Tis great to be thick and poor again.

At the start of the nineties, with the last chords of ole ole ole croaking from our throats, and the whole world knowing that we were great craic, complete with a copy of The Joshua Tree under our arms, we sat down to see how we could all be taken more seriously across the world. For decades Paddy had been seen as the man with spuds growing in his fingernails, with the next fight just an utterance away. Now that we were universally acclaimed as being great fun to be with, all we needed to join the world was a bitteen of wealth and a bitteen of education — the two things our forefathers had fought for in the GPO.

Wealth was defined as having the second home in Bratislava where periodically, Paddy would retire to snort cocaine off the taut belly of Svetlana and her Slovakian sisters. There was also the mandatory 4X4 for those rare off-road moments, the eff-off gates (to keep neighbours from visiting) and the thrice-yearly skiing trips to Soldeu where Paddy would make a fool of himself skiing down the black slope, ripping his ligaments and other body parts that he never knew he had, before he got the education.

The times we live in

Ya know the world is not right when Irish politicians are resigning on the grounds of principle...without any video or audio evidence...when the Greens are the ones who are caught out being unlawful...when Tiger Woods is pretending to be human and is saying sorry to everyone but the scores of mistresses...when Willie O’Dea is giving out about people kicking a man when he is down. Ya know the world is not right when Mayo beat Galway...twice...in a row...without even trying. Ya know the world isn’t right when the Galway footballers are dying their hair blond...and they not even knowing Michael Jackson. Ya know the world isn’t right when hurling fans in Tipperary hand the GAA €150,000 on a snowy Saturday night, be tormented for an hour or so, and then head off home into the night without seeing any hurling or without getting any of the cash back. Twice. Will we get a receipt? Will we f... ya know the world isn’t right when Galway club hurlers have to go to the High Court to get a victory...Ya know the world is not right when ya realise how long it took for Cheryl to realise that Ashley is a twat. And we all knowing that for years. Honest. Ya know the world is not right when ya realise that it’s costing the Guards €10,000 to police rag week in Galway and leave a state of the art policing buggy in the Square to do the job when criminals are shooting each other across the country... Why don’t they just give the money to charity and tell all the students to stay at home...ya know the world isn’t right when despite all the policing, rag week students behave themselves...ya know the world isn’t right when Enda Kenny is trying to find himself and then be that person...and then finding out that that person is a cross combining Roy Keane, Ena Sharples and Arnold Schwarzenegger...ya know the world isn’t right when Jedward tickets sell out in 15 minutes which is probably 12 minutes more than the material they have...ya know the world is not right when the last connection with Wanderly Wagon goes to his eternal reward and when the first person you meet (on ‘Judge’ment day) in the afterlife is Bosco...ya know the world is not right when ya hear that an unelected Green can tweet us all into distraction...when the Bishops are asking us for their forgiveness...when Thalimidomide survivors can’t even get a grant to help lock their homes while a directly elected mayor will have a staff of 30...ya know the world is not right when Ronan O’Gara writes to newspapers to complain about them complaining about him...ya know the world is not right when the Irish bobsleigh team don’t come last in the Winter Olympics and when Irishman Mikey Graham is still in the running to win Skating on Ice...ya know the world isn’t right when Michael O’Leary comes over all patriotic and caring...So how could we be anyway but the way we are?

Irish politics is a bit like The Sopranos

Over the past fortnight, Irish politics has resembled the final episodes of that classic crime drama The Sopranos. As that series rumbled to a climax, all it took was one stray bullet to set into train a series of events that saw one character after another take a hit.

While the resignation of Trevor Sargent on Tuesday has so far been portrayed as an isolated incident, there are not many people who would bet that it is not connected to the incidents of the past few weeks.

More Editorial

• The Boy With The Dragon Yahoo and other Swedish things
• Tis great to be thick and poor again.
• The times we live in
• Irish politics is a bit like The Sopranos
• Pope’s blame misplaced as Irish faith was at its strongest when abuses were carried out
• Lee farce ruins chances of commoners in mayoral polls
• Bye bye Gluas-keen, hello bendy buses
• Government should never have left Galway begging for race aid
• Our weather woes will encourage us to help Haitians
• It didn’t take long for Galway’s ugly side to come to fore
• Give the gift of yourself this Christmas
• M6 and the cities — end of the road
• Tiger, chin up. You could be over here with us!
• Help the people who know those who need help
• When it rains, it pours
• The knock that every parent dreads hearing
• Let there be no laughing this Christmas
• Our health is our wealth
• Paddy wants the right to drive when drunk, so he does
• Bull’s hit speech treated us all like gombeens
• Exs and Ohs — all aboard, all aboard, the gravy train is pulling out
• From the people who brought you wife swapping sodomites...
• Shop local and help keep our communities alive and interesting
• Delay in Taaffes development delaying job creation in city, claims Crowe
• GAA backing of Alan Kerins’ charity shows nice guys do win
• Last laugh for the girl who walked funny
• We must fill empty college seats to attract clean jobs
• O’Shea’s sale highlights the quality on show in Terryland
• Ballybrit and the stream of unconsciousness
• The white flag has been raised....