BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Divis Sweeney
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 10:52 AM

He was in the army, he wasn't in the army ! This gets better by the minute. Now your saying he was not a real soldier after all, half way through this great career he joined the weekenders! So why do they speak about forty years service in the army ?

Oh how they never get it right ! shouldn't be wearing a GSM ribbon then.

No need to dig Keith. Only time I will be digging is to help you out of that hole your in, YET AGAIN !

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 10:48 AM

Cornish is not a real person.
Just someone trying to change the subject in a hurry.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST,Cornish
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 10:22 AM

It's my surname you idiot not where I'm from!

"ard mhacha" sounds like a shit shoveller from the arsehole of botswana!

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: ard mhacha
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 10:12 AM

The Guest that signs himself Cornish, and carries the flag for England is unlike some of the Cornishmen I have met, they resented being called English.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST,Cornish
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 10:07 AM

This pathetic film should remain banned in the UK. It portrays the murdering, cowardly, scum IRA as good people. It does not tell the truth about the heroic Black & Tans who gave up their time to serve the King. We English should stick up for ourselves and not allow foreigners to take the blatant piss!

God Save The Queen.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 09:57 AM

Here
is a link to the piece you quoted from, Sweeney.
It is the link that I gave in the original "I met a War Hero" thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 09:33 AM

He was with the Territorial Army up until the early seventies.
No full time service.
No active service.
No NI tour
No NI clasp.
All made up.
Keep digging.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Divis Sweeney
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 09:21 AM

Lil' Kiwi so glad the DVD's about the British in Ireland have arrived with you. Now don't forget to let us know what you learned from them !
Always glad to spread the "Word of truth "

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Divis Sweeney
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 09:17 AM

What you spoke to another terrirorial, that says it all !

Read below

Sergeant Keith D. Banwell

Tex Banwell joined the British Army and served with the Coldstream Guards with whom he saw action against the Pathans and Kashmiries,


BLA BLA BLA..........



Returning home, Banwell continued to serve in the army until during the 1970's, and was likely to have been amongst Britain's most senior parachutists. At the 25th anniversary of Arnhem in 1969, Banwell stood alongside present day paratroopers in a Dakota and jumped once more over Ginkel Heath, formerly DZ-Y. It was his 650th jump, and far from his last because he felt the experience of parachuting kept him "mentally alert". He donated his battle dress jacket to the Airborne Museum Hartenstein, where it is presently on display.

Did you read that Keith, BANWELL CONTINUED TO SERVE IN THE ARMY UNTIL DURING THE 1970'S.

Has this guy got it wrong ???
I can supply a link if you want to put him right ?

See he did well for himself after a lifetime in a profession only got to rank of Sergeant ! Christ my fathers two brothers who were in the Air force became senior officers in no time, not that their much of an example. In 1969 Banwell WHILE STILL A SERVING SOLDIER was awarded the B.E.M.

Dear dear Keith, how the army like yourself never seem to get the story right !


Do I consider myself a better man ? Of course I do. If you want to meet real hero's, you should be in my living room most nights !

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 08:46 AM

sweeney,
Re Tex Banwell.
I have spoken to a man who was in the terrirorials with Tex in the early 50s. His regular army service was over by then.
Re your post 05.24 on 24th

"So why did he wear a Northern Ireland bar on his GSM ????
Did they just give it to him ?"
Completely false

Re your post 04.52 on 24th

"He was in the North of Ireland in the early seventies."
Completely false.

Your descents into dishonesty devalue your cause Sweeney.

You call Banwell a tosser, so you consider yourself a better man.
This is what the
New York Times said about Tex.
Make your own judgement.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 05:17 AM

Greetings Keith. To give you a better understanding of the people of Ulster you must look into it's history.

What lies behind this new loyalist campaign, and what does it tell you Keith about how unionism is evolving in the current situation? In the first place, the symbolism of Ulster should not be missed. You are aware of the UVF's importation of German arms in 1914? One of those doing the heaving was South Belfast man called Patsy Cooper. Orange Order Grand Master Jocky Keenan was speaking at the press conference next day, was asked what he thought of Tommy Jordans participation? Bro Keenan replied that he wasn't aware of any paramilitary involvement. It must be assumed that Jocky didn't read the Whig, which the British was trying to ban from sale in Belfast at that time because of unflattering stories about the governments leadership. But still, even without the benefit of John Spellman's scandal sheet, the world and its dog know that Patsy Cooper was a leading member of the UVF. We shall return to Mr Cooper in due course Keith.


Other figures in your charts Keith are not quite clear about paramilitary involvement in murders in Ireland. John McVicar of the Daily Mirror said: "The reality is that loyalist paramilitaries are part of the Protestant community. They along with a lot of other people were part of the conflict we have been involved in and they need to be part of the resolution. We have come out of 35 years of violence, things aren't going to change overnight and we need to influence everyone in our community positively and that includes loyalist paramilitaries." One of the principal spokesmen for the campaign is Willie Frazer of the group FAIR, which claims to speak for "real victims" – that is, Protestant victims of republican violence. Frazer stated that loyalist paramilitaries would be welcome at the October rally, providing they attended in a personal capacity. Under questioning, Frazer argued that the rally was all about Protestant victimhood and loyalists hadn't been killing Protestants, so that was all right then. Maybe Frazer's brass neck is inhibiting his peripheral vision – not only does he refuse to call on loyalists to end attacks on Catholics, or ethnic minorities for that matter, but he doesn't seem to have noticed that the UVF has killed four Protestants in recent months.



Love Ulster, hate taigs What is the programme of Love Ulster? The special edition of the Shankill Mirror holds the key to this. One of the more eyecatching elements of the campaign has been a poster that abuses the memory of Pastor Martin Niemöller, imprisoned by the Nazis, a famous poem attributed to whom says, "First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a communist; Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a socialist; Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a trade unionist; Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out – because I was not a Jew; Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak out for me." The Shankill Mirror transmutes this to "In the 1970s they came for the B Specials – I did nothing; in the 1980s they came for the UDR – I did nothing; in the 1990s they came for the RUC – I did nothing; 2005, and they've come for the RIR – what can I do? Just say, 'Enough is enough!'" The rest of the paper is a brilliant exhibit of whinging and paranoia. "They" get everything. The job market is rigged against us by equality legislation – in particular, Protestant small businesses aren't free to employ only Protestants.



We've lost the police. We can't march through areas where we aren't wanted any more. Any reforms – even the mildest ones – are concessions to terrorism. To the extent that Catholics even appear in Love Ulster literature, it is invariably as crazed gunmen whose sole ambition is to commit genocide against Protestants who never did them any wrong – or if they did, they deserved it. What is the programme? The programme is a return to the old Stormont, except they would do it right this time. No concessions. No restrictions on discrimination. It is no coincidence that Willie Frazer is a former election candidate for the Ulster Independence Movement, a small cult that specialises in spinning fantasies about the wee Orange utopia loyalists could have if they were free of British interference. The implicit demand for a return to an all-Protestant police force shows an acute understanding of the nature of the Northern statelet.


The RUC played a double role, not just in repressing the Catholic minority, but in providing social employment for unskilled Protestants. This is why the 50/50 recruitment policy recommended in the Patten report and adopted in a watered-down form by the British – the age cohort for police recruitment is 50/50, after all – has been a persistent target of unionist wrath. In fact, there is a popular urban myth doing the rounds in middle-class unionist areas to the effect that a friend of a friend's son passed the police exam with flying colours, but didn't get a job because he was Protestant. The story usually ends with a senior officer taking the kid aside and saying that he would love to have him in the force, but this quota... The triple alliance The launch of Love Ulster has met with a cautious response from the two main unionist parties. However, there is little doubt that if the campaign picked up significant support they would jump on the bandwagon – some low-level DUP people are already involved. After all, the content of Love Ulster, from the whinging over minimal police reforms to the lying about levels of deprivation, derives directly from unionism's arsenal of grievances. And the 10-day loyalist riot in September merely underlined the close connections binding the unionist parties, the Orange Order and the paramilitaries – from the provocation of the Springfield Road march by the Orange, to the heavy involvement of the paramilitaries in the rioting, to the cover provided by respectable politicians in both the DUP and UUP.



The triple alliance of the parties, the Orange and the paramilitaries has come to the fore on innumerable occasions in recent years. But, while the presence of bands with paramilitary links on Orange marches is plain to see, the constant apologetics for armed loyalism by respectable politicians, displaying their symbiotic relationship, is too often ignored. The Holy Cross affair in 1998 was a clear instance. The roots of Holy Cross lay in the expulsion of UDA members from the Lower Shankill by the UVF in a paramilitary feud. These UDA men then settled in the Glenbryn estate and sought to flex their muscles, their chosen vehicle being the mass intimidation of Catholic children walking to school. This action was defended – or, what amounts to the same thing, explained away – by politicians of both UUP and DUP. Chris McGimpsey, a supposed UUP "liberal", was prominent among those saying that the small Catholic schoolgirls walking to their school were provocative; the same Chris McGimpsey sees nothing provocative in Orangemen, accompanied by paramilitary flute bands, marching through Catholic areas. There have been other examples. The racist pogrom against the Chinese community in South Belfast in 2003-04 appears to have started as a dispute between the Donegall Road UVF and the local Chinese business community, who had put up some resistance to extortion demands.


The UDA, not to be outdone, got stuck in as well, not just on the level of violence but with the production of the notorious "Yellow Invasion" leaflet circulated in Donegall Pass. There have been few charges and virtually no convictions resulting from the pogrom, with hardly anybody willing to blame the perpetrators and even anti-racist campaigners spinning the fantasy that English Nazis were responsible for racist attacks in loyalist-controlled areas. Again, the political wing of the triple alliance played its role. DUP councillor Ruth Patterson opined that residents of Donegall Pass felt the Protestant character of their area was under threat. How that was possible when the local Chinese population had gone from over forty families to under ten due to loyalist intimidation, she did not say. Meanwhile, liberal unionist poster boy Steven King argued that to blame loyalists was to smear the entire Protestant community, and speculated about whether the Chinese were entirely innocent.



The racist pogrom was followed in short order by mass intimidation aimed at the Whitehall Square flats complex at the top of the UDA stronghold of Sandy Row. This culminated in several hundred people, including bands, marching on the flats in a clear UDA show of strength. The young population of the complex may include some Catholics – nobody knows its sectarian makeup, which infuriates the loyalists even more. The UDA's action was publicly defended by UUP liberal Michael McGimpsey, who claimed the paramilitary demonstration was a spontaneous expression of concern by Sandy Row residents. Furthermore, McGimpsey claimed that anyone who attributed a sectarian motivation to the intimidators was an anti-Protestant bigot. He sought to back up his position by recycling various urban myths – some wee woman told him a young lad on a flats balcony had shouted at her; somebody else claimed to have seen someone in a Celtic jersey on a balcony. This, on Planet McGimpsey, was proof positive of sustained republican provocation which had sparked off an understandable and moderate reaction by respectable Protestants.



Sandy Row and the anti-Chinese pogrom are worth mentioning as they took place in the South Belfast fiefdom of Jackie McDonald, who is currently being built up as the acceptable face of the UDA. McDonald is said to be on first-name terms with Free State president Mary McAleese and regularly plays golf with her husband. More importantly, he is being heavily courted by both London and Dublin governments, to the extent that he could be described as British imperialism and Irish capital's favourite paramilitary. But as we have seen, touting of McDonald as a loyalist Mr Clean is some considerable way wide of the mark. It seems more likely that he is being built up because of his political usefulness than any intrinsic merits he might have. British policy and loyalism There have been a number of strands to British policy, and they have not always sat together harmoniously. For the last ten years, for instance, the Northern Ireland Office has been attempting to encourage the growth of a loyalist equivalent to Sinn Fein. This scheme has been almost a complete failure – the loyalist groups have never managed to create a political wing that even their own members would take seriously, let alone that significant numbers of people would support. In the early 1970s, during a time of massive sectarian polarisation, UDA-sponsored candidates in hardline areas like Sandy Row would routinely poll fewer votes than the UDA had members in the area. Even in the mid-1990s, huge amounts of sympathetic press coverage could not create a mass electoral base for the death squads.



The few paramilitary-linked figures who were elected to local councils or Stormont were invariably people with a record of activism around bread-and-butter issues in deprived areas – candidates who were seen as simply paramilitary frontmen received derisory votes. But in recent years even this limited base has largely evaporated. The UDA has bowed to the inevitable and dissolved its front party, the UDP. The UVF-linked PUP has lost much of its support, and is rapidly succumbing to the Paisleyite tide. It was instructive that in the recent local elections, the DUP polled over two thirds of the vote on the Shankill Road while the PUP's Hughie Smyth, who once had the highest personal vote of any councillor in the North, could only scrape back to City Hall on DUP transfers. The mathematics only confirm the underlying political trend, that the programme of Paisley is now the programme of unionism as a whole. The PUP's fake "socialism" – so much ballyhooed by the more gormless elements of the far left – was always trumped in any case by its commitment to remaining part of the "unionist family", and, having provided the muscle for Trimble and got precious little in return, it is now somewhat grumpily adapting to the new Paisleyite dispensation.



This is not to say that the loyalist paramilitary groups themselves, as distinct from their satellite parties, have not prospered under the Good Friday process. Both of the main groups, but particularly the UDA, have been in receipt of vast sums of British government money in the guise of community development. Meanwhile, the UDA and UVF have recruited massively, using the flute band culture to bring in an entire layer of youth (paramilitary-linked bands also forming a crucial part of the alliance with the Orange Order). They have extended their empires into small towns and villages with no history of paramilitary activity – most notably the UVF in North Antrim towns like Dervock, Bushmills and Ahoghill, which forms the immediate background to the recent sectarian pogrom in the area. People in these North Antrim towns might like to look at the heroin epidemic in nearby Ballymena as a harbinger of what the UVF's expansion is going to bring them. But while the British have aided the expansion of these organisations, this expansion also poses problems for them. The essential features of armed loyalism – bigotry, criminality and indiscriminate violence – have by no means abated over the past decade. As a result, the security apparatus has been preoccupied with managing loyalism.



This has intersected with the need to either protect their assets within loyalism – or liquidate them if they go rogue. A definite pointer to British policy is the list of figures targeted by the Assets Recovery Agency. While the UDA's North Belfast boss Andre Shoukri flaunts his wealth despite never having worked a day in his life, the ARA's targets are marginal figures, dead men and people connected to the LVF. This last group is too small to be useful to the British, but significant and active enough to be an embarrassment, which would explain why the British are apparently happy enough to let the UVF wipe it out. The support being extended to the UDA may well flow from a "balance of terror" theory, according to which the UVF should be prevented from becoming the hegemonic loyalist group. It is worth pointing out that, in defiance of its own monitoring commission, the British government continues to recognise the UDA's non-existent ceasefire.



Fall of the godfathers These military considerations, taken along with the fact that the loyalist groups are riddled with informers, help to shed some light on the sudden falls from grace of prominent figures in the murky world of paramilitarism. The late Billy Wright is a case in point. The charismatic Wright – mass murderer, drug dealer, born-again Christian, Orangeman and almost certainly a British agent – was responsible for the indiscriminate slaughter of dozens of Catholics in the Portadown area for many years. For most of this time he and his Mid-Ulster UVF appeared untouchable. Then, following the Good Friday Agreement, Wright denounced the peace process and split from the Shankill-based leadership of the UVF – who he described, incredibly, as "communists" – to form the small but vicious LVF. Wright expressed his support for the analysis of the DUP, who reciprocated by defending him against threats from the UVF.



Following this, Wright was convicted of intimidation – which calls to mind Al Capone's imprisonment on tax evasion charges – and then assassinated in prison under dubious circumstances. Then there was Johnny Adair, UDA boss of the Shankill. Adair, like his friend Wright, was untouchable. Then in 1995 he was convicted of "directing terrorism", an offence specifically designed to put him behind bars. Quickly, however, he became useful to the British in their efforts to keep the UDA on side – he was visited in prison by secretary of state Mo Mowlam and freed in 1999. Eventually, however, he got to be too much of a loose cannon for the British. Coincidentally, he had also made many enemies by his megalomaniac attempt to make himself supreme leader of the UDA, expanding his empire by putting the Shoukri brothers in charge of North Belfast and cutting into other bosses' fiefdoms. This ended with the assassination of the UDA's East Antrim leader John Gregg.



In 2003 the British returned him to prison, whereupon the UDA majority – now including the Shoukris, who were smart enough to see which way the wind was blowing – moved into the Shankill, kicked out Adair's family and closest associates, and took over his empire. Adair is now free again, but exiled in England. Most recently we have seen the UDA's murder of Jim Gray, formerly the organisation's leader in East Belfast for 14 years. The media coverage, in true Sunday World fashion, has concentrated on the flamboyant Gray's love of chunky gold jewellery and pastel knitwear. But there is much more to it than that. Gray, who was never convicted of any offence despite his very public role in the UDA, became a key figure in the Good Friday process. He made several trips to Stormont to meet successive British proconsuls, and fronted up a UDA PR exercise called the John Gregg Initiative. Then, in March 2005, he suddenly fell from grace and lost his position in the UDA. This was immediately followed by two noteworthy statements – one from Jackie McDonald stating that the UDA wouldn't tolerate criminality in the ranks, and another from the Assets Recovery Agency that they were investigating Gray.



The ARA investigation was generally taken as a reason for his fall, but the other way around is a more likely sequence. Now Gray is dead, gunned down outside his home while apparently under 24-hour police surveillance. Why British strategy won't work Britain's immediate plans regarding the UDA are clear. Proconsul Hain, while announcing drastic cuts in the public sector in the North, has made it clear that big sums – £200 million has been mentioned – will be available to help loyalism "take the political road". The money is being dressed up as going to regenerate poverty-stricken loyalist areas, but it doesn't take a genius to read between the lines. The Provos have surrendered. The UDA will now be aided to legitimise its business interests, provided it can stop the more blatant criminality – such as its heavy dependence on drug dealing, pimping and protection rackets – while ridding itself of some of its more outré characters. Then if the UVF can be persuaded to follow suit, the North will be pacified. There will be lavish rewards for those who play ball. That's the plan. It won't work, for two reasons. First, it depends on the assumption that the UDA will clean itself up and stay on the straight and narrow. This is rather unlikely. Paradoxically, the Provos have been easier to buy off because they were less corrupt. Although they always had an element of corruption, this was relatively minor and subordinated to their political goals – the racket served the movement and not vice versa. So once the Provos had surrendered politically, the legitimisation of their assets and winding down of paramilitary structures – what is currently going on – was relatively straightforward. By contrast, criminality is so much part of the essence of the loyalist groups that the chances of them going straight are minimal.



The more important point is linked to Britain's overall strategy. What do the British want? They want the North stabilised, but they don't want just any stability. They want to keep partition as well – this is also the programme of Dublin, hence the defeat of the Provos, who had no defence against Southern capital. They need to incorporate the Catholic middle class as a bulwark against a resurgence of anti-imperialist politics. But the nature of the Northern statelet means that any stabilisation must rest on unionism, as Britain's popular base in the North. This gives us the outline of British strategy since Sunningdale in 1973. The SDLP – both the party of the Catholic middle class and an instrument of the Dublin government – was always reliably on side, as was the NIO's front organisation, the small Alliance Party. The need was for a moderate unionism to cut a deal with the Catholic middle class. The trouble with that scenario is that unionism is not so much a political movement as a conspiracy to defend sectarian privilege.




You can't have a moderate unionism for the same reason you can't have a liberal Pope. In the world of unionism the biggest bigot always wins. So we have had a succession of unlikely figures, from Brian Faulkner to David Trimble, painted up as great moderates only to be overthrown from the right. The impasse of unionism Now we have a situation where the DUP forms the leadership of unionism. This puts paid to the search for moderates who could "consolidate the centre". Instead, we have somewhat desperate talk about a "pragmatic" wing of the DUP – people like Peter Robinson and Nigel Dodds – who, unlike the arch-bigot Paisley, might be willing to do business with Catholics. This is a wild misreading of the situation. In the first place, Peter Robinson already had a chance to modernise when he, along with the late Harold McCusker MP and UUP officer Wee Frankie Millar (son of legendary Belfast councillor Big Frankie) produced the Task Force report in 1987.



This document was suppressed by party leaders Jim Molyneaux and Ian Paisley, on the reasonable grounds that modernising unionism was a dead end. What we have we hold. Shortly afterwards, McCusker died, Millar left politics for journalism, and Robinson has never said another word about it. This is the point about accommodating Catholics. Catholics always had a place under the old Stormont, only a subordinate one. As Lord Kilclooney has said, Catholics could have rights but not equal rights. There can't be – as Love Ulster is demanding – a return to unalloyed supremacism because some crucial things have changed since 1967. Most crucially, the Catholic population is much more assertive and much larger. Unionism can't impose its will on a 45% minority as it could on a 30% minority. The more intelligent Paisleyites – Robinson and Dodds among them – recognise this, but don't have a solution. Britain's approach at the moment has been to hand the DUP various goodies that don't matter much in the scheme of things. Big Ian has been made a privy councillor and the DUP is getting seats in Blair's appointed House of Lords. The DUP is also getting extra seats on the Policing Board, an oversight body with few teeth but many opportunities for grandstanding. But this doesn't go anywhere towards the DUP programme.



As DUP MP Gregory Campbell pointed out in an important statement, the DUP welcomed these goodies but wanted movement on crucial issues like parades, jobs and policing. Campbell's position could be translated as follows. Exempting Orange halls from rates is all very well, but we want the Parades Commission scrapped and the right to march through Catholic areas guaranteed. We want the Fair Employment Act scrapped and measures put in place to restore Protestant privilege in the job market. And extra seats on the Policing Board are fine, but what we really want is an end to 50/50 recruitment and a return to an all-Protestant police force. The impasse is clear. The DUP can't impose their programme on the British, and the British can't implement the DUP programme without endangering the stability they desperately want. But British policy depends on keeping their loyalist base loyal, which is why the post-Good Friday process keeps being shifted to the right. It is quite obvious that there can be no solution within this process. The defeat of reactionary unionism is the precondition for any kind of political progress that benefits working people.


Keith you have cliamed here you will make a stand against republicianism and I like many other are grateful.


GOD SAVE ULSTER AND OUR QUEEN.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Divis Sweeney
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 04:27 AM

The price of fame can be high Keith. You seem to attract the wrong sort of fan ! I never read such a load of long winded crap in my life Guest.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 04:07 AM

Please Guest I too favour paragraphs.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 03:58 AM

Paragraphs, Guest, paragraphs.

I am just a thick nome - can't read whole tracts without it being broken up. I think one or two others may be the same:-)

Tír Chonaill. I don't think Keith was complaining about the lack of a dynamic link. I think he is as computer literate as the next man. What he said was it is not a link - it is a file. Which it is. If you would care to look rather than just have a go at him whatever he does you will notice it ends '.zip' rather than '.htm' or '.html'.

I don't think I would download and open a file from someone I don't know and is obviously at odds with my postings either.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 03:57 AM

Tir
I pasted your url into my address box and it did not work.
I am no expert in IT.
I am not prepared to make further effort and doubt anyone else will.
You show contempt for forum users by leaving it like that.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 03:43 AM

Perhaps my posts are too short.
I do argue against violent Republicanism, and I would argue against violent Loyalism too if anyone here proposed it.
But they don't.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 09:16 PM

Greetings Keith. To give you a better understanding of the people of Ulster you must look into it's history. What lies behind this new loyalist campaign, and what does it tell you Keith about how unionism is evolving in the current situation? In the first place, the symbolism of Ulster should not be missed. You are aware of the UVF's importation of German arms in 1914? One of those doing the heaving was South Belfast man called Patsy Cooper. Orange Order Grand Master Jocky Keenan was speaking at the press conference next day, was asked what he thought of Tommy Jordans participation? Bro Keenan replied that he wasn't aware of any paramilitary involvement. It must be assumed that Jocky didn't read the Whig, which the British was trying to ban from sale in Belfast at that time because of unflattering stories about the governments leadership. But still, even without the benefit of John Spellman's scandal sheet, the world and its dog know that Patsy Cooper was a leading member of the UVF. We shall return to Mr Cooper in due course Keith. Other figures in your charts Keith are not quite clear about paramilitary involvement in murders in Ireland. John McVicar of the Daily Mirror said: "The reality is that loyalist paramilitaries are part of the Protestant community. They along with a lot of other people were part of the conflict we have been involved in and they need to be part of the resolution. We have come out of 35 years of violence, things aren't going to change overnight and we need to influence everyone in our community positively and that includes loyalist paramilitaries." One of the principal spokesmen for the campaign is Willie Frazer of the group FAIR, which claims to speak for "real victims" – that is, Protestant victims of republican violence. Frazer stated that loyalist paramilitaries would be welcome at the October rally, providing they attended in a personal capacity. Under questioning, Frazer argued that the rally was all about Protestant victimhood and loyalists hadn't been killing Protestants, so that was all right then. Maybe Frazer's brass neck is inhibiting his peripheral vision – not only does he refuse to call on loyalists to end attacks on Catholics, or ethnic minorities for that matter, but he doesn't seem to have noticed that the UVF has killed four Protestants in recent months. Love Ulster, hate taigs What is the programme of Love Ulster? The special edition of the Shankill Mirror holds the key to this. One of the more eyecatching elements of the campaign has been a poster that abuses the memory of Pastor Martin Niemöller, imprisoned by the Nazis, a famous poem attributed to whom says, "First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a communist; Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a socialist; Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a trade unionist; Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out – because I was not a Jew; Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak out for me." The Shankill Mirror transmutes this to "In the 1970s they came for the B Specials – I did nothing; in the 1980s they came for the UDR – I did nothing; in the 1990s they came for the RUC – I did nothing; 2005, and they've come for the RIR – what can I do? Just say, 'Enough is enough!'" The rest of the paper is a brilliant exhibit of whinging and paranoia. "They" get everything. The job market is rigged against us by equality legislation – in particular, Protestant small businesses aren't free to employ only Protestants. We've lost the police. We can't march through areas where we aren't wanted any more. Any reforms – even the mildest ones – are concessions to terrorism. To the extent that Catholics even appear in Love Ulster literature, it is invariably as crazed gunmen whose sole ambition is to commit genocide against Protestants who never did them any wrong – or if they did, they deserved it. What is the programme? The programme is a return to the old Stormont, except they would do it right this time. No concessions. No restrictions on discrimination. It is no coincidence that Willie Frazer is a former election candidate for the Ulster Independence Movement, a small cult that specialises in spinning fantasies about the wee Orange utopia loyalists could have if they were free of British interference. The implicit demand for a return to an all-Protestant police force shows an acute understanding of the nature of the Northern statelet. The RUC played a double role, not just in repressing the Catholic minority, but in providing social employment for unskilled Protestants. This is why the 50/50 recruitment policy recommended in the Patten report and adopted in a watered-down form by the British – the age cohort for police recruitment is 50/50, after all – has been a persistent target of unionist wrath. In fact, there is a popular urban myth doing the rounds in middle-class unionist areas to the effect that a friend of a friend's son passed the police exam with flying colours, but didn't get a job because he was Protestant. The story usually ends with a senior officer taking the kid aside and saying that he would love to have him in the force, but this quota... The triple alliance The launch of Love Ulster has met with a cautious response from the two main unionist parties. However, there is little doubt that if the campaign picked up significant support they would jump on the bandwagon – some low-level DUP people are already involved. After all, the content of Love Ulster, from the whinging over minimal police reforms to the lying about levels of deprivation, derives directly from unionism's arsenal of grievances. And the 10-day loyalist riot in September merely underlined the close connections binding the unionist parties, the Orange Order and the paramilitaries – from the provocation of the Springfield Road march by the Orange, to the heavy involvement of the paramilitaries in the rioting, to the cover provided by respectable politicians in both the DUP and UUP. The triple alliance of the parties, the Orange and the paramilitaries has come to the fore on innumerable occasions in recent years. But, while the presence of bands with paramilitary links on Orange marches is plain to see, the constant apologetics for armed loyalism by respectable politicians, displaying their symbiotic relationship, is too often ignored. The Holy Cross affair in 1998 was a clear instance. The roots of Holy Cross lay in the expulsion of UDA members from the Lower Shankill by the UVF in a paramilitary feud. These UDA men then settled in the Glenbryn estate and sought to flex their muscles, their chosen vehicle being the mass intimidation of Catholic children walking to school. This action was defended – or, what amounts to the same thing, explained away – by politicians of both UUP and DUP. Chris McGimpsey, a supposed UUP "liberal", was prominent among those saying that the small Catholic schoolgirls walking to their school were provocative; the same Chris McGimpsey sees nothing provocative in Orangemen, accompanied by paramilitary flute bands, marching through Catholic areas. There have been other examples. The racist pogrom against the Chinese community in South Belfast in 2003-04 appears to have started as a dispute between the Donegall Road UVF and the local Chinese business community, who had put up some resistance to extortion demands. The UDA, not to be outdone, got stuck in as well, not just on the level of violence but with the production of the notorious "Yellow Invasion" leaflet circulated in Donegall Pass. There have been few charges and virtually no convictions resulting from the pogrom, with hardly anybody willing to blame the perpetrators and even anti-racist campaigners spinning the fantasy that English Nazis were responsible for racist attacks in loyalist-controlled areas. Again, the political wing of the triple alliance played its role. DUP councillor Ruth Patterson opined that residents of Donegall Pass felt the Protestant character of their area was under threat. How that was possible when the local Chinese population had gone from over forty families to under ten due to loyalist intimidation, she did not say. Meanwhile, liberal unionist poster boy Steven King argued that to blame loyalists was to smear the entire Protestant community, and speculated about whether the Chinese were entirely innocent. The racist pogrom was followed in short order by mass intimidation aimed at the Whitehall Square flats complex at the top of the UDA stronghold of Sandy Row. This culminated in several hundred people, including bands, marching on the flats in a clear UDA show of strength. The young population of the complex may include some Catholics – nobody knows its sectarian makeup, which infuriates the loyalists even more. The UDA's action was publicly defended by UUP liberal Michael McGimpsey, who claimed the paramilitary demonstration was a spontaneous expression of concern by Sandy Row residents. Furthermore, McGimpsey claimed that anyone who attributed a sectarian motivation to the intimidators was an anti-Protestant bigot. He sought to back up his position by recycling various urban myths – some wee woman told him a young lad on a flats balcony had shouted at her; somebody else claimed to have seen someone in a Celtic jersey on a balcony. This, on Planet McGimpsey, was proof positive of sustained republican provocation which had sparked off an understandable and moderate reaction by respectable Protestants. Sandy Row and the anti-Chinese pogrom are worth mentioning as they took place in the South Belfast fiefdom of Jackie McDonald, who is currently being built up as the acceptable face of the UDA. McDonald is said to be on first-name terms with Free State president Mary McAleese and regularly plays golf with her husband. More importantly, he is being heavily courted by both London and Dublin governments, to the extent that he could be described as British imperialism and Irish capital's favourite paramilitary. But as we have seen, touting of McDonald as a loyalist Mr Clean is some considerable way wide of the mark. It seems more likely that he is being built up because of his political usefulness than any intrinsic merits he might have. British policy and loyalism There have been a number of strands to British policy, and they have not always sat together harmoniously. For the last ten years, for instance, the Northern Ireland Office has been attempting to encourage the growth of a loyalist equivalent to Sinn Fein. This scheme has been almost a complete failure – the loyalist groups have never managed to create a political wing that even their own members would take seriously, let alone that significant numbers of people would support. In the early 1970s, during a time of massive sectarian polarisation, UDA-sponsored candidates in hardline areas like Sandy Row would routinely poll fewer votes than the UDA had members in the area. Even in the mid-1990s, huge amounts of sympathetic press coverage could not create a mass electoral base for the death squads. The few paramilitary-linked figures who were elected to local councils or Stormont were invariably people with a record of activism around bread-and-butter issues in deprived areas – candidates who were seen as simply paramilitary frontmen received derisory votes. But in recent years even this limited base has largely evaporated. The UDA has bowed to the inevitable and dissolved its front party, the UDP. The UVF-linked PUP has lost much of its support, and is rapidly succumbing to the Paisleyite tide. It was instructive that in the recent local elections, the DUP polled over two thirds of the vote on the Shankill Road while the PUP's Hughie Smyth, who once had the highest personal vote of any councillor in the North, could only scrape back to City Hall on DUP transfers. The mathematics only confirm the underlying political trend, that the programme of Paisley is now the programme of unionism as a whole. The PUP's fake "socialism" – so much ballyhooed by the more gormless elements of the far left – was always trumped in any case by its commitment to remaining part of the "unionist family", and, having provided the muscle for Trimble and got precious little in return, it is now somewhat grumpily adapting to the new Paisleyite dispensation. This is not to say that the loyalist paramilitary groups themselves, as distinct from their satellite parties, have not prospered under the Good Friday process. Both of the main groups, but particularly the UDA, have been in receipt of vast sums of British government money in the guise of community development. Meanwhile, the UDA and UVF have recruited massively, using the flute band culture to bring in an entire layer of youth (paramilitary-linked bands also forming a crucial part of the alliance with the Orange Order). They have extended their empires into small towns and villages with no history of paramilitary activity – most notably the UVF in North Antrim towns like Dervock, Bushmills and Ahoghill, which forms the immediate background to the recent sectarian pogrom in the area. People in these North Antrim towns might like to look at the heroin epidemic in nearby Ballymena as a harbinger of what the UVF's expansion is going to bring them. But while the British have aided the expansion of these organisations, this expansion also poses problems for them. The essential features of armed loyalism – bigotry, criminality and indiscriminate violence – have by no means abated over the past decade. As a result, the security apparatus has been preoccupied with managing loyalism. This has intersected with the need to either protect their assets within loyalism – or liquidate them if they go rogue. A definite pointer to British policy is the list of figures targeted by the Assets Recovery Agency. While the UDA's North Belfast boss Andre Shoukri flaunts his wealth despite never having worked a day in his life, the ARA's targets are marginal figures, dead men and people connected to the LVF. This last group is too small to be useful to the British, but significant and active enough to be an embarrassment, which would explain why the British are apparently happy enough to let the UVF wipe it out. The support being extended to the UDA may well flow from a "balance of terror" theory, according to which the UVF should be prevented from becoming the hegemonic loyalist group. It is worth pointing out that, in defiance of its own monitoring commission, the British government continues to recognise the UDA's non-existent ceasefire. Fall of the godfathers These military considerations, taken along with the fact that the loyalist groups are riddled with informers, help to shed some light on the sudden falls from grace of prominent figures in the murky world of paramilitarism. The late Billy Wright is a case in point. The charismatic Wright – mass murderer, drug dealer, born-again Christian, Orangeman and almost certainly a British agent – was responsible for the indiscriminate slaughter of dozens of Catholics in the Portadown area for many years. For most of this time he and his Mid-Ulster UVF appeared untouchable. Then, following the Good Friday Agreement, Wright denounced the peace process and split from the Shankill-based leadership of the UVF – who he described, incredibly, as "communists" – to form the small but vicious LVF. Wright expressed his support for the analysis of the DUP, who reciprocated by defending him against threats from the UVF. Following this, Wright was convicted of intimidation – which calls to mind Al Capone's imprisonment on tax evasion charges – and then assassinated in prison under dubious circumstances. Then there was Johnny Adair, UDA boss of the Shankill. Adair, like his friend Wright, was untouchable. Then in 1995 he was convicted of "directing terrorism", an offence specifically designed to put him behind bars. Quickly, however, he became useful to the British in their efforts to keep the UDA on side – he was visited in prison by secretary of state Mo Mowlam and freed in 1999. Eventually, however, he got to be too much of a loose cannon for the British. Coincidentally, he had also made many enemies by his megalomaniac attempt to make himself supreme leader of the UDA, expanding his empire by putting the Shoukri brothers in charge of North Belfast and cutting into other bosses' fiefdoms. This ended with the assassination of the UDA's East Antrim leader John Gregg. In 2003 the British returned him to prison, whereupon the UDA majority – now including the Shoukris, who were smart enough to see which way the wind was blowing – moved into the Shankill, kicked out Adair's family and closest associates, and took over his empire. Adair is now free again, but exiled in England. Most recently we have seen the UDA's murder of Jim Gray, formerly the organisation's leader in East Belfast for 14 years. The media coverage, in true Sunday World fashion, has concentrated on the flamboyant Gray's love of chunky gold jewellery and pastel knitwear. But there is much more to it than that. Gray, who was never convicted of any offence despite his very public role in the UDA, became a key figure in the Good Friday process. He made several trips to Stormont to meet successive British proconsuls, and fronted up a UDA PR exercise called the John Gregg Initiative. Then, in March 2005, he suddenly fell from grace and lost his position in the UDA. This was immediately followed by two noteworthy statements – one from Jackie McDonald stating that the UDA wouldn't tolerate criminality in the ranks, and another from the Assets Recovery Agency that they were investigating Gray. The ARA investigation was generally taken as a reason for his fall, but the other way around is a more likely sequence. Now Gray is dead, gunned down outside his home while apparently under 24-hour police surveillance. Why British strategy won't work Britain's immediate plans regarding the UDA are clear. Proconsul Hain, while announcing drastic cuts in the public sector in the North, has made it clear that big sums – £200 million has been mentioned – will be available to help loyalism "take the political road". The money is being dressed up as going to regenerate poverty-stricken loyalist areas, but it doesn't take a genius to read between the lines. The Provos have surrendered. The UDA will now be aided to legitimise its business interests, provided it can stop the more blatant criminality – such as its heavy dependence on drug dealing, pimping and protection rackets – while ridding itself of some of its more outré characters. Then if the UVF can be persuaded to follow suit, the North will be pacified. There will be lavish rewards for those who play ball. That's the plan. It won't work, for two reasons. First, it depends on the assumption that the UDA will clean itself up and stay on the straight and narrow. This is rather unlikely. Paradoxically, the Provos have been easier to buy off because they were less corrupt. Although they always had an element of corruption, this was relatively minor and subordinated to their political goals – the racket served the movement and not vice versa. So once the Provos had surrendered politically, the legitimisation of their assets and winding down of paramilitary structures – what is currently going on – was relatively straightforward. By contrast, criminality is so much part of the essence of the loyalist groups that the chances of them going straight are minimal. The more important point is linked to Britain's overall strategy. What do the British want? They want the North stabilised, but they don't want just any stability. They want to keep partition as well – this is also the programme of Dublin, hence the defeat of the Provos, who had no defence against Southern capital. They need to incorporate the Catholic middle class as a bulwark against a resurgence of anti-imperialist politics. But the nature of the Northern statelet means that any stabilisation must rest on unionism, as Britain's popular base in the North. This gives us the outline of British strategy since Sunningdale in 1973. The SDLP – both the party of the Catholic middle class and an instrument of the Dublin government – was always reliably on side, as was the NIO's front organisation, the small Alliance Party. The need was for a moderate unionism to cut a deal with the Catholic middle class. The trouble with that scenario is that unionism is not so much a political movement as a conspiracy to defend sectarian privilege. You can't have a moderate unionism for the same reason you can't have a liberal Pope. In the world of unionism the biggest bigot always wins. So we have had a succession of unlikely figures, from Brian Faulkner to David Trimble, painted up as great moderates only to be overthrown from the right. The impasse of unionism Now we have a situation where the DUP forms the leadership of unionism. This puts paid to the search for moderates who could "consolidate the centre". Instead, we have somewhat desperate talk about a "pragmatic" wing of the DUP – people like Peter Robinson and Nigel Dodds – who, unlike the arch-bigot Paisley, might be willing to do business with Catholics. This is a wild misreading of the situation. In the first place, Peter Robinson already had a chance to modernise when he, along with the late Harold McCusker MP and UUP officer Wee Frankie Millar (son of legendary Belfast councillor Big Frankie) produced the Task Force report in 1987. This document was suppressed by party leaders Jim Molyneaux and Ian Paisley, on the reasonable grounds that modernising unionism was a dead end. What we have we hold. Shortly afterwards, McCusker died, Millar left politics for journalism, and Robinson has never said another word about it. This is the point about accommodating Catholics. Catholics always had a place under the old Stormont, only a subordinate one. As Lord Kilclooney has said, Catholics could have rights but not equal rights. There can't be – as Love Ulster is demanding – a return to unalloyed supremacism because some crucial things have changed since 1967. Most crucially, the Catholic population is much more assertive and much larger. Unionism can't impose its will on a 45% minority as it could on a 30% minority. The more intelligent Paisleyites – Robinson and Dodds among them – recognise this, but don't have a solution. Britain's approach at the moment has been to hand the DUP various goodies that don't matter much in the scheme of things. Big Ian has been made a privy councillor and the DUP is getting seats in Blair's appointed House of Lords. The DUP is also getting extra seats on the Policing Board, an oversight body with few teeth but many opportunities for grandstanding. But this doesn't go anywhere towards the DUP programme. As DUP MP Gregory Campbell pointed out in an important statement, the DUP welcomed these goodies but wanted movement on crucial issues like parades, jobs and policing. Campbell's position could be translated as follows. Exempting Orange halls from rates is all very well, but we want the Parades Commission scrapped and the right to march through Catholic areas guaranteed. We want the Fair Employment Act scrapped and measures put in place to restore Protestant privilege in the job market. And extra seats on the Policing Board are fine, but what we really want is an end to 50/50 recruitment and a return to an all-Protestant police force. The impasse is clear. The DUP can't impose their programme on the British, and the British can't implement the DUP programme without endangering the stability they desperately want. But British policy depends on keeping their loyalist base loyal, which is why the post-Good Friday process keeps being shifted to the right. It is quite obvious that there can be no solution within this process. The defeat of reactionary unionism is the precondition for any kind of political progress that benefits working people. Keith you have cliamed here you will make a stand against republicianism and I like many other are grateful. GOD SAVE ULSTER AND OUR QUEEN.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Epona
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 04:39 PM

Eh...201! :)

E

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST,Tír Chonaill
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 03:41 PM

.... eh...

200!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST,Tír Chonaill
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 03:40 PM

Copy & Paste the link, Keith.

Spoonfed, that's what you need to be.

Once you exhibit a bit of intelligence, I'll start to take you a bit more seriously.

You only think you are being clever, Keith.

When in fact you're being incredibly tedious.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 10:09 AM

guest, that is a file not a site.
I prefer not to open it, not knowing anything about you.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 09:57 AM

Keith try this site,http://cryptome.org/john-dignam.zip

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Fiolar
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 09:10 AM

Came across this news item.

"Controversy surrounds the carrying of a banner commemorating a UDA killer in the Twelfth of July Orange parade in Belfast city centre. It is widely accepted that Joe Bratty, who was eventually killed by the IRA in 1994, murdered Teresa Clinton in a sectarian attack a few months earlier. He is also believed to have been involved in the murder of five Catholics in Seán Graham's Bookmakers in 1992. An Orange Order spokesman refused to comment other than to say that everything that happened on the Twelfth would be reviewed."

Nothing changes or is likely to.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 06:12 AM

He left the army after the war, but served as a territorial afterwards.
I think that is where the confusion has arisen.
I have looked at a picture of his medals and can not see the GSM and clasp, but I have e mailed the museum to make sure.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Divis Sweeney
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 05:41 AM

So are you saying he was out of the army in the early seventies ? Think you need go check your facts again Keith, it's okay I can wait.

I was invited onto this site by another member who told me about the propaganda you post, so really had to make sure people knew the truth about over here, as you will see they are if you read some of the above posts !

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 05:38 AM

I see one of his obits says he served into the seventies.
I think that is a mistake, but excuses you.
I will check.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 05:36 AM

Such a nasty welcome to new member Lil Kiwi

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford - PM
Date: 17 Jul 06 - 04:58 PM

Very sorry, one more.
You posted at 0405 local time.
Trouble sleeping?

The guy lived in New Zealand for Christ sake!

Classic Keith at his finest.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 05:35 AM

Read about Tex.
He was not even in the army in "early seventies" or even the sixties.
I think that you also made up me calling you a murderer.
We did have a lot of discussion around the post you made that appeared to be about killing by sniping.
The one you first apologised about, then joked about, then denied making, then accused me of making under your name.

I have never said you should be banned from the site.
We have no way of banning people anyway.
There is no reason why someone who hates folk music should not use this site as a platform for political propaganda.
There is also no reason why such a person should be given a free ride here.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Divis Sweeney
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 05:24 AM

So why did he wear a Northern Ireland bar on his GSM ????
Did they just give it to him ?

So is Mudcat police officer Keith telling me to leave this site because I am not interested in your music ?

The hole you are digging for yourself gets deeper !

No Keith it's not I hate being challenged, I just don't like the fact you call me a murderer on this site, without proof, even after the site informed you there was no proof of your allegation.

Let us call it YET another mistake on your part !

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 05:04 AM

Tex Banwell
did not serve in Ireland.
Let us call that a "mistake" on your part.
Sweeney, you came to this site saying that you did not like our music but you just wanted to inform us about how good the IRA were.

Why do you deserve an easy ride?
I never start anti Republican threads, I just challenge propaganda.
And how you hate to be challenged!

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Divis Sweeney
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 04:52 AM

Really don't want to know about your respect of a tosser who was part of a murder gang regiment who killed innocent people on the streets of Derry. He was in the North of Ireland in the early seventies.

I really have no desire to go into any point with you Keith here. Al tried to get you to see reason and I offered the hand of friendship, which was rejected with the reply that you were going to make sure I didn't get an easy ride on mudcat.

Go for it Keith, Game on.

Recently so many posters from all over the world have tied you in knots, and it was once pointed out to you, "You dig a hole for yourself".

Think it's best you stick with the like of Guest William Frazer above, he also honours ex soldiers.

See your back to your charts again, well it wasn't the IRA that killed members of my family Keith, it was the British security forces.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Lil' Kiwi
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 04:44 AM

So the collusion and orange intimidation,
the plastic bullets and blatant slaying of civilians,
the protection and rewarding of their killers,
a brutally biased police force,
and the politicians holding peace to ransom,
and division and apathy long instilled...

Could only be met by peaceful means?! Yeah right.

I truly doubt how the conditions now for peace and progress could have been without those volunteers.

Even from over here I can see why they fought, and good on them. I'd certainly have done the same if I was Irish born, or faced a similar situation here in NZ.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 03:05 AM

Sweeney,
I did post that I felt honoured to have known a man who did some extraordinarily brave things in WW2
It was in a thread about meeting war heroes.
What is your objection?

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 02:55 AM

Beachcomber, I have always posted in favour of ultimate unity, i.e. when nationalists have the majority.
I have always posted against the use of political violence by all sides.
I remember describing B Specials as sectarian thugs.

Sweeney, armies make bad policemen. Putting heavily armed young men into a volatile situation leads to bad things happening.
but
British army is least worst, most restrained of all.
IRA kept army there for 30 years. IRA stopped, army left.
IRA killed HUNDREDS MORE innocents than army.
(See chart)
http://www.wesleyjohnston.com/users/ireland/past/troubles/troubles_stats.html#statusperpetrator

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Divis Sweeney
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 07:43 PM

You made some very valid points there beachcomber. when you consider 27 full and part time members of the security forces were charged and jailed for the murders of innocent nationalists/Catholics. Now that's not counting those murdered by the British army including all the children they killed with plastic or rubber bullets.

When someone with reason such as yourself looks into the situation over here, you can see the roots of the problem. We did not start this, but we did rise to defend our families. Expect the usual chants from Keith, about bombs in litter bins and Warington, sometimes think he must have been here that day because he recalls it that often.

I have attended the funerals of children who were shot at point blank range with rubber bullets by the soldiers who wore the same uniform you will find him wearing in the members photos section here. Never heard him condemn that.

Anyway having lived here all my life and been subjected to the Orange jackboot in employment application and saw my fathers business burnt out because we were a catholic family living in a Protestant area when the troubles started. When the police arrived they told my father " well what you expect" When my father pointed to the ones standing yards away from him and told them they did it, he was told, sorry we didn't see it and doubt any witnesses will come forward either.

Simple as this, we would never have gained anything if it wasn't for the armed struggle. The unionists had the power and the blessing to keep nationalists in the North of Ireland under heel. The IRA campaign brought the torture to the table. I use the word torture because any catholic who lived here in the 1960's will know it as nothing else. We were not allowed to vote, we were not allowed to own houses, we were refused work because the then prime minister in Northern Ireland told protestants not to employ catholics.

Listening to the like of Keith here beachcomber rabbit on about the honour of meeting great men who served in the Paras or who the IRA killed in attacks should really just be ignored, it's rabble to me, he knows f... all about it. He said recently he was here to ensure that Divis Sweeney would never get an easy ride here ! What is supposed to make me rethink my position ?

My position is very clear and simple to understand. We fought for what we have today. Do I support the peace process ? Yes 100%. Did I support the Provisional Irish Republican Army. Yes I did and I will honour and defend every last volunteer to the day I die.


Thanks for your understanding beachcomber.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Divis Sweeney
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 05:40 PM

Good weekend away Keith ? good post above, nice to see your views on Ireland in above post. Great to see we are starting to agree on something. So it's only me and the Provo's you don't like ?

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST,beachcomber
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 05:37 PM

Keith I am sorry if I misunderstand you but you will admit that your postings (at least those that I have read ) on the topic of Irish unity and the methods that have been employed by Irishmen to regain it, have generally been adverse. You say that you are opposed to paramilitaries of both sides. Fine, but you make no such claim concerning the activities of the "legal" paramilitaries nor, of the British Army. I include among those such as the former B-Specials, UDR and RUC , now PSNI, all of whom have been involved in "extra curricular activity" down the years.
The political path to unity was , I believe, well explored in the years up to and including WW1 only to fail under the implacable opposition of the Loyalists, Orange Order and "Covenanters". Surely that was, and still is, obvious. Even if Ian Paisley were to stand down tomorrow, can you say that the succession would not be equally against Irish Unity ?
I would like to think that unity is now a possibility but I need to hear more reassuring words from the people in the 6 counties of both sides.
What would your opinion be Divis ?

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Lil' Kiwi
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 05:25 PM

Hey y'all,

I have started a thread for anyone that wants to talk or ask things about NZ stuff :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 04:46 PM

Dave I read a book by the last of the native Tamans on the genocide which was practised by the early British settlers on the native population of Tasmania.

Ard, exactly what has that got to do with the price of fish? Were they Maoris? Were they Irish? Why are you talking about Tasmania? Medication need adjusting perhaps?

:D (tG)

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 01:54 PM

Tir Chonail,
Please take the trouble to read your own posts.
You have made another unintelligable one.
My name is mentioned but I don't know what you are saying. (12.10)

Beachcomber, in your post largely directed at me you say "Really, What would be so wrong about IRELAND as one Nation,"

It is frustrating that I am so often assumed to believe things that I have so often denied.
Many of you are shouting at an imaginary bogey man you give my name to.
AGAIN.
I am a supporter of the cause of Irish Nationalism.
Get it?
I am opposed to the paramilitaries of both sides.
I look forward to Irish unity.
This last should surprise no one. The whole population of England and Wales, and most of Scotland long for the day when NI becomes someone else's problem.
If you have been told that Britain wants to keep NI as a vestige of Empire, you have been lied to.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Lil' Kiwi
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 09:47 AM

Ard, my ex-fiance is Tasmanian, and my mother is from mainland Australia, so I know a bit about the aboriginal people being literally hunted. They were pretty much wiped out in Tas. and not far from it on the mainland of Aussie. People would even go "abo hunting" after church on sundays! (I kid you not).

nitie nite all.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Lil' Kiwi
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 09:36 AM

The Maori mostly have been treated equal, nowadays of course they completely are.

I think they even had the right to vote before women in a lot of countries. It certainly hasn't been perfect over the years but there is the 'Waitangi Tribunal' that is tying the loose ends up of any grievences that some Iwi (tribes) still have. That's basically a court especially for Maori affairs arising from the treaty. I might add that this treaty was actually signed by Maori chiefs and taken up and down the country for them all to consider. The Maoris leaders, NZ government and opposition are all working towards everything sorted out within the next several years at the latest (a timeframe has been offcially set but that date escapes me right now).

The cultures have integrated/assimilated and there's never really been a Maori vs. European issue as such (aside from the Land Wars I may have previously mentioned). Maori words and place names are common. Basically every major official even has Maori content with a specific protocol. Even orientation at university for example has a Maori ceremony to welcome all new students.

Our key sports teams perform the Haka before games particularly The All Blacks for example (I'm not at all a rugby fan unlike most NZers), most of us have no problems singing the Maori part of our anthem, and many Maori chose to fight in all major conflict that we have been involved in from WW1 to the present.

There's also Maori taught in schools as well as schools that are completely Maori and Maori radio stations and tv channels.

And that's all I can think of right now at 1:30am. Off to try to sleep.
Have a grand week everyone!
Lil' Kiwi x.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: ard mhacha
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 09:15 AM

Dave I read a book by the last of the native Tamans on the genocide which was practised by the early British settlers on the native population of Tasmania.

This lady was the last recorded native of this island, the writer states that the natives were hunted down until she was believed to be last of the aboriginal inhabitants, it was a book I found very hard to finish.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 08:12 AM

Excellent points from both of you. This thread has become interesting. Once Keith re-appears i'm off !

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 08:11 AM

Don't ask me, Epona, I'm not a Kiwi. Read back up the thread and see what a native of NZ says. Speculation without the facts to confirm or deny is worthless.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Epona
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 08:05 AM

Would be interesting to see if the Maori think they were always treated as equals...

E

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 07:43 AM

Yay! I have been posting for years that the working class and poorer English copped as much shite as the Irish and Scottish - Nice to see that at last some people are agreeing. I keep saying over and over again on various threads that the ordinary folk like you and I are not enemies. Never have been. Never will be. It is the landlords, money-men and power brokers that are causing all this grief. The sooner we stop arguing amongst ourselves and face the real problem the better off everyone will be!

Having said that (and having a love of rhetoric anyway!) I must take you up on a point, Epona. The British have not treated everyone as sub-human. By the admission of Lil' Kiwi on this thread (I think!) the Maori peoples of New Zealand have always been fairly teated and have in fact benefited from a British drawn treaty which entitled them to their own lands and stopped others invading them! Wonder what was different then? Perhaps we realy were at the zenith of our empire? Gone steadily downhill since;-)

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST,William Frazer
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 06:53 AM

I never heard so much tripe and pro-republican guff. NO SURRENDER

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: Epona
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 06:03 AM

WLD - Maybe it's not just the Irish and Scottish, but the English too? For as much as I appreciate your post, I think one point is missing. It doesn't matter who the first victims were or who the last ones will be. What matters is that there were victims at all! What matters is it's an ongoing assault on people and one that many choose not to recognize and stand up against. It's been happening in Ireland for hundreds of years, in England and Scotland for the same. In the British "colonies" too. To use a line from a song that the English were perhaps the first victims of their own rulers doesn't divert attention from the fact that in every country that has tasted British rule, the citizens have been treated as less then human. And that, WLD, is the problem, regardless of who the Brits brutalized first.

This movie only showed a minute part of the what the Irish faced. There are SO MANY more stories that haven't been told, and I'm sure you've glimpsed that from some that you hear on Mudcat. What I'm asking is not for anyone to play the "who was hurt first and who suffered most" game, but for everyone here to see that there was and still is a problem and that it has to be stopped, whether it's in England, Ireland or even New Zealand. It doesn't help to say, "yes, we've been victimized. Maybe things will change." You must admit that there is a horrific abuse of power and determine IT HAS TO BE CHANGED. If not for you, for you children, for your grandchildren.   

Rant is done. Off to work.

E

And WLD, for the record, I think your parents story is just as worthy as being remembered as the story that was told in the movie. History too often forgets those not in power, so don't let anyone forget how they suffered BUT survived.

Subject: RE: BS: Ban on 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'
From: GUEST
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 04:41 AM

Regarding Families Acting for Innocent Victims (FAIR). That crew could export hate !

William Frazer and FAIR claim as a victim is Robert McConnell of the UDR (a regiment of the British Army) and the UVF (a unionist paramilitary organisations) who was charged with the the killing of the Catholic Reavey brothers in 1975. McConnell had a long sectarian history.

Frazer's web site includes reference to a speech made by Ian Paisley in which Paisley said under parliamentary privilege that Eugene Reavey, another brother of the dead Reaveys, was responsible for the Kingsmill massacre. This is a lie that Frazer and Paisley refuse to either apologise for or to delete from their sites, the police said this was rubbish.


The attack on the brothers in their home at Whitecross, Co Armagh, on January 4, 1976 and the simultaneous murder of three members of the O'Dowd family near Gilford, Co Down was believed to be done to provoke the IRA - then officially on ceasefire . William Frazer said both incidents "were no big deals" !

The attacks started the second worst annual death toll in the Troubles, with another 290 people dying before 1976 was finished.

No one has been convicted for any of these two attacks.

The 24-hour spasm of violence began with the attack on the Reavey home. Two of the brothers, John and Brian, died immediately. Their 17-year-old brother Anthony died three weeks later.

A Luger pistol and a 9mm sub-machinegun used in the murders were matched by ballistic traces to a gun and bomb attack on the Rock Bar, outside Keady, which took place five months later. One man was wounded in that attack when the bomb failed to explode.

Three serving officers of the Royal Ulster Constabulary were convicted in 1980 for the Rock Bar attack. One - who was already serving a life sentence for another sectarian murder.

The judge who passed sentence, the then Lord Chief Justice Lord Lowry, said "powerful motives" had pushed these officers, including "the feeling that more than ordinary police work was needed and justified to rid the land of the pestilence which has been in existence".

The RUC did not reveal the ballistic link between the Reavey murders and the Rock Bar attack for almost 25 years.

William McCaughey, the constable jailed for the Rock Bar attack, said it was "perfectly natural" for loyalists to be in the UVF and the RUC."

Fair and the DUP insist the war is not over and that the enemy can still be hunted and defeated (they sound like Keith A. of Hertford). A previous effort led by Drumcree stalwarts to rally Protestants around a new Ulster covenant was launched in Ballymena in 2001 with calls from one speaker for "B52 bombers over Dublin".

Willie Frazer said of Billy Wright the notorious unionist paramilitary and sectarian killer, "I have a lot of time for Billy Wright", because he "called a spade a spade". Presumably Wright called a taig a Fenian and vice versa, before he shot them.

At a protest against the release of republican prisoners under the Good Friday Agreement, Willie was asked about the release of loyalist unionist prisoners. Frazier said, "They should never have been locked up in the first place". Frazier said that the unionist paramilitaries were a necessary part of the 'war' against the IRA, and did a good job – which included hundreds of blatantly sectarian murders.

F.A.I.R. have not been without their own problems. Four senior members have appeared in court for either lude behaviour or acts of perversion within the last two years.