As always Witkoff is a soggy vampire, Vance is a fascist goblin, death to America… etc

Also if you are passionate about Irish neutrality and keeping defence spending low you’d want to be casting out anyone who gives off weird pro-Russia vibes or you’re basically gifting a bucket of free material to FF/FG or Pat Leahy etc

Most Irish people like neutrality but they also dislike Putin!

Like yeah the FG rugby dads will show up in force but there’sore more of a quiet awkward groan from other lefties most of the time rather than really calling them out.

Letting these gobshites get away with this rubbish has no benefit and just undermines all the good of Irish progressive politics.

If you can figure out Israel justifying annexing the West Bank, mulching Gaza and slaughtering <100k Palestinians because of Oct 7 is indefensible evil horse shite, but say Russia had *real* reasons to start a land conquest war killing as many Ukrainians you’re either malicious or thick as manure.

In an era when many of our biggest traditional trade partners like the US, Russia, India and China are all becoming increasingly authoritarian and aggressive, I’d like Europe to have closer economic and political ties to South America which for all its faults is inspiringly peaceful and democratic!

A coherent progressive policy would imo be 1) critical of weak environmental enforcement in EU trade deals, 2) deeply critical of the environmentally disastrous Irish beef industry and call for urgent reform + biodiversity, and 3) generally supportive of increased EU-South America trade.

Tbf climate is a huge issue and arguably *the* issue imo, but it’s an oddly conservative argument to say we can’t do one important thing because of another important thing. Many problems can be and are real at once!

Ha yes British ads do do that now you say it! The odd Irish one probably does too. All the whispery women ones.

Oh yeah I’m sure 99% of the time it’s just saving money Vs recording another voice over, but I often wonder how much more successful some ads might be if they bothered to re-record the 20 seconds with a local voiceover.

Irish ads will be corporate too but they’ll usually lean toward fake quiet coziness or fake howyi buddy stuff.

But American ads can do that awful “plastic fantastic super duper you got this buddy” thing that’s culturally alien to me.

That's the other angle some people need to engage with, poll after poll shows Irish people are strongly in favour of neutrality AND increased defence spending! Confusing the two isn't helpful or accurate.

Does sound like a good enough gig that I'd want to stay quiet about it!

Tbh I think it's perfectly fine to question our own neutrality and question the defence posture of any other European country, ideally without smug ignorant lecturing in any direction