all true Jim.
the conservative party was still at that point (round 1967 say...) the conservative party the conservative and unionist party. there can be little doubt which side the english establishment were on.

However - they weren't the party in power. plus i think many english people were genuinely repelled by the violence of Ian Paisley's rhetoric. Although in truth, I will admit very few of us could have told with any certainty what he was on about! But he sounded like trouble, and english people don't like that.

Adams and Martin McG were very young and full of 1916 rhetoric. McG was younger than me. at that age i was screwing up my first teaching practice. i don't think its really fair to expect wisdom from the young. i'm not sure its all that clever to be justifying them. certainly failing the teaching practice was my fault.