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  BBC's sterling coverage of 'The Twalf'
Sunday, July 18, 2004
July 12Monday's colourful pageantry in the North, aka `The Twalf', was given the usual comprehensive coverage by BBC Northern Ireland last week.

Yes, how those residents of leafy south Dublin must bemoan the years before the advent of cable and satellite TV.

Now the annual march fest is beamed directly into their living rooms, neatly packaged by those cheery chaps in Belfast's Ormeau Avenue.

Robust farmer-types streamed past the cameras throughout the `Province' sporting the usual bowler hat, sash and swords.

Children ate ice-cream in large fields while their political masters waxed lyrical from the backs of articulated lorries.

Meanwhile, in the real world, the PSNI had filtered 300 boozy loyalists through the Ardoyne provoking a pitched battle between residents, the British army and the police.

Frenzied hacks, who had thought their days in the frontline were just about numbered, filed breathless reports about senior Republicans on the streets preventing death or injury to the security forces. What must they think on the mainland?

Like father, like daughters

Great to see the party-loving Bush twins joining their dad on the campaign trail as the battle for the White House hots up. Barbara and Jenna (22) have been carefully repackaged as ``all-American girls'' to aid George Dubya's re-election prospects.

This, of course, means there is no reference to the incident in 2001 when both were charged with underage alcohol offences at a Mexican restaurant in Austin, Texas.

The charges were dropped after they did community service.

The president is a proud dad. Who can forget what he said about his daughters during an interview with CNBC on April 15, 2000? ``Laura and I really don't realise how bright our children is (sic) sometimes until we get an objective analysis.''

It's the way he tells 'em. . .

KKK lauds McDowell

Minister for Justice Michael McDowell might take to hiding under his white cotton sheets to recover from his latest embarrassment - an accolade for his Citizenship Referendum from the Ku Klux Klan.

Apparently, the referendum sent out a message to the rest of the world that Ireland was racist. This was, of course, seen as a positive characteristic by the notoriously racist, white supremacist group.

McDowell's Referendum result is supported by the Klan, along with other burning issues for ``White Christians World Wide - the World's True and Unrepresented Minority''. Other issues affecting white Christians are helpfully collated in the news section of the group's official website.

A choice selection of scurrilous news includes: ``New British law could pave the way for adoptions by homosexuals''; ``Canadian government sponsoring homosexual `marriage' ads''; ``Human sacrifice in London? (Yes, say experts) - Ah the wonders of non-white immigration''.

The Klan also highlights the rash of ``female Olympic athletes getting pregnant deliberately and having abortions just days before an event - just to boost their red blood cell count for an edge on the competition''.

The good work done by McDowell in upping Ireland's Klan status is balanced by the website's warning: ``Ireland considers legal changes on abortion . . . if the woman's life is considered at risk.''

Knights' spokeswoman Rachel Pendergraft disapproves: ``Women libbers would have this mean anything from a women not being ready financially to a women not being ready emotionally (it might interfere with her education or social life).''

Dunphy downs Deauville

Last week's issue of the Racing Post included an interesting reverie on the subject of Deauville, summer home to Eamon Dunphy. The broadcaster is in the news again, this time over his deal to host a morning radio show at Newstalk 106.

The writer and prominent British racing journalist Alistair Down, reflected that he had managed to go racing without seeing a horse on only two afternoons in his life. One was on a visit to Deauville 15 years ago, when he had occasion to run into Dunphy.

``We descended on the racecourse with all the subtlety of the first Panzer Division,'' Down wrote. ``It was at this stage when things began to deteriorate from bad to actionable.

``Having taken a wrong turn into a bar, I ran into this paper's former editor Alan Byrne. It was this most serious-minded of men who led me astray by introducing me to a splendid cove called Eamon Dunphy . . . Dunphy is clever, acerbic and amusing and on this afternoon he was also thirsty.

``Purely out of good manners, I accepted his offer of a drink and the rest, as they say, is mystery.''

And Last Post always presumed Dunphy was in France for the food.

Martial arts imitates life

Commuters on London's underground in the week of the Butler report will have found themselves confronted by a huge poster featuring a US soldier in full desert combat gear and bearing the legend `Command Respect'.

No, it's not a sign of totalitarian things to come but an ad for the computer game Full Spectrum Warrior.

According to its website, Full Spectrum Warrior ``is based on a game commissioned by the US Army to train light infantry troops in urban combat situations.''

This time the enemy is the fictitious Al Afad, a fanatical Moslem (not another one!) ``picking up where the Taliban left off'' and bent on destroying the west.

``After the US-led operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, thousands of ex-Taliban and Iraqi loyalists crossed the borders of Zekistan seeking asylum by invitation of the nation's dictator, Al Afad.

``It wasn't long before the same terrorist training facilities and death-camps that the US fought to remove in Afghanistan were operating again under full sponsorship by Al Afad's government.

``After repeated warnings and failed diplomatic resolutions in the United Nations, Nato votes to invade Zekistan to depose Al Afad, eliminate the terrorist element, and stop the ethnic cleansing of the Zeki people.''

A Last Post agent who has fought his way to level eight can testify that the only Nato element is an SAS man trying to evacuate a wounded comrade. So far its all blood, sand, cussin' Yanks and not a trace of shamefaced irony.

Seems they modelled the soldiers' language on the real thing too.

Terrorists are `just like us'

Last Post is heartened to learn that international terrorists are just like us. According to a counter-terrorism adviser to the US government, Marc Sageman, ``the guys who did 9/11 were not lunatics from another planet, but were actually fairly normal.''

After spending two years poring over data on individuals with direct or indirect links to al-Qaeda, Sageman has concluded the terrorists were generally well-off and westernised.

A sample of 382 suspected terrorists found that 72.5 per cent were upper or middle class; 28.8 per cent had some college education; 33.3 per cent had a college degree; and 9 per cent had a post-graduate degree; 42.5 per cent were professionally employed (doctor, lawyer, teacher, etc); 70 per cent ``joined the jihad'' in a foreign country.

Many of these joined while travelling as privileged individuals in the West.

``It is comforting to think of the terrorist as ` the Other','' says Sageman, ``but that isn't quite the case.

"Mostly these guys are the elite of their countries; very much like some of us in the west . . .''

Brits `r' us

Last Post has redoubled its efforts to re-educate those labouring under the misconception that Ireland is really just British. When British Retail Week magazine last week reported that a retailer was to make its British Isles debut in Dublin, we were puzzled. Is not Dublin the capital of the Republic of Ireland?

When Last Post suggested the magazine might see its way clear to correcting the error, an educative e-mail to the publication elicited this response: ``We are using the term British Isles as a purely geographic expression to refer to the archipelago of islands lying of[sic] the north-western coast of Europe, of which the isalnd [sic] of Ireland is the secong [sic] biggest, after the island of Britain.

"In this, as in all matters of geographic expression, we defer to the higher authority of the Times Atlas of the World.

"We are well aware that Dublin is the capital of the Irish Republic, and as far as we are concerned the term British Isles is a purely geographic construct, and one that does not carry for us any political overtones. Accordingly, I feel a correction is not justified.

"Sorry to be such a pedant.''

Archipelago of islands lying off the north-western coast of Europe? Higher authority of the Times Atlas of the World? The fight for independence continues . . .

What's in a name?

A Last Post agent had a distressing experience when trying to book his son a ticket last week to Barcelona on Aerlingus.com.

The system did not allow his name to be spelled Seán, as it does not recognise the fada. Seán's exasperated father was forced to anglicise the young man's name to Sean - and him only three months old. He's already the victim of cultural imperialism and, to add insult to injury, this time imposed by our `state airline'.

Last Post calls upon Minister for Transport James Brennan to tackle the problem.

Conductor keeps time

The presentation of a gold watch to conductor Gearoid Grant after a celebratory concert in the National Concert Hall last week wasn't altogether due to the fact that he was celebrating 25 years as leader of the National Youth Orchestra of Ireland.

Apparently Grant and orchestra elders had been invited a week previously to a celebratory spot of nosh at Aras an Uachtarain by President Mary McAleese, who is patron of the orchestra.

Grant, well used to being the last on stage for big events, kept everyone on tenterhooks until just two minutes to sit-down when he arrived onto the forecourt in his little sports car, in a fashion that could have frightened the horses.

Apologising for his lateness, Last Post believes the conductor was said to have mumbled something about not having a watch.

Ross displays selective amnesia

Last week's tetchy Seanad debate on the merits of the Aer Rianta bill was insisted upon by leader of the house, Senator Mary O'Rourke. However, a few lighter moments shone through the six hours of deliberation.

Minister for Transport Seamus Brennan was interrupted mid-way through his speech by Senator David Norris, who enquired what `cpt' meant when he referred to Aer Rianta cpt. Brennan politely informed the Joycean scholar, ``It's Irish for plc''.

Progressive Democrat Senator John Dardis shot his own riposte across the boughs of our erudite independent senator, ``Ah, the benefits of a Trinity education,'' he murmured.

Senator Shane Ross was in rip-roaring mood during the Seanad debate, describing Aer Rianta as an ``ugly monster'', an ``independent republic'' and ``rotten in its structure from top to bottom''.

Ross moved into high drama mode, asking whether the Taoiseach himself operated as a ``fifth columnist'' by backing the trade union agenda at cabinet. He questioned why Brennan did not sack Aer Rianta chairman Noel Hanlon when it was clear the board was against the Aer Rianta plan.

Last Post's colleague in journalism warned that media leaks on Aer Rianta simply could not be allowed to continue.

The unsubstantiated `cigars and brandy' story which attempted to besmirch the transport minister was ``unfair, unjustifiable and untrue,'' Ross ranted.

Shame he neglected to remind the Seanad, just for the record, that this ``exclusive'' story appeared in the Sunday Independent, the paper for which he writes.