Gerry Feehily - Europhrenia

Ireland for sale

2011-03-18T18:43:00.000+01:00

It seems a rich, if not bitter, irony that on the feast of Saint Patrick, the day Ireland pats itself on the back, that its new government should announce a plan to sell off its state assets, the “crown jewels”, as the Irish Independent puts it. Although the Dublin daily doesn’t go into the specifics of what jewels will go under the hammer, a recent report by NCB, an Irish securities

Democracy – but beautiful

2011-02-25T14:49:00.000+01:00

Here’s my editorial for Presseurop on the Irish elections, Arab revolutions, and more… An angry Ireland votes today, and will doubtlessly elect as its next Taoiseach Enda Kenny of Fine Gael, a centre right party, to replace Fianna Fail, another centre right party, widely blamed for the country’s economic crash. Mr Kenny, like most of Ireland’s political leaders, intends to pursue

EU couldn’t keep peace in a Buddhist monastery

2011-02-16T18:34:00.000+01:00

In the wake of the EU’s reaction to the events in Egypt, I can’t help thinking again of President Van Rompuy’s recent Warsaw speech. “Europe is the best guarantee for peace. It was and is a work of peace.” Then, “Europe has to be the fatherland of peace. We owe this to our history ... The bloody battlefields from our history have been replaced by Brussels

As queer as a jobless recovery

2011-02-09T18:33:00.000+01:00

Ireland is in “recovery”. Such is the sage counsel of NCB, “one of Ireland's largest independent securities firms” and “a leading provider of institutional equities, wealth management and corporate finance services to our clients for over 25 years.” NCB has just produced a 104-page opus entitled “Ireland Moves Forward” (IMF for short, notes Jason Walsh @

Laurent Wauquiez - dodgy oxygen

2011-01-21T17:51:00.000+01:00

Here’s Laurent Wauquiez, French Minister for European Affairs, in a speech in Helsinki on bringing Romania and Bulgaria into the Schengen area (HD to @beranger_v4 for info). “If the Schengen zone’s data-base falls into the hands of international organised criminals, then it’s European internal security in its entirety that is wiped out.” He then argues that it’s in Romania, Bulgaria and

The IMF has such good taste

2010-11-26T19:30:00.000+01:00

After a hard week chuckling over the future of Europe with my transcontinental colleagues at the Presseurop offices, there’s nothing I can resist quite as much as scooting off to poor banjaxed ould completely knackered Ireland in an Air France jet and just “letting go” at the Merrion Hotel, “one of the finest luxury hotels in Dublin

It's TINA, stupid

2010-11-21T15:35:00.000+01:00

This is the Presseurop editorial I wrote as the EU / IMF men in back landed in Dublin. It's available also in 9 other languages at our site. In the coming weeks, if not months, the story you are likely to hear will be one of a plucky nation, emerging from a legacy of colonial oppression, poverty and mass emigration, whose rise to riches was as spectacular as its downfall. And there are no

Meet the new government of Ireland

2010-11-18T17:16:00.000+01:00

The only thing sovereign in Ireland right now is the contempt which the government holds for its own people, denying point blank that an EU/IMF bailout for the national economic car crash is imminent. So first off I would like to offer profuse thanks and curtsies to Simeon Djankov, deputy Prime Minister of Bulgaria, for finally calling a spade a spud when he

The new Irish famine

2010-11-16T13:55:00.000+01:00

“The Irish famine killed more than a million people, but it killed poor devils only. To the wealth of the country, it did not the slightest damage.” So wrote Karl Marx back in 1867. As 21st century Ireland peers out over the debt drop, beneath which lie the open jaws of an EU/IMF “bailout”, I’d like to make some outrageous parallels between then and now. Back

Attack of the fantasy bombers

2010-11-05T11:50:00.003+01:00

“Booby-trap bomb sent to Nicolas Sarkozy”, “Greek parcel bomb plot targets Merkel”, “Italian police investigating parcel bomb sent to Berlusconi”. To go by yesterday’s headlines, you put a bomb in a box, do a gift wrap, post it “personally addressed” to Nicolas Sarkozy, Elysée Palace, Paris, and usually it should end up on his desk, or in Merkel’s case, in her “

Meet France’s Number 1 scroungers

2010-10-14T13:27:00.001+02:00

Pff… strikes, strikes and more strikes. There I was, only yesterday, railing on a metro platform with my two plastic bags at all these sluggy, pasty faced, socially-assisted scroungers running France into the ground, when my train turned up 30 seconds late and I got to work on time. To think that three million of these good for nothings, born with “a hair in the

Frontex flies under the radar

2010-10-08T13:24:00.000+02:00

Frontex anyone? What sounds like a brand of prophylactic actually is one - an EU body charged, among other chores, with keeping illegals out of Europe. Of French inspiration, a crunch of Frontières Exterières (ie External Borders), Frontex, in its own words, provides “particular added value (my italics) to the national border management systems of the Member

McCreevy and the Brussels afterlife

2010-09-30T00:48:00.001+02:00

You really have to hand it to Charlie McCreevy, ex-European Commissioner. There he was, leaving his office at the Commish on a bitter cold February morn this year, no doubt with a couple of plastic bags full of personal effects, and gloomily contemplating what life might be from without the glass walls of Berlaymount. No doubt, as Europe sank into crisis, he

The truth? There is no crisis

2010-09-24T18:25:00.001+02:00

Very recently, I ran into a copy of London’s ultra-glam Plastique, a “Bi-Annual Luxury Fashion and Culture Magazine”. Plastique is so stratospherically glam that its website just leads you to three photos of a woman who looks like she’s been on the skag since her sex change but is too rich to care. You can click on absolutely nothing else. On the Info section of

Et pourquoi pas English?

2010-09-16T19:59:00.003+02:00

On Tuesday, Libération’s Brussels correspondent, the indomitable Jean Quatremer, mounted his favorite hobby horse, the perils of the use of English at the Commission. This time it was Viviane Reding’s condemnation of France’s expulsion of the Roma that caused his cables to snap. It’s worth quoting in full the following passages which I fear fail to convey their vigour in original French, but

Brian Cowen, no credit can he gain

2010-09-15T17:36:00.001+02:00

Last night consternation hung like a dreadful cloud over the capitals of Europe and the world… if you follow the Irish media, that is. From Brussels to Bratislava, and along the ancient Silk Road via Kazakhstan to China, the alleged drunkeness of Irish Taoiseach Brian Cowen on national radio was evoked in hundreds of exotic tongues. According to the Irish Examiner, the

Thilo, the self-hating Sarrazin

2010-09-09T13:16:00.000+02:00

Who can feel sorry for Thilo Sarrazin, who lost his cushy Bundesbank job after the publication of “Deutschland schafft sich ab” (Germany is deleting itself), a diatribe against the lower orders, but probably would have held onto to it had he avoided talking about Jewish "genes". In nine chapters of pop science with graphs and pie charts, Thilo proves that the lower

Dublin, toytown of literature

2010-07-29T18:34:00.001+02:00

So Dublin has been named a UNESCO City of Literature. Greeting the news, the Irish Republic’s Minister of Tourism said, "Being one of only four cities in the world to achieve the status of UNESCO City of Literature, will enable Dublin to increase its market share of tourists and attract more people to both the city and the island of Ireland." Indeed, Dublin is one of four cities, along

European integration? Go to jail

2010-07-22T16:07:00.002+02:00

Quite often Mr Wolfgang Schäuble and Madame Christine Lagarde make sense. But then again, it seems that just when the synapses get sparking all luminously, the connects short circuit. Take this initially promising declaration they have just posted to Herman Van Rompuy. “A single currency simply cannot work properly without enhanced economic policy coordination”. Correct. Indeed, it’s

Green taxation, green sadism?

2010-07-22T12:46:00.000+02:00

Individual consumer, Joe Sausage, muddling through this vale of CO2, be warned. If your planet is warming, seas are rising, glaciers turn to soup, entrapping polar kittens etc etc, then it’s all your fault, or your dodgy heater’s, or draughty attic. Take this case spotted by The Times yesterday – with hat doff to @tiredhack. The new caring Tory / LibDem admin is so concerned about “energy

Meet Europe’s highest paid politician

2010-07-19T19:19:00.000+02:00

Politics.ie has just posted a list of the world’s highest paid politicans, four of whom are European. Confining ourselves to the Eurololly-list only, we get Angela Merkel in fourth place, David Cameron third, second spot for Nicolas Sarkozy and taking the gold medal is…is…is… Monsieur Brian Cowen of the Irish Republic... Who with his cool €263,000 can have a right laugh and say a

Bring Paul the Octopus to Brussels

2010-07-09T19:04:00.001+02:00

News has just come in at the Presseurop office’s that Paul the Psychic Octopus has officially retired, following his latest prophecy that Spain will beat the Dutch in this Sunday’s World Cup final. Octopus life expectancy being only two years, Paul, already an advanced two and a half, shall be no more by the European Championship 2012 and World Cup Brazil 2014. Spiegel reports that the director

ECB, the bank that looks after its own

2010-07-06T16:55:00.000+02:00

A lovely little bit of news comes from the Financial Times today. The European Central Bank, champions of fiscal austerity across a continent, has been giving Romania an earful for hitting employees of the country’s central bank with a 25% pay cut. “In a strongly-worded statement,” the FT writes, “the ECB on Monday warned that Romania’s actions violated European Union treaties allowing monetary

Will the Tories do Sarkozy’s bidding?

2010-07-02T12:59:00.000+02:00

European Voice reports that UK Foreign secretary William Hague, speaking at the Foreign Office in London, has said that the UK government is ‘determined’ to increase its influence in the European Union. “The idea that the last government was serious about advancing Britain’s influence in Europe turns out to be an unsustainable fiction,” he said. “They neglected to ensure that sufficient

Football cannot affect your retirement plan

2010-07-01T13:38:00.003+02:00

Has France gone daft? 10 days after its shambles of a national football team shuffled out of the World Cup and we’ve got a public inquiry into the “fiasco”. Today, a parliamentary “Commission des affaires culturelles et de l'éducation” led by Sports Minister Roselyne Bachelot held an in-camera hearing with French coach Raymond Domenech to determine why Les Bleus are so, well, rubbish. I would

Austere, moi?

2010-06-30T11:38:00.000+02:00

TALES FROM THE SARKOZY ADMINISTRATION (3) Is France heading for a British style expenses meltdown? Maybe not, since this is the country where a C’est normal is as much a default reaction as a frothy mouthed Ce n’est pas possible. However, now that details of politicians’ expenses have replaced political debate across the Channel, it was inevitable it should

Anti-smoking lobbyists, meet Ms Bacall

2010-06-10T16:25:00.003+02:00

Euobserver.com reports that a Belgian judge has filed two complaints with the EU court in Luxembourg calling on the union to ban the sale of cigarettes in Belgium. If the tribunal finds the case admissible, and then rules in favour of it, this could “lead to a ban on the sale of tobacco products across the EU.” At least “in theory”, the EUobs thankfully points out. Said judge, who goes

One law for Europe, another for Africa

2010-06-04T18:42:00.000+02:00

Africa Research Centre has just published a study by Dr David Hoile on the International Criminal Court. Coinciding with the ICC’s first ever review conference in Kampala, Uganda, its title, The International Criminal Court: Europe’s Guantánamo Bay? somewhat betrays the mood. “While the ICC presents itself as an international court this is quite simply not the case,” the abstract

Europhrenia – Tonight’s blog isn’t about Israel

2010-06-03T15:55:00.002+02:00

The boffins at Eurostat have published figures for unemployment across the EU, which now stands at a 10.1% high, with obvious, if I may be so bold, “regional” variations. Without wishing to sound like a Eurovision, here are the results of the pear-shaped jury, and what a pear it is, with all sorts of non-standard lumps. And the lowest jobless figures go to The Netherlands and… welcoming

Europhrenia – Why is Israel judged by different standards?

2010-06-01T23:42:00.000+02:00

So far it seems that nine civilians were killed during the storming by Israeli commandoes of the aid flotilla heading for the Gaza Strip. And, as far as I know, some Israeli soldiers got a proper kicking. Seth Freedman in the Guardian can’t get over “quite how savagely numerous activists greeted the arrival of the troops on to the ship.” In an article helpfully entitled “Israel had

Europhrenia – Israel, not altogether pleasant

2010-06-01T00:49:00.000+02:00

So far we know that at least 10 activists have been killed (others reports are saying 19) and scores injured during the Israeli army storming of the Gaza aid flotilla this morning. Understatement of the day must go to Israel’s Minister of Trade and Industry Benjamin Ben-Eliezer. “The images are certainly not pleasant”, he owed, after viewing the clips. A bummer that, to have

Europhrenia - Ryanair, masters of actually existing capitalism

2010-05-29T15:11:00.000+02:00

The Irish Times has just reported that ex-Commissioner Charlie McCreevy has been appointed to the board of Ryanair. For a while the European Commission wrestled with its conscience as to whether this might be a conflict of interest, and won. McCreevy, with his oodles of insider knowledge of labyrinthine EU processes must surely not be without his uses to the low-cost airline

Europhrenia - Predicting the future, rewriting the present

2010-05-27T23:50:00.000+02:00

The Irish Independent led this morning with news from the OECD that Ireland’s economy “is close to a turning point and could rebound to 3 per cent growth next year.” According to the “influential” body’s twice-yearly global report, “export-led growth would be almost twice the expected level in the 16-nation euro area,” the Dublin daily beams, “and more than twice the predicted 1.3

Europhrenia – Leave Naomi Campbell alone

2010-05-21T00:31:00.001+02:00

The BBC reports that Naomi Campbell might be subpoenaed to testify at the trial of Liberia’s ex-President Charles Taylor. Let’s remember that Mr Taylor, among other things, is accused of selling diamonds and buying weapons for Sierra Leone’s Revolutionary United Front rebels, who, among other things, used to hack off people’s hands and legs during the 1991-2001 civil war. He

Europhrenia – Let’s drink to water scarcity

2010-05-18T20:06:00.003+02:00

“Brussels has warned that Europe is facing water scarcity and droughts, and not just in the drier Mediterranean countries,” writes the EUobserver. A report from the Commission states that even the Czech Republic and Belgium are at risk, with “water scarcity” reported even in these reputedly dribbly places. What might be the solution to the problem? As the EUobserver notes, the word from the

Europhrenia – Escape the future, become a luvvie

2010-05-18T10:02:00.000+02:00

Not without a soupçon of relish is The Daily Telegraph grinding out stats in its series on “Rebuilding Broken Britain”. Public debt exceeds £777 billion and will metastise to £1.4 trillion by 2014-15 etc, etc. It’s impossible to grasp what such figures represent, so right now, being confused as to what money itself is supposed to represent, I’ll pass. On the other hand, the budget rigour, the

Europhrenia - If Ireland is sovereign, then this duck will ride bicycles again

2010-05-13T14:55:00.000+02:00

It’s a long time since we last heard from Taoiseach Brian Cowen, Ireland’s equivalent of Gordon Brown, but whose political career is unlikely to survive beyond the opening minutes of the next general election, let alone a week like Brown’s. Cowen is quoted today in Cork’s Examiner addressing the Dail, Ireland’s parliament, telling it that - “The strategy that the Government has been

Europhrenia - That market news explained

2010-05-12T17:02:00.002+02:00

And so to The Guardian and the FT. We have been given to understand that another turbulent day has bewildered the world's markets. Only yesterday they rallied after the announcement of the €750bn eurozone bailout package. Today, that powerful mind like time lapse shots of a fast evolving weather pattern is “losing faith”. This has not prevented the press from relaying the appropriately named

Europhrenia - Human sacrifice on an Excel sheet

2010-05-10T19:54:00.002+02:00

So the European Union has decided to set up an economic defence mechanism. Said mechanism, reports euobserver.com, amounts to “half a trillion euros to protect weaker eurozone nations from market speculation”. Let’s remember that prior to this everyone was invoking the “no bail-out clause” in EU treaties that explicitly prohibits member states from taking on the financial commitments of a

Europhrenia - Bon anniversaire, Mr President of France

2010-05-07T01:14:00.002+02:00

It’s exactly three years since Nicolas Sarkozy was elected President of the French Republic. It only seems like one thousand and ninety five days since I went walking out on Place de la République to watch some anti Sarkozy activists in a standoff with the CRS riot police, who sent tiny CS gas canisters tocking out of wide stubby barrelled guns. Just as I was turning in for the night,

Europhrenia - Whoever wins, the rain will raineth every day

2010-05-05T19:30:00.002+02:00

The first British general election I remember was in 1979. It was Mrs Hamilton, the local Protestant lady from the Big House (this is borderlands Irish Republic) who was telling us, a bunch of Catholic kids on the way home from school, that a lady was gonna come. She was going to smash the unions over in England, was going to smash the killers five miles away in the North. She was a rain

Europhrenia - If austerity is Ireland’s strongest card, what game is this?

2010-05-04T19:38:00.002+02:00

How has economic nut-job Ireland reacted to the Eurozone/IMF €110bn bail-out of Greece? Let’s look at that ineffable source of mainstream blather that is the Irish Independent. Brendan Keenan in an article promisingly entitled “We’re not like the Greeks” admits that after last week’s Greek, Spanish and Portuguese downgrades Irish bonds fared badly. “People may well feel miffed about all this,

Europhrenia - Greece, this is your doctor

2010-05-04T10:07:00.001+02:00

A day after the Eurozone and the IMF pledged €120bn to bail-out Greece, the financial markets, which last week “panicked” at the downgrades awarded to Greece, Spain and Portugal, are now, according to the BBC, “muted”. One supposes this is good news. “But the markets realise,” says medically minded Philippe Gijsels, head of research at BNP Paribas Fortis Global Markets “that it will be a very

Europhrenia - Life’s a Fitch

2010-04-29T11:29:00.002+02:00

Europe is being over-run by credit rating agencies like Standard and Poor’s, Fitch, Moody’s et al, who on long legs are walking over our lives. The Financial Times has just broken the news that Standard and Poor’s have downgraded Spain’s credit rating from AA+, which was ok, one imagines, to AA, which is less. This comes just after the same prophetically named organisation (I set Standards,

Europhrenia – Whatever people say Greeks are, that’s what they’re not

2010-04-27T10:05:00.001+02:00

The BBC reports that only a few days after Athens was full-nelsoned into appealing for a €40bn-€45bn rescue package from the EU and the IMF… Greek bond yields are just a wee touch below last week’s whopping 9.15%. “The interest rate is 6.14 percentage points higher than that charged to Germany – seen as the safest investment in Europe,” the website chirps, explaining that even with Greece due a

Europhrenia - Biofuel, it’s not so cool

2010-04-23T19:13:00.002+02:00

Reuters has revealed that an EU document published in December 2009 cut out an annex showing that biofuels can produce up to four times more climate warming emissions than traditionals. According to the doc, Reuters relates, “Biodiesel from North American soybeans has an indirect carbon footprint of 339.9 kilograms of CO2 per gigajoule - four times higher than standard diesel.” And here’s more –

EUROPHRENIA- We are all Belgians now

2010-04-22T19:52:00.001+02:00

As you might have heard Belgian PM Yves Leterme has just just resigned, again. This is the fifth time he’s quit public office, and his third exit as prime-minister. He may well be the Ziggy Stardust of Belgian poltics. Perhaps he’s always playing his last concert, but coming back once again, only a little more worn. One can sympathise. His coalition with Open VLD (Flemish liberals) collapsed

EUROPHRENIA - Burqa ban, and why not plastic surgery too?

2010-04-21T18:12:00.000+02:00

Here in France, President Nicolas Sarkozy has green-lighted legislation that will ban women from wearing burqas in public places. This is obviously great news for the 2000 or so unfortunates – out of a Muslim female population of approximately 5 million - who actually go round wearing two man tents over themselves. Just how the French police are going to enforce these rules in public

Europhrenia - Atom bombs, easy peasy

2010-04-20T19:54:00.000+02:00

I was a guest on France 24’s The World This Week last Friday – here are links for parts one and two. For me one of the many interesting aspects of the debate was our discussion around the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington 12-13 April. Obviously at presseurop.eu, we are not privy to high level security information like the US prez, but nevertheless his declarations on nuke security still

Europhrenia - No fly ban, the sleep of reason

2010-04-19T18:13:00.000+02:00

Early January I found myself on the main road from Sligo in the Republic of Ireland to Dublin. Outside, the temperature was minus five. The grass on the verges was sparkling white, the mountains snow-capped. The EU funded dual carriageway, though, was perfectly clear, as smooth and black and driveable as a runway. Nevertheless, everyone was going along at a crawl of 50 kph.It was obvious we

Europhrenia - Ghost MEPs in the Brussels machine

2010-04-15T14:57:00.000+02:00

TheParliament.com has revealed that 18 “ghost MEPs” have recently begun wafting down the corridors of power in Brussels and Strasbourg. Having emerged from the linguistic sludge of the Lisbon treaty, which increases the number of MEPs from 736 to 754. they will not officially be allowed to vote in the European parliament until June 2014, after the next elections, but in the meantime are

Europhrenia - Lech Kaczynski, a counter-homage

2010-04-15T10:16:00.000+02:00

A few weeks back I had a bone to pick, or as they say in German, a hen to pluck, with Libération’s Brussels correspondent Jean Quatremer after he had mounted one of his traditional hobby horses and bemoaned the excess of rosbifs speaking English at the European Commission. However, Monsieur Quatremer hits the nail on the head most days, calling spades spades, and, as the French say, cats cats

The World This Week - France 24

2010-03-22T18:34:00.000+01:00

I was on France 24’s The World this week last week. Here’s the blurb… The Germans, too selfish to motor the European Union ? The World This Week’s Friday panel debate reaction to the Greek crisis with the New York Times’ Steve Erlanger, Gerry Feehily of presseurop.eu , Antonio Rodriguez of Agence France-Presse, and France 24’s Annette Young. For part one, click here… For part two, here…

Europhrenia - French is just too provincial

2010-02-18T21:43:00.002+01:00

My latest blog at presseurop One of the most consistently informative and entertaining blogs about the European Union has to be Jean Quatremer’s Coulisses de Bruxelles. However, a recent post (for relevant English extracts click here) has caused some Czech, German and indeed Irish ed hackles to rise. Monsieur Quatremer was griping about the predominance of native English speakers working as

Losing Angela in translation

2010-02-05T18:57:00.001+01:00

My latest Europhrenia blog at presseurop.eu When presseurop.eu was launched in May last year, one of its guiding mottos was Umberto Eco’s “The future of Europe is translation.” But quite frequently I’m inclined to think that sometimes the future of Europe is lost in translation. I recently checked a statement by Angela Merkel concerning the CD-rom nabbed by HSBC supergrass Falciani

The World Last Week

2010-02-04T11:27:00.004+01:00

Last week, I was on the France 24 World This Week debate with John Vinocur from the IHT, Judah Grunstein of World Politics Review, who wrote this blog on the discussion, and Pierre Rousselin from Le Figaro. For Part One, click here… and for Part Two, here… We discussed Tony Blair’s appearance at the Chilcot inquiry on Iraq in which I made the point that Iraq was always a war looking for a

Burqa barbarous, but a ban is wrong

2010-02-03T18:53:00.001+01:00

My latest blog at presseurop.eu Le Figaro reports today that Immigration Minister Eric Besson has refused citizenship to a Moroccan man on the grounds that in his application he stated he would never allow his wife to leave the home without a burqa. Prime Minister Fillon has weighed in declaring he will sign said decree, with Deutsche Welle adding that the man also stated that woman is “an

Is this the end of the IPCC?

2010-02-02T15:41:00.000+01:00

My latest blog at presseurop.eu Yet more embarrassing revelations about the scientists at the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit who brought us Climategate. The Guardian leads today with news that Phil Jones, at the centre of last year’s leaked emails affair, is once again facing fresh claims that he “hid problems in key temperature data on which some of his work was based.”

L'église en Irlande

2010-01-18T18:48:00.000+01:00

I was one of the guests on Daniel Desquelles show about the place of Catholic Church in Ireland 1. Les tendances : L’église irlandaise sème le doute dans les esprits Le cardinal Sean Brady, numéro un de l'église catholique irlandaise, s'est déclaré profondément honteux des révélations du rapport sur les affaires de pédophilie. Par Daniel Desesquelle

The World This Week

2009-12-02T14:43:00.000+01:00

Ok, it was last week, but here I am talking about the infamous hand of God in the France Ireland World Cup match, live on France 24's The World This Week. Click here...

Gunk - 3 extracts

2009-11-09T11:28:00.002+01:00

3 extracts from my second novel - Gunk - appeared in 3am magazine this morning. "This was the season Gix Reverb saw storks for the first time. They were nesting in the ruins of the Roman aqueduct that previously had conveyed the icy waters of the mountains of Anatolia to the colony of Ephesus. Now there were storks there, roosting in the broken columns. Gix came to in a four-star hotel wearing a

Lisbon Treaty / Decline of social democracy

2009-10-09T18:02:00.000+02:00

I was on France 24 this week talking on the above subjects. Click here for first part “Is the EU on the right path?“ Click here for second part “The decline of social-democracy”

The other side of Lisbon

2009-10-01T11:09:00.001+02:00

My latest blog at Presseurop.eu In Catholic societies, bible study is discouraged as a species of Protestant intellectualism. It’s almost inevitable therefore that in holy Ireland the government of Brian Cowen and associated “business leaders” with their “assertive” campaign have not promoted any close readings of the Lisbon Treaty lest the electorate be led astray by their own minds.

L’avenir de l’Europe se joue en Irlande

2009-09-26T21:53:00.002+02:00

I was on France Inter on Saturday, talking about the Lisbon Tricky. You can listen to the programme with brilliant journalists Jose Manuel Lamarque and Emmanuel Moreau here. Le 02 octobre prochain, les irlandais seront invités au second référendum concernant le Traité de Lisbonne. Nous vous proposons de découvrir l’Irlande à la veille de cet événement, les positions des partisans du Non et

Was St Patrick for or against the EU?

2009-09-21T12:00:00.001+02:00

My latest Presseurop blog.Less than two weeks to go before Ireland votes on the Lisbon Treaty, the Irish press is awash with Yes editorials. With little left to be said beyond sleep-inducing reassurances as how the fraught text will not compromise national taxation, anti-abortion laws and the continued presence of an “Irish” commissioner in Brussels, the tone is inevitably taking a shrill

Vote 1916 for a better Europe

2009-09-07T13:20:00.003+02:00

My latest blog at Presseurop.A new poster by anti-Lisbon Treaty group Coir with portraits of James Connolly, Patrick Pearse and Thomas Clarke, three of the executed leaders of the 1916 Easter rebellion against British rule, accompanied by the slogan “They won your freedom, don’t throw it away” has Ireland’s pro-Lisbon establishment in a patriotic lather. Former Taoiseach (Prime Minister)

BHL buries socialism, sort of

2009-07-20T22:31:00.003+02:00

My latest blog at Presseurop. Click here When Parti Socialiste general secretary Martine Aubry, shortly after the French Socialists European election debacle in June, proclaimed she was giving the party “six months to change course", she probably didn’t reckon on Parisian philosopher Bernard Henri Levy butting in over at Journal du Dimanche (JDD) and declaring that she manages a

Iran, '68 and all that

2009-06-19T14:51:00.003+02:00

Published on June 19 2009 |PRESSEUROP Michelet, in his famous history of the French revolution relates the story of an aristocrat disguised as a peasant, fleeing Robespierre’s Terror for the safety of what it is now Belgium. Feeling peckish while still in France, he entered a tavern. When invited to order, he eagerly called for a twelve egg omelette, and thus sealed

Berlusconi laughs all the way to the polls - Presseurop

2009-06-06T15:01:00.001+02:00

If you're from the left, you might have reasons to dislike Silvio Berlusconi. A provisional list could include recent pronouncements against a multi ethnic Italy, backed up by draconian anti-immigration laws, the fact his coalition partners the Northern Alliance press for preferential seating for “native” Milanese. All this must be fairly obnoxious to anyone with progressive instincts. Then

Walesa jumps gravy trains

2009-05-29T10:35:00.002+02:00

My latest blog at Presseurop A couple of weeks back Lech Walesa caused mutterings in the Irish and Polish press for having been a guest speaker at the Libertas convention in Rome. Papers speculated whether this was not a ringing endorsement of Irishman Declan Ganley’s crusade against the Lisbon Treaty on a “pro Europe - anti EU” ticket. “We need to heed the Libertas message and put the

No peek-a-boo with President Sarkozy

2009-05-28T21:54:00.001+02:00

My first blog at Presseurop Is France taking an authoritarian turn? So wonders left-leaning daily Libération. In Marseilles a 52 year old philosophy professor has been charged for “breach of the peace in daylight hours disturbing other people’s tranquility.” The incident unfolded all of eighteen months ago in Marseilles’ central train station where PL (only his initials are known) yelled

The Paris Cloud Factory is Ever Generous

2009-05-17T13:50:00.001+02:00

The Paris Cloud Factory is Extremely Busy

2009-05-17T13:49:00.002+02:00

It's working overtime to bring good clouds to you.

Yes we Cannes - Part 2

2009-05-14T23:07:00.000+02:00

Click for a fine finishIf I may say soFrench culture:Yes we “Cannes” (Part 2) The French turn out more than 200 movies a year, market them cannily, and they host the industry's biggest bash. So how are French films faring? And is the French film industry getting an unfair boost from public subsidies?

France 24 - Yes we Cannes Part 1

2009-05-14T22:58:00.007+02:00

Was on France 24Click for a shaky startFrench culture:Yes we Cannes The French turn out more than 200 movies a year, market them cannily, and they host the industry's biggest bash. So how are French films faring? And is the French film industry getting an unfair boost from public subsidies? <

The Paris Sky

2009-05-08T16:38:00.002+02:00

Cuidad, this is not an environmental protest. The twin stacks near the Grand Library feed clouds to the Parisian sky daily and it is indeed one of my favorite sights.

Fiebre

2009-03-17T18:32:00.003+01:00

Fiebre Gerry Feehily A la venta a partir del 15-06-2009 Colección BTFL BooksEs el puente del 12 de julio en Dundrug, el “Las Vegas de Irlanda”, y el dieciseisañero Jerome Maguire, el único punki gótico de la ciudad, comunista y (autoproclamado) poeta laureado, quiere “descubrir el amor”.Equipado con un condón, Jerome, a medida que la ciudad se va llenando de turistas de Belfast, Derry y…

The Sustainable Republic of Ireland - 2029

2009-02-27T19:16:00.006+01:00

France Culture phoned last week and said to me, Gerry, in what kind of dwellings will Irish people be living in 2029?I had a think about this and the result of these thoughts were broadcast on Station Meteo the other night in French.Basically, I believe that by 2015 Ireland will go bankrupt. Foreign capital all fled, nothing for revenue but tourism, of the green, responsible variety,

Sean O'Casey in Dijon

2009-02-11T21:13:00.004+01:00

The Theatre Dijon Bourgogne is a doing a production of Sean O'Casey's The Plough and the Stars (or rather La charrue et les etoiles in French) and this Monday 16th February I'm in Burgundy taking part in a discussion about Irish literature and Irish nationalism with the play's director, Irene Bonnaud.This is interesting, as I might well air my new theory that Ireland ceased to exist at some point

Fever in Spanish

2009-01-19T15:51:00.004+01:00

I'm delighted to announce that the rights to Fever have been bought by Spanish publishing house El Tercer Nombre.As of now, my prayers go out to the translator.We expect a Spanish version of Fever to be published end 2009/2010.Fidel Castro, who has a lot of reading time at the moment, will be sent a signed copy.

Crest of a Wave

2008-12-31T12:16:00.005+01:00

Far be from me to revel in the discomfiture of the sisterfucking speculators who not only destroyed the Donegal landscape these last ten years, but also imprisoned a generation in a death by mortgage prison of gerrybuilt plaster and spit constructions at 300k a pop, but I sincerely hope that in hell they will have their place alongside those who killed off the coast of Spain, their heads encased

They were here first

2008-12-31T11:47:00.003+01:00

This is one of my favorite collection of stones in Ireland, between the towns of Tullaghan and Mullaghmore - it's called Saint Patrick's Well.The little shrine on top of it contains a plaster sculpture of Saint Patrick in green robes.Saint Patrick's Well has a splendid view of the Atlantic, a series of cliffs and inlets leading to Bundoran. It looks out on Donegal Bay and Slieve League. If it

Debate in Brussels

2008-12-07T19:46:00.006+01:00

I'm having my shpake in Brussels tomorrow about the EU and the Irish no.Details belowOn 11 December, EU leaders will meet to find what they call a ‘solution’ to the ‘Irish problem’ – Irish voters’ rejection of the Lisbon Treaty in their June referendum. The Manifesto Club will be taking our campaign for popular democracy to the heart of Brussels – to expose the contemptuous attitude of European

A bailout plan for writers

2008-11-24T01:35:00.004+01:00

The CEOs of the automobile industry are a great inspiration to me.As is Tao Lin.Shares in an individual writer's forthcoming novel are one thing however.I feel writers, all writers, needs a bailout plan too.Take GUNK, my second novel, for instance.An extract from my second novel GUNK is due to appear in the next 3am / Offbeat anthology.But GUNK is in danger.GUNK runs on alternative fuel sources

Offbeat with Andrew Gallix

2008-11-05T16:06:00.004+01:00

Last night I was on French radio with Andrew Gallix of the great 3am magazine.We talked about the Offbeat Generation.Then I read an extract from Fever in French, that I'd translated.Then Andrew read an extract from Tony O'Neill.It was an excellent night.To listen, press 1

Offbeat Generation on France Culture

2008-11-04T17:24:00.002+01:00

Tonight, I'm on France Culture with Andrew Gallix from 3am Magazine. We'll be talking about the Offbeat Generation. And I'll be reading an extract from Fever in French. émission du mercredi 5 novembre 2008 THE OFFBEATS avec Andrew Gallix et Gerry Feehily + Christophe Conte pour sa bio Une Histoire d’Etienne Daho (Flammarion) + un Live d'Arnold Turboust "Animé par un

London

2008-11-02T21:17:00.001+01:00

I was in London this weekend.London is an amazing city with a population of 500 million people who stay indoors all the time.

Text and the City

2008-10-31T13:50:00.003+01:00

I'll be in London this weekend talking at The Battle of Ideas conference about literature and the city, along with novelist Julian Gough and Professor Swapan Chakravorty."When a man is tired of London he is tired of life; and when a man is tired of life he moves to Paris to write a book about it. But other cities are keen to emphasise their literary heritage: Edinburgh was delighted to be named

C'est de la merde

2008-10-29T18:44:00.001+01:00

My sentiment precisely...

BHL and Houellebecq believe their own hype

2008-10-23T19:18:00.002+02:00

My latest blog in the Guardian. Click here.

3am - Bothering the Geese

2008-10-04T13:58:00.004+02:00

My recital of page one of Fever found its way onto the Buzzwords blog of the excellent 3am magazine, complete with the following kudos -"World, let me introduce you to the best author you’ve never read: Gerry Feehily. His stunning debut novel Fever was published last year and an extract from his work-in-progress appears in the forthcoming Offbeat anthology. Gerry is also a talented literary

Fever Recital 2

2008-09-29T02:56:00.001+02:00

This recital happened in a field, where animals were present.

Reciting page 1 of my novel, Fever

2008-09-29T01:18:00.002+02:00

This Sunday afternoon I recited the first page of my novel, Fever, while rowing a boat.

Content-driven kitsch happens in Paris possibly

2008-09-11T22:44:00.005+02:00

The French invented many things - cakes, roads, vegetables, the English language. B-b-b-but (sorry, I start to stutter when I feel I'm losing my audience) who could have imagined they invented Goth as well? Siouxie Sioux, off with you now.

Alcibiades - California 1969

2008-09-09T03:25:00.007+02:00

I was thinking of Alcibiades, the Greek traitor, again. Here, I feel, is his sixty-ninth reincarnation making a right dog's dinner of that delightful song by The Doors. Though it must be said - he is lionlike. Lionlike.

Madame Bovary, c'est moi - an interview with Andreï Makine

2008-09-01T14:51:00.001+02:00

My interview with Russian author Andreï Makine has been published in 3am Magazine.It’s said that on his death in 1982, Leonid Brezhnev, leader of the Soviet Union, was so obese that his body fell through the bottom of the wooden coffin meant to contain him. Reassigned to a metal casket, a final indignity still awaited at his graveside by the Kremlin walls. The pallbearers lowering him down on

Seeing between the lines

2008-08-06T15:28:00.004+02:00

My blog on how we "see" fictional characters is up on Guardian Unlimited today. And above is a picture of Marlon Brando.Click here.

Did Sarkozy convince the Irish?

2008-07-22T19:29:00.002+02:00

Not really sure he was bothered to convince them. But to hold Brian Cowen's head down the toilet in a bid to persuade him to hold a second referendum some time next year, I am quite sure. It's in English, and you can watch it here

When characters die, can we really feel grief?

2008-07-17T14:04:00.005+02:00

A question which I've had an extensive muse over. On Guardian Unlimited. Ici

Guillotine Love Poem

2008-07-16T15:47:00.007+02:00

Last night I helped Laurent climb the traffic sign on Boulevard St Martin, a bit like celui -la that sends the eternal flow of Paris cars south towards St. Germain, westwards to Opéra and Etoile.It's about twenty feet up under the linden trees. Linden leaves are shaped like hearts, if you must know.Then I grabbed a barstool, placed it underneath the traffic sign, clambered up on top, as it