For Babe it was a rude awakening

Apart from the Central Bank that ignored and failed this country before, during, and after the rise and very predictable fall of the Celtic tiger, a scam artist in Galway set up a cloned website of Danske bank last week and very nearly relived taxpayers of another €1.4 million from the clowns running the Central one; can we take anymore of this? Sure we can for it cannot get anymore ridiculous in how this country is still being run by the powers that be and those that think they are power itself. How about the following.....

                                                                              Babe

The case of the murdered swine: and I do not use this word lightly for even in the human world the legal killing of people demand it being done in a humane manner. The department of Agriculture along with their ‘special investigation unit’ (think SS here) got together with a thick bogman farmer in 2002 and oversaw and cheerlead the slaughter of 4000 pigs with one bolt gun between the lot of them. For Babe it was a rude awakening.

As the first of six unfettered pigs were fatally maimed, the swine went down with a loud shriek followed by a violent convulsion. It did not fare better if not worse for the 3,994 pigs that would follow. 

Despite EU regulations that dictates that a bolt gun be used only to stun an animal; that the animal must also be spared avoidable excitement, pain and suffering; that it must be restrained prior to stunning, the Department of Agriculture was having none of it even 13 years later. It’s official stance on the matter read: “During the course of the slaughter process, veterinary inspectors visited the farm on a number of occasions to assess the on-going slaughter operation where they observed the collection, restraint, slaughter and disposal process, and were satisfied that in the circumstances of a large -scale farm slaughter process, that the matter was progressing satisfactorily and the farmer in question had acted appropriately.” Of course they did not state how they disposed of the pigs after the killing though rumours abound of dead fish in the nearby lake.

                                                                    ....and his sister

The four vets involved here were all cleared later by the vet’s disciplinary body of professional misconduct and found to have properly discarded their duties. Tom Galvin, the thick farmer involved and head serial killer of pigs, was the only one found guilty during the pig genocide, but where ignorance is bliss for the rest of them at the Department of Agriculture, to be reasonable would be very foolish indeed. As Jesus would say: “God, forgive them for they know not what they do.”

So it goes and fine for God or Jesus but for the rest of us, the ignorant gravy train is still going and we foot the bill every time and is as certain as taxes, win or lose. All aboard…..if you can get a seat.

Barry Clifford

With Paudie Mc Gahon and no visible means of support: it is all about timing

With Paudie Mc Gahon it is all about timing even though he can be very economical with the truth or his memory on either one. To understand any story one must connect the dots of what was said before and what was being said now. If these do not align they it would be fair to say it is nothing but a pack of lies, and damned lies at that!!

In one of today’s newspaper is this banner headline: ‘Provos are hiding my abuser in safe house’-Paudie. The carrier of this story as usual is the Irish Independent, and without prejudice let us look at the ham reporting of facts that are nothing more than a bunch of ‘maybe’s and ‘alleges’ with all the fire of damp toilet paper.

The Gardai, apparently, on todays Independent are looking to arrest someone just on the allegations alone by Mc Gahon of adult male rape, though the Independent called it child rape (that's Irish justice and reporting for you), but this phantom cannot be found on this small Island of ours. Without much ‘facts’ here, the Independent relies not on them alone, because they, the facts, cannot be found, but  rely on ‘understandings’ instead. They understand that this phantom went to ground shortly after Mc Gahons fiction. This story is re-worked in exactly the same fashion as the fantasies put about by Mairia Cahill and of course the usual cover ups that Sinn Fein was ‘alleged’ to have done.

                                                               Paudie Mc Gahon

A few facts do come through though despite the best efforts of Paul Williams who has being calling himself a crime reporter for years, if not a crime fighter itself. It seems Mc Gahon has been down on his luck for years and could do with a few euros wherever he can get it. He is never too far away from the border counties either. 

Lacking more facts, the Independent have another ‘understanding’ that Gardai have not ruled out the possibility that the phantom IRA member may have left the country using a false passport.

Mc Gahon said "He is being financially supported by these people because he has no source of income….” The irony was lost on Mc Gahon that he is being supported by the state, the free part of it anyway, and has no official source of income either.

Mc Gahon is a 40 year old man and a father of three, without any ‘visible’ means of support who needs money badly, and waited all this time until late 2014 to make allegations against an innocent man. It is all about timing. Having seen Cahill get away with her fiction, he was thus encouraged to try and get away with his. One does not have to dig about for dirt on Mc Gahon, he is busy enough doing that against others. The problem with dirt is that, throw enough of it and some of it is bound to blow back on your face. 

"I have been told by the ‘most informed sources’ that republicans have been trying to dig dirt up to discredit me, but they can dig all they like - they won't push me into the background. I am going nowhere.” On the latter utterance, Mc Gahon for once, told the truth.

At this point in the article, the Independent lost all pretence that he was an alleged victim but was a victim instead. Throw in a few kangaroo court scenes by Mc Gahon in his own family home (how convenient) and hey presto, the Gardai are ‘understood’ again to be making progress on this one while pursuing two lines of enquiry. All of this is after launching a major investigation into Mc Gahon’s claims last year which turned up nothing. 

Detailed statements of fiction aside of Mc Gahon, and another alleged victim that has yet to be confirmed even exists, this is classic Irish Independent style reporting intended only to discredit and malign Sinn Fein. 

Still, even in the dull reporting of fiction Williams lets another fact in, though reluctantly, to bolster his ‘once upon a time’ untruths, suppositions and innuendos: “….there is no hope of forensic evidence being found, it is understood that the locations were photographed and mapped.” How CS and I is that. 

Only in Ireland……only in fecking Ireland…….

Barry Clifford