I will get to the responses to a couple of you in a minute. But first I must offer an apology. John, I misread your intent in the first post. What I took to be just another post from someone who doesn't like the attention that the Irish get these days, was actually a straightforward question. There were two things that led me to this. One was the "and don't give me that crap..." portion of the original post, and the the other was the "waiting for the backlash" portion. It is clear to me now that your intent was really to register a gripe on an irritation, and to stimulate discussion. If you wonder what prompted this, it was Wolfgang's post. I have great respect for him, even though we frequently disagree. While he doesn't always convince me, he always does cause me to ponder seriously his opinion. I offer you a sincere apology for my silly attempt at analyzing your motives. I am not sure what got into me, buy I want to say publicly that I apologize to you for that.

Hansio, same deal.........sorta. I do sincerely apologize to you for my suggestion that you are shallow. No excuse for that, and I regret it. You did not act in a confrontational manner..........I did.........and I apologize for that as well. The rest of the analysis ...........offered in a nonconfrontational manner.........stands. I object strenuously to generalizations that characterize a whole group of people in a negative way.

Sophocleese, with regard to your analysis of the post...........I concur. With regard to your comment regarding what some refer to as my intellect.........f**k off. How's that for confrontational, Marc?

Mick