What have the Romans ever done for us?

In your very modest proposal(ahem). . .

You could say the same sorts of things about Israel of course, which would result in the same argument you make here for dismantling the Jewish state, placing it under UN trusteeship, eliminating “the preferential treatment given to the millions of members of the Irish [Jewish] diaspora,’ and so on.

A couple of factual errors:

It is not a “lie” that the Irish “are a people with the right to organize themselves and determine their future in a state.” If anything it is a truth of international law, at least no less true than the right of Jews to organize themselves and determine their future in a state. That right is vested no less in Irish Protestants, dissenters or people from any auld background who are no less Irish for it, of course, and it should be possible and proper to “remove control of primary and secondary education from the Catholic Church and prosecute those members of it suspected of crimes against women and children” without dismantling the Irish state.

“Until the third quarter of the nineteenth century most of them were quite happy with a British identity; they spoke and dreamed in English. . .”

I know of no evidence to support the first clause of that sentence, and the second is plainly false. I think you’ll find that it wasn’t until the third quarter of the nineteenth century that the majority of the Irish were even starting to become conversant in English, let alone capable of “dreaming” in it.

Say what you will about absurd constructions of Irish history and identity, but do you really want to try to have some Eurogruppen autocracy instruct the people of Ireland in how to “find their true identities” and then further instruct them in what forms of government and “identity” they are permitted to possess, so long as it specifically excludes an “Irish” national identity?

You’ll need more than just a few aromatherapy sessions up in Finglas for that sort of thing, Eamonn.

But I’ve played along. Odd no commenter has noticed the game.

TG

Do the Irish realize that their government’s foreign minister…Martin…is merely spouting Vatican policy…when he criticizes Israel…

Irish policy is Vatican foreign policy…no different…