To a republican like myself who has long since stopped buying into the SF line and indeed the notion that for Ireland, republicanism is the Holy Grail and the only true way forward, events over the Adams arrest last week were fascinating.

Republicanism has become a catch-all, tired and much abused political 'philosophy' which all manner of carpetbaggers can legitimately claim as their own. Worse still physical force republicanism it seems to me always ends up in the same stable at the end of the political race, namely the runners up enclosure; usually led there by scoundrels of the highest order after good men have been executed, slaughtered and betrayed. It was with this in mind that I watched events unfold over the four days Gerry Adams spent in the custody suite in Antrim.

Big Bobby Storey was wheeled out to put the wind up the establishment and I'm sure they didn't need a TV to hear him in England he roared that loud. How dare they arrest the leader of Irish republicanism? How embarrassing! It became evident that something would have to give. It was a question of was the old RUC still calling the shots or would the English establishment rally to the aide of their new decommissioned, neutered and quarantined 'republican' partners in Ireland?


The best that can be said for all the tout scandals and paedo facilitation that has gone on and the endless lies coming out of SF this decade or more is that the police were trumped by the British political establishment and a wee loyalist mob were totally clueless for the world to see live on Sky News.

Then we had the press conference after Gerry's release. For his part Adams wasn't as smooth as he obviously thought he was yesterday. Perhaps in his haste to make political capital he hadn't given himself, at 65 years of age, sufficient time to get over 33 interviews at the hands of his new best friends.

Had he done so he would not I'm as certain as is possible with a chronic liar, have allowed himself to look so inconsiderate and self-obsessed. 

He tells us he was sitting in his cell thinking about Bobby Sands anniversary (which took place yesterday) and that the food was terrible in the Antrim interrogation suite, but not terrible enough after day two that he didn't fold and get it into him.

No white-house chef, how awfully awful. It was an insight into the man's personality and probably lets us see how much genuine empathy he had with Bobby Sands and his family back in 1981.

Or indeed for his sister when her shop in Dundalk had its locks changed on her in a panic by Adams crew to show their trustworthiness to their new found friends and establishment masters. A sociopathic display if an example is required for psychology students globally.  
In all of this the McConville family whose mother was dragged screaming from her home and murdered in 1972 awaited the outcome of events.

What emerged over the four days surprised and shocked many. Not only did the family know some of those who abducted their mum personally, they have had to suffer this knowledge in silence for decades without any help whatsoever.

This beggars belief when we consider Martin McGuinnes on the steps of Stormont with the PSNI head honcho calling people engaged in physical force republicanism 'traitors to Ireland' and for people to give any information they have to the police. At the time many felt it was a case of 'careful what you wish for'.


SF is now in the precarious position of having to decide if it will support the McConville family in their quest for closure.

IRA volunteers involved in the incident in 1972 may be worried that indeed the SF leadership will do so. There is a precedent for Gerry Adams placing his career before all else. Indeed there are several. The 1981 hunger-strikes when votes became the name of the game and more recently when his brother and dead daddy had to be dispensed with for the greater good of the SF leaders political survival.

Surely SF must assure the family they are under no threat in this new dispensation of total support for the PSNI? The only people to emerge from the last four days with any integrity were the McConville family. How can anyone fail to feel a heartfelt sympathy for them? Let down by the political establishment from the very top live on Sky News no less.


On the election front what we have now is a sectarian electorate in the north once again primed and ready to go. SF will feel the PSNI have been slapped down and the Orange mob made fools of again. In the south we have a society sick to the teeth of the FF/FG/Lab corruption which is grasping like a drowning man for any chance of a change, an alleviation of any sort from the economic nightmare they are enduring. In the midst of never ending austerity and chronic negative equity the parties in government have introduced multi billion euro bailouts for bankers.

They have refused to jail those bankers recently found guilty even as people are jailed for having no TV licences and are having their homes repossessed by the very same banks. Bankers' bonuses continue without shame, paying themselves millions for failure.

On top of property taxes are proposed water charges in a country that hardly goes two days in a row without rain. Yes the time is certainly right for a change in the south of Ireland. It very likely will happen and SF will do extremely well this time out unlike 2007. 
Gerry may feel recent events have helped claw back some of the embarrassment he suffered at the hands of Michael MacDowell back then.

But change that sweeps in paedo facilitators, proven British agents and perpetual liars and self-servers is hardly changing anything at all; is it? If SF and FF are what republicanism continually morphs itself into then I'm happy to say to Gerry Adams, I may represent no-one, but you sure as hell no longer represent me!