I was in the Provos ...

... and all I got was this lousy power-sharing executive.

Well, I wasn't, but a lot of people I'm aware of, have met, have socialised with, were part of the militant Republican movement.

The war was declared over some years back. Now the British overlords have confirmed that the transition to mainstream political activity is complete.

I suppose there wasn't much time left for Martin McGuinness (see pic, far right) to be holding IRA council meetings since his day job as Deputy First Minister to Ian Paisley and Mr Iris Robinson (who himself was a terrorist in his day, as the people of Clontibret can testify, see pic below) takes up so many hours.

But today's final nail in the Provo coffin must be hard to bear for some of the ground level volunteers - the people who took a guerilla war to what were often violent, brutish and sadistic British troops.

They've got out of prison early, which I wasn't a great fan of. But where are they now, the best years of their lives spent fighting a civil war or incarcerated? Sure some of them have got nice state jobs like Marty McGuinness, as 'community workers' and the like.

But most of them must now be wondering what was it all for? This paltry power-sharing deal? The same deal as Sunningdale offered so many decades ago? For Martin McGuinness to swan around preposterously posing as a peacemaker to Iraqis?

And what of the victims? Not just the victims of Provo attacks, but the victims of Provo domination of neighbourhoods, the victims of Provo intimidation of individuals, the victims of Provo insistence that they and only they could speak for Irish Republicanism?

How do they feel today?

Well, the Unionists now have what they wanted. They have Stormont back, they have made the IRA go away, they have their gerrymandered veto on Irish reunification. They have their pet Provos in the ha'penny power places.

Big Ian leaves: compare and contrast

Martin McGuinness of Sinn Fein, his fellow Chuckle Brother, said:

"Obviously there's a lot of interest in the work I have been doing with Ian Paisley in the course of the last ten months," he said at Stormont. I think I have to say it's been a remarkable and unique experience."
"I think many of you will know I had a very dim view of Ian Paisley prior to the 26th March last year (when Sinn Fein and the DUP agreed to share power) and I suppose he even had a dimmer view of me if we are to be truthful about all of this."
"But we managed to work together on a deal brokered by Ian Paisley and leader of my party Gerry Adams and we developed a positive and constructive working relationship within the Office of First and Deputy First Minister."

Bertie Ahern, of Fianna Fail, and Taoiseach of the Irish Republic said:

"I'm not going to say I didn't spend most of my political life taking a different point of view (to Mr Paisley), I did."
"But when it came down to making the Good Friday Agreement work and to having an inclusive executive in Northern Ireland and to have North-South bodies, he made the big moves. We've worked hard to get the stability, we've worked hard to build a relationship with Dr Paisley."
"We've achieved that, it was not easy, and now the main player in a few months' time will go off the stage. We have to now work to see if that harmonious relationship can continue. Obviously, I hope so but time will decide that."

Only Seamus Mallon of the SDLP had the balls to say:

"The paradox is that it was the Good Friday Agreement, which he set out to destroy, that allowed him to be inside in terms of influence for the first time in his whole political career. Those are two of the areas that historians will look at and people will be assessing from now on."
Mallon, who once watched Mr Paisley during the famous Civil Rights march at Armagh when he took over the city said "it was that desire for dominance that many people in the nationalist community will remember."
And he also pointed out that the fact that among Paisley's first moves during serious negotiations with the Governments was for seats in the House of Lords and a Privy Councillorship indicated "his desire, not just for power, but for the trappings of power."
"Yes he brought unionism into a power-sharing arrangement with Sinn Fein, but to do that he had to destroy, as he had destroyed Terence O'Neill, as he destroyed Faulkner, as he destroyed Chichester Clarke, he had to destroy the unionist leader David Trimble."
"It tells you about the paradox of all this, that the creativity which he undoubtedly gave the political process in Northern Ireland in his later years, was achieved as a result of the destructive element in his approach to politics and this type of political atavism which demanded absolute and total power."

Correct, Seamus.

Additional useful perspectives on Paisley from Trimble and Ruarai O'Bradaigh can be read here, at Best of Both Worlds.

Happy Hogmanay

Yes, it's been a while.

Sorry about that.

I was busy though, if that helps.

During my blogging mini-hiatus, I became aware of the following facts, which I will offer to you without further comment:

1. Ryanair claim to be the world's 'on-time' airline, but they only achieve their on time targets by adding forty minutes to the scheduled journey, to account for the fact that they are invariably a half hour late leaving.

2. If people try to kill you by blowing themselves up near to you, chances are that they are determined enough for another of them to try a second time. Change jobs, up your security and leave the country. Don't hang around for an election you won't live to see.

3. We's all in big economic doo-doo now. I expect housing to fall calamitously in price in 2008, especially in micro-bubbles like Northern Ireland and the commuterland in the Pale. Sell now, or remortgage on a fixed rate if you haven't already and don't plan on moving for half a decade, when your house will be worth half as much.

4. I don't care how many times they do it, or where they do it, or the fact we're all supposed to feel warm and gooey inside when they do it. Everytime I see Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness gurning their hideous grins at each other like smitten teens, I feel nauseous.

5. Writing a book is solitary, boring, and takes a helluva lot of hours out of your free time. It also requires discipline, inspiration and a functioning computer.

6. I got a sat-nav for Christmas. But what I really wanted was one of those electronic devices that emit noise only gangs of surly ne'er-do-well teenagers can hear.

7. Texting people is not the same as calling or writing a card or letter. I'm a bad and cheapskate friend in this regard.

8. Big open plan houses are expensive to heat in a rising oil market. So is driving a large family saloon. So why did I only start doing both this year?

9. A chest infection is a handy way of clearing your lungs of all the gunk that smoking normally deposits in there.

10. My peers all started having babies in earnest this year. Fourteen years into my own parenthood project, I'm not inclined to start from scratch again. I admire the courage and energy of my friends, but having seen the road ahead of them, I don't intend to walk it twice.

Happy Hogmanay. Let's all meet up here again next year for pints, right?

NI bigots advise Iraqi bigots on peace

The world, with its constant ability to astound and amaze with wonderful ironies, has managed an absolute beauty of the genre this week.

The sectarian leaders overseeing the internecine bloodbath in Iraq have sought the help of Sinn Fein and the DUP in learning to overcome their differences.

Yes, when you find yourself embroiled in a bloody conflict between two communities who look the same, speak the same and worship the same God in marginally different ways, the people you need to help find a way out of the horror are obviously those who managed to sustain an identical conflict for three decades past its sell-by date!

Getting advice on creating peace from Martin McGuinness is like getting lessons in bedside manners from Dr Harold Shipman. And being taught about mutual respect and cross-community engagement by Jeffrey Donaldson is akin to being tutored in multiculturalism by Adolf Hitler.

If the Iraqis, already beleaguered by the ongoing occupation of their country by Britain and the United States, really needed some advice from Ulster politicians, surely the people to send were Nobel laureates John Hume and David Trimble?

The fact that those loons McGuinness and Donaldson were sent not only underlines the pointlessness of the exercise, but also confirms it as nothing more than a junket for those whose attention ought to be on the tanking Northern Irish economy instead.

PS I am very keen to let known my thoughts on Africa, and have plenty of pics to accompany the ranting. However, ongoing net deprivation in the burbs continues to frustrate. Please stay tuned!