 'sexy' to younger people; therefore, in my opinion admittedly, the potential numbers taking up and playing the sport will be reduced. Please, present a factional rebuttal to this. Who are the new generation about to come through?

Refer to bold above ..... Jeez, So how can you tell whats going on then 

btw, Gaelic is my first sport .. Rugby is next and its bloody great, and I honestly believe that we (Ireland & Provinces) have a great future..

Lost a lot of respect for Corbyn when he did that "no seats" on train stunt, so showed how much of a man of the people he was by sitting on the floor between carriages.

Yeah that was a silly stunt but if its the biggest issue you have with him then he mustn't be too bad...

and it was just that, a stunt ... He was only attempting to highlight a daily issue that season ticket holders in GB face EVERY single day .. and that cant be denied..

Sam Coates Times
✔
@SamCoatesTimes
Tonight: Times/YouGov regular weekly poll shows 3pt Tory lead. (Poll different to YouGov model but Tory lead same)

It's like watching Offaly in the 94 hurling final

Before you come in your trousers there is another poll showing the Tories 12 points ahead

the difference is all about the turnout of young people

Seems 2m young people have registered to vote since the election was called.

Fair play. Lets see how they react after a few tax hikes

What do you mean? ....... I doubt there's too many young people in the top 5% of earners ...

This is the problem with politics, when you get an "honest" man,  people either dont listen to what he says or they dont believe what he says .. which is it with you ?

Arlene wants to go back to the demographics of the 50s

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2017/may/31/general-election-2017-may-corbyn-bbc-debate-campaign-personal-politics-live

Foster said, for her, the most important issue at the forthcoming election "is not devolution but the union itself".
She called on all unionists to rise to the challenge from Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams and put a border poll off the agenda for generations.
"Sinn Fein want to use this election as a precursor to a border poll," she said. "Gerry Adams has declared that this election will be a barometer on Irish Unity.
"Let us rise to that challenge and seek to ensure that unionism still returns a majority of unionist MPs to Westminster and puts the notion of a divisive and destabilising border poll off the agenda for generations to come."

This is exactly the issue I have with Unionism. Everything on their terms and the only legitimate culture and ideology in NI is a unionist one.

Yep, down croppy down .. they havent changed a bit and would happily (delightedly) go back to 1950 in the morning