Lost Train

Last week's train crash near Santiago in Spain in which 79 people lost their lives has served as an awesome reminder that speed kills. 

Local Spanish media reported that the driver of the train 'Mr Garzon admitted to the judge that he took the curve too fast, saying he had a momentary lapse and forgot what part of the track he was on.' He has since been charged with negligent homicide.

Ireland just about escaped a rail tragedy of potentially similar proportions in 2009 at the Malahide Estuary on the outskirts of Dublin. Hundreds of passengers were travelling on a Dublin bound train 'when a section of track dramatically plunged into the water moments after they passed over it.'

The last train to leave
Harcourt St Station before it closed on 31st December 1958.

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Starving India

The recent death by food poisoning of 23 Indian children has led to a widespread anger throughout India.

The children who were served food as part of a free school meals scheme died rapidly from the effects of the poisoning, some of them in their parents' arms on the way to hospital. 'Several parents who lost children in the tragedy said they had trusted the school to serve their kids their only solid meal of the day.'

In a country where 42 per cent of children are underweight the free school meals are considered crucial.    But their supply has been blighted by corruption.

Indian Ambassador Mrs Vijaya Lakshmi Nehru Pandit presents credentials to

Pres Sean T. O'Kelly 1/3/1955

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GUBU for sure

A fatal plane crash earlier this month in a San Francisco airport has led to bout of behaviour on a US television news programme which can best be described in terms once coined by Taoiseach Charles Haughey in response to a controversy which generated much controversy. Haughey referred to the arrest of the killer in the house of the country's Attorney General as Grotesque, Unbelievable, Bizarre, Unprecedented. A political opponent and writer immediatelty coined the acronym GUBU and it as rapidly entered the political lexicon.

In a post crash news report 'Oakland TV station KTVU broadcast four erroneous names for the pilots of Flight 214 after a National Transportation Safety Board intern mistakenly confirmed them as being correct.'

The airline is now to sue the broadcasters.

Fianna Fail leader Charles Haughey addressing the party at its annual Árd Fheis at the Simmonscourt, RDS, Dublin, 19th April 1986.

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Concern for Everybody Except the Child.

With the release of the last chapter of the Murphy Report the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland has come in for more criticism because of the role of its hierarchy in effectively covering up for the clerical abuse of children taking place on its watch.

The report revealed that three former archbishops of Dublin behaved abominably in their handling of a paedophile priest, who the Church spirited away to the US.

The Irish Independent reported the Archbishop of Dublin, Dr Diarmuid Martin, as being scathing of 'the church's lack of concern for children abused by priests.' Dr Martin claimed that 'there was concern for everybody except the child.'

No sense of reality

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Bankers Booked

Yesterday a small group of protesters gathered throughout the afternoon outside Dail Eireann in protest at the kleptocratic culture that mushroomed in Ireland under the Celtic Tiger, the public face of which in recent times has become the bankers.

Book The Bankers protest outside Dail Eireann on 4/07/2013

Protests in the same location against the banks have taken place in the past.

What made this one different is that atypical for street protests there were no people standing on soap boxes pushing a political agenda. It was a silent protest. Each protester came as an equal, a book in hand, which they stood reading as part of a silent protest named Book The Bankers by the people who made the initial call for a rally. Amongst the books on display were Banksters and Nineteen Eighty Four.

Quieter Times: 16th Dail Reopens at Leinster House, 20/03/1957

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Book The Bankers

On Thursday from 1500 throughout the remainder of the day and evening a protest will take place outside Dail Eireann, the scene of a number of protest gatherings in recent years.

Like many Dail protests before it this one is being led and driven by women infuriated at the massive theft inflcited on Irish society by the banks.The women hope to register their anger with Taoiseach Enda Collegue and his fellow TDs, arguing that the government too has been robbed blind by the banks.

You canlisten to ‘Book the Bankers interview on Phantom FM’ on Audioboo

Newly Elected TD Enda Kenny arrives at The
Dail on the 18th November 1975

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