“You are only as old and boring as the people you surround yourself with.”
John Brockman
That’s one of the reasons why it’s nice to work in a university.
Daily Archives: November 28, 2010
Clochemerle-on-the-Liffey
One of the Irish newspapers last week (I forget which but the reporter was Pat Leahy) had a revealing little vignette from the Donegal South West by-election — which was won by the Sinn Fein candidate, and in which the Fianna Fail vote collapsed. Leahy reported a conversation he had with a constituent in which he asked her how she intended to vote. She replied that she and all her family would be voting for Fianna Fail, the architects of the current economic catastrophe. “Why?” asked Leahy. “Because Mary Coughlan [Deputy Prime Minister and one of the other TDs [MPs] for the constituency] got my mother into hospital”.
This (and my own story about my father’s death) tells you all you need to know about Irish politics. Parish-pump politicians are not the kind of people you need to run a modern state.
Why the Establishment hates the Net
This morning’s Observer column.
Two disconnected events last week showed how far we still have to go in understanding our new communications environment. In one, an Anglican bishop was suspended for some remarks he made on his Facebook page about the forthcoming wedding of two graduates of St Andrews University. In the other, a 27-year-old accountant had his appeal against a conviction for posting a joke message on Twitter dismissed.
First, the bishop…
Still life with fire
Reflections in my sitting room.