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