In recent weeks, Tánaiste Brian Cowen (of this parish, sorta) has been sent out several times to bat in defence of Don Bertione. When answering opposition criticism of the Taoiseach, especially from Enda Kenny, he describes Fine Gael as a party that was "rejected by the electorate."

Let's examine this claim. In 2007, Fine Gael won 51 seats, up 20 from 31. Fianna Fáil won 78 seats, down three from 81.

What are Biffo's criteria for defining "rejected"? On the face of it, it looks like being simply unable to cobble together the numbers to form a government. So does that mean that the government parties have been decisively endorsed by the electorate? The PDs still have a cabinet minister, even though they only have two TDs now, having lost six of the eight that were elected to the 29th Dáil. Even the Greens didn't manage to increase their representation in the 30th Dáil, flatlining with six TDs.

The reality is that no one party was either decisively endorsed or rejected. Due to the fractured nature of our party political system, parties that have seemingly been endorsed by the electorate can end up in opposition; while those that have been rejected can end up in government.

This article caught my eye in today's Observer Magazine. Two men, both around my age, both first-time dads of daughters around Aoife's age, record their experiences.



Eighteen months into the job myself, I can't say that it hasn't been demanding, tiring and sometimes frustrating. But whenever I look into those gorgeous little brown eyes, and see that sweet little smile, I appreciate the honour of being her Daddy.

…as Carl Hooper might say.

This optical illusion tricks your brain into seeing a black and white photograph as colour.

(NSFW, I should add)

The people have spoken. Ireland's representative at this year's Eurovision Song Contest is to be Dustin the Turkey, with the song "Irlande, Douze Points."

Back in May, after Dervish were sent home from last year's Eurovision with just five points, I opined:

"If Ireland is ever to have notions of winning the Eurovision again, the strategy involved must change dramatically. Forget the idea of meaningful songs. Eurovision is as gay as Christmas, so to do well, Ireland's entry needs to camp it up. Two and a half minutes of fizzy Europop, that kids can remember just long enough to vote for it, performed by a pop starlet or a boyband/girlband. Skimpily clad dancers swishing their hair around, all that sort of stuff. Nothing deep and serious, as that just scares the votes away."

And this is exactly what Dustin is doing. The song is hi-NRG Europop nonsense with a catchy chorus. A very appropriate chorus too - "Irlande, douze points" is after all selling a message. The backing singers and dancers are as camp as they come. It's Eurovision gold, I reckon.

Taylor shouldn't have just been sent off. He should have been arrested as well.

And to add insult to injury, Birmingham scored from an ill-deserved penalty deep in second-half time added on, to draw the match 2-2.

Fuckers.

Ireland's rugby rehabilitation continued today, with a comprehensive five-tries-to-one demolition of Scotland at Croke Park.

There was a dazzling performance by the backs, with full-back Geordan Murphy putting in a man-of-the-match performance. Bearing in mind that he wasn't even in the matchday 22 on Tuesday, this was a two-fingered display for Eddie O'Sullivan's benefit. Murphy is and out-and-out full-back, and you can be sure that if he was qualified to play for any other Six Nation team, the team sheet coming out of the coach's printer on a Monday would have the name "G Murphy" pre-printed on the No 15 spot.

Andrew Trimble played one of his best games in an Ireland shirt so far. Rob Kearney got his first international try, while Tommy Bowe bagged two. The Munster forwards showed that they were no slouches either, with David Wallace and Marcus Horan claiming a score apiece.

There are still some areas of concern. Ireland got off to a very slow start and allowed Scotland a lot of possession early on. Caledonian ineptness ensured that this possession did not translate to points on the board, but you would think that if this had been England or Wales in Croke Park today, we would have been playing catch-up after 20 minutes or so. The line-out was poor. This is a dilemma for O'Sullivan. Jackman is effective around the park, but his throwing is not up to scratch. Rory Best simply isn't international standard. Jerry Flannery is the best hooker in Ireland at the moment, and hopefully he will be available for our last two matches. However, even if he is fit, it's no guarantee that O'Sullivan will pick him.

Elsewhere, Wales had a slow start against a feisty Italian side, but once Tom Shanklin ran in a try from an intercepted pass, they just ran riot from then on. England had a magnificent win against France in Paris this evening, demonstrating once again that Ireland's extended run of losses to Les Bleus remains unexplained.

A new typographic expression is born - keming.

"Someone is wrong on the internet"

(both via Daring Fireball)

An old Joy of Tech, but a good 'un.

A couple of readers have been in touch with links that might be of interest to my readers (all three of them), so here goes:

Tim Kelly from Concert Travel first:

"I am contacting you as I thought you might be interested to know Concert Travel are now servicing Portlaoise (and Laois in general).
We are a Limerick based company running dedicated bus services to concerts and events in Dublin and around the country.
We want to enable small groups of people, couples, children etc to travel to events without the worry of driving and having to park etc.
If you would like to know more please dont hesitate to contact us on the email above or on 061 384422."


Also, Ronan O'Keeffe of Mediacontact.ie asked me for a shout-out.

The Irish Times motoring section led with a piece last week about the failure of the the Government and the Road Safety Authority to implement their much-vaunted speed camera project. Under the original plan, 600 speed cameras would have been installed on the country's roads. The installation and maintenance of the camera network was to have been contracted out to the private sector. However, it is believed now that the initial costs envisaged were radically underestimated, and so the prospect is much less tempting for any putative operator.

Needless to say, there has been great wringing of hands by the great and the good as a result. But to me, this is a victory for common sense. As evidence from other jurisdictions has shown, speed cameras are far more limited in their effectiveness at reducing road fatalities than we are led to believe.

"Speeding" can take one of two forms. It can mean (a) driving at a speed that is too fast for the road or the prevailing conditions (fog, ice, etc.), or (b) exceeding an arbitrary speed limit on a stretch of road. In some cases, an instance of speeding might be both of these combined, but usually it is one or the other. Situation (a) above is obviously dangerous, whereas situation (b) may not necessarily be. Yet speeding detection and prosecution is carried out pretty much exclusively on the basis of the latter scenario.

To implement a credible speed control regime on the national roads, the authorities must first sort out the speed limits themselves. They had the opportunity to do this in 2005, when we changed from miles-per-hour to kilometres-per-hour speed limits, but this was botched. Uniform speed limits are applied to non-uniform roads. If you drive from Cahir to Portlaoise on the N8, you will see what I mean. From Cahir to just north of Cashel, you have a dual carriageway, built to motorway standards. From then on, it is mostly a wide single carriageway, with hard shoulders. But once you get past Abbeyleix it is a narrow, twisting road, the sort you might expect to be designated as an "R" road. Yet for the entire length of that journey (stretches through towns, villages and roadworks excepted), the speed limit is a standard 100 km/h. Now, for some of that road, the speed limit is too low, and for other parts of it, it is too high. On the dual carriageway part, it is arguably safe to drive at 120 km/h (the arbitrary speed limit for a motorway in Ireland.) On the narrow, twisty part, driving at 100km/h is arguably too fast. However, you risk prosecution for the former, even though the latter is more dangerous.

Consider also, regional roads and their speed limits. Once again, we have a one-size-fits-all policy. There are a number of "R" roads that are former national routes, and are good wide roads and would be safe for 100 km/h. One that springs to mind is the dual carriageway between Naas and Newbridge, or long stretches of the old N1. Then we have roads that are little better than goat-tracks, some of which cannot accommodate two cars passing one another without one having to pull in. Whereas it is safe to drive on the former in excess of the prescribed 80km/h, it would be an act of unbridled lunacy to attempt the same speed on the latter. (The original version of the image above can be seen at IrishSpeedTraps.com)

Speed limits on all roads are fixed, irrespective of the prevailing driving conditions. 120km/h on a motorway with clear visibility may be safe, but in fog or torrential rain it is not. Last March, there was a multiple vehicle pile-up on the M7 in Kildare in which a young woman lost her life. Eyewitness reports told of drivers tearing along the motorway at speeds well in excess of what was safe, yet most of them would probably have been under the speed limit.

The other question that needs to be asked is how much exactly does excessive speed contribute exclusively to accidents. I would guess that it is a lot less than we are led to believe. Yes it is a factor, but it is often in addition to another factor, like intoxication or inexperience or fatigue. Several fatal accidents involve a single vehicle, late at night, with a young driver. Yes, he may have been going too fast, but he could have been drunk or on drugs, or have fallen asleep at the wheel, or just not have the experience to handle the speed he was doing.

Speed detection is done on the basis of whatever the prescribed limit is for the road in question. Whether the driver is driving safely or not is not considered. So you could happily drive at 120km/h on the Fermoy bypass (a motorway) without fear of prosecution, yet if you drive at that speed on the stretch of the N8 between Watergrasshill and the Dunkettle interchange you risk prosecution, even though the standard of the road is exactly the same as the M8.

The other major problem I have with the speed camera initiative is that it was to be installed and run by a private company. Private companies have two motives - to make a profit, and to have that profit grow each year. I'm not criticising that, as that is what private companies do. But the purpose of speed cameras is to reduce the number of people "speeding". So if fewer people are speeding, that means that revenues should be decreasing each year. To counteract this the company operating the cameras would have to install cameras at "softer" locations (like the aforementioned stretch of the N8 in north Cork, or on the N6 between Kinnegad and Kilbeggan, or on the N11 between the Glen of the Downs and Wicklow, or on the Gorey bypass, etc., etc.) in order to keep revenues up. Instead of prosecuting unsafe driving, they would be persecuting drivers who happened to be exceeding an artificially low limit, but were still driving safely. It would lose credibility very quickly.

The issue of speed and road safety is a lot more complex than is often presented. It requires a fine balance between credible speed limits and effective enforcement. Speed cameras, particularly privatised ones, are a blunt instrument, and we are better off without them.

Leinster House is to undergo some renovation work shortly, and to facilitate this, Seanad Éireann is to temporarily relocate to the Natural History Museum. The Dáil is to stay put, but if it happens that it is required to move, then I reckon its temporary home should be the Gaiety Theatre.

The Gaiety is a very traditional style of theatre, and I always think that it bears a striking resemblance to the theatre of The Muppet Show.

Which begs the question - which politician best matches the various characters in the show?

Kermit - Bertie (or possibly John Gormley, being Green and all that.)
Miss Piggy - Mary Harney
Sam the Eagle - Enda Kenny
Animal - Conor Lenihan
Gonzo - Willie O'Dea
Scooter - Pat Rabbitte
Beaker - John O'Donoghue
Thog - Brian Cowen

Any more suggestions?

In the meantime:

This was a headline in the news digest of Saturday's Irish Times:



What a brilliant idea! Build a new network of roads especially for non-nationals. Then they can drive on the right hand side to their hearts' content and it won't affect Irish drivers one little bit.

Oh. Hang on. Maybe not…

via MacUser

The Apple Store is finally coming to Ireland. Apple have announced that they are now recruiting for a new store in Victoria Square in Belfast, "North Ireland."



No dates yet as to when it's going to open. Or indeed any indication if there is to be any move to open a shop in "South Ireland."

In other Mac news, Apple have released an update to OS X Leopard, bringing up to version 10.5.2. Is it just me, or are these updates getting bigger and bigger? This baby weighs in at 343MB. Those DSL speed enhancements can't come a minute too soon!

In my preview of today's match I stated: " I can't see another match like the extraordinary one of 2006, when Ireland came back from 43-3 down to finish 43-31." Well, I got that wrong! Like 2006, today's match, as anyone called Trevor might say, was a game of two 'alves.

It can be summed up thus - France were lucky, but Ireland weren't smart enough.

The bounce of the ball favoured France today. Indeed the bounce off the balls favoured them too. David Skrela put through a little grubber early in the second half that bounced off the O'Driscoll family jewels, and popped up perfectly for Cederic Heymans to collect and run in under the posts.

One thing I did get right was that Vincent Clerc is usually good for a try or two against us. Today, he went one better and got three before half-time.

All in all it was a vastly improved performance by Ireland, and much closer to the form they showed in last year's Six Nations than what was on offer at the World Cup. Several players showed up today. Our back row was excellent. This should be the starting 6.7 and 8 for the rest of the tournament, with Gleeson on the bench. I thought Reddan was a bit ponderous in the first half, but he improved after the break. The scrum did very well, and unlike last week, our lineout was interested in poaching French ball.

During the week, ROG gave an interview to RTE radio that showed his leadership credentials. He said that Ireland shouldn't keep trying too many power plays, but should be patient, keep chipping away, and as the game develops, the chances will come. It's exactly how Munster managed to prevail in the Pool of Sharks of this year's Heineken Cup. It seems to me that Brian O'Driscoll is Captain in name only these days. He does the press conferences and all the other shite that captains have to do.

But there is one leader on the pitch, and on his back is the number 10.

It's a cliché that gets thrown out at manys the post-match press conference - you can only play what's in front of you. When it comes to analysis and prediction, you can only go on what's behind you.

So, looking forward to Ireland's Six Nation clash with France tomorrow, I find little solace in studying the recent results. We have to go back ten matches and eight years to find our last win in Paris, and a further 29 years to find the one before that! Since 2000, we have overcome the French twice at home, in 2001 and 2003.

So here's the numbers (since 2000, including RWC):

P 10; W 3; D 0; L7; F 177; A 288

Our biggest win was 22-15 in 2001, and our heaviest loss came the following year, 44-5. The average score in the last then games has been 18-29. France have won the last six games on the trot, with an average score of 18-32.

(Incidentally, of the Irish team that started in our last win in Paris, five will start on tomorrow, and another two will be on the bench. None of the French team of that day will feature tomorrow.)

So looking at those stats, I cannot see anything other than a defeat for Ireland tomorrow. Add in a few more observations:

- Ireland haven't played well since last year's Six Nations, and struggled against a poor Italian side at home last week.
- France showed none of their frequent first-day jitters last Sunday with a convincing win away to Scotland.
- Vincent Clerc is playing, and he's normally good for a try or two against us.
- Eddie O'Sullivan is still our coach.

There are a few chinks of light, though:

- Three players will be making their Paris débuts, and you'd never know, Rob Kearney might repeat Brian O'Driscoll's hat-trick feat of 2000. (This, I readily concede, is a long shot.)
- Ronan O'Gara is back on form, and would appear to have put the nightmare of the World Cup behind him.
- The French might see Bernard Jackman's bald head at hooker and think that Keith Wood is back.

But I don't think that will be enough to save us. I can't see another match like the extraordinary one of 2006, when Ireland came back from 43-3 down to finish 43-31. I can't see where Ireland's tries will come from. Our line is too flat. Guys are taking ball on and going into a tackle one millisecond later. There is no opportunity to generate any momentum to break the tackle or to offload before the tackle goes in. It also allows the opposition line to stay on the right side of the ref's offside radar and get the tackles in early and legally. So what happens is that we lose field position, as rucks form further and further back. We need strong ball carriers to pick and go, and break the gain line, so hopefully our rejigged backrow might be able to do this.

Alternatively, ROG will use the boot, but to what effect? We got nothing from the Italian line-out last week (and coughed up a few of our own), so how are we going to turn his darts to the corner to our advantage? Those lovely cross-field kicks he put up for the winger to run on to are a joy to watch, but that's a weapon to be used sparingly.

Much as I love France as a country, I cannot stand their sodding rugby team. They are to Irish rugby what the Kerry footballers are to Mayo. You might admire their skill and their flair, but you'll never get me to like them.

I was up in the Cavan/Monaghan area today, and after I heard of Senator Donie Cassidy's moment of brilliance, realised that it would have a fundamental effect on a stretch of road I drove today. How would we manage border crossings? Would we lobby the British Government to have Northern Ireland adopt the same side of the road as the Republic? Or just nip across to the other side whenever we crossed the border?

The N54 between Cavan and Clones crosses the border four times.

The rubbish some people come out with sometimes…

Fianna Fáil leader in the Seanad, Donie Cassidy suggests that non-national drivers should be subject to a lower speed limit on N-roads. Instead of the usual 100 km/h, he suggests they should adhere to an 80 km/h limit. What happens then of course is that queues of traffic will form behind these restricted drivers, leading to frustration and dangerous overtaking. Way to go. But that's not the best of it. Senator Cassidy also reckons we should look at switching to driving on the right hand side of the road (like they did in Sweden in 1967), so as to facilitate tourists and immigrants. Maybe we should do it on a phased basis, just so that we can all get used to the idea. Trucks and buses only for the first six months, and then cars.

And then on the other side of the wather, comes this nonsense from Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, that Sharia Law could operate alongside civil law in the UK to help ease Muslim alienation. For the love of God/Allah/The Flying Spaghetti Monster, where do these ideas come from??

via MacUser:

A UK based cruise company, who already owned the domain name cruise.co.uk, have just paid £560,000 (€668,000) to buy cruises.co.uk.

The new owner said that the the plural always came ahead of the singular in Google searches, and that they wanted their site to be "the first port of call" for searches.

Boom, boom!

The FAI come in for a lot of criticism, a lot of it is justified. A couple of years ago, everyone threw their hands up in horror as the Association hastily appointed the inexperienced Steve Staunton as national team coach.

Stan got the boot last October, and the FAI were keen not to make the same mistake again. So they set up a three-man committee to find suitable candidates to recommend to the FAI board. Bear in mind that the next competitive international for Ireland isn't until September, so it's not as if an appointment has to be made urgently.

Once again, the chatterati are in despair. "Why is it taking so long?", they ask.

Because they appointed in haste last time and made a balls of it!

Let them take their time and find the right man for the job.

Eddie has named his starting line-up for the French match, with three changes in personnel and two positional switches from the side that started in Croke Park last Saturday.

Andrew Trimble goes into the centre to take the place of Gordon D'Arcy, who fractured his wrist in last Saturday's game. Rob Kearney starts on the wing. Jamie Heaslip takes the No.8 shirt from Denis Leamy, who moves over to the blindside. The previous incumbent at 6, Simon Easterby, is on the bench. Bernard Jackman and Rory Best swap the No 2 and No 16 jerseys from last Saturday.

In the replacements, Shane Horgan comes back to the senior squad after his stint with the "A"s.

It's better than last week, but it should be borne in mind that one of those changes was brought about by injury. I still think that Easterby shouldn't even be in the squad, and his place on the bench would be put to better use by picking Alan Quinlan or Keith Gleeson in the replacements. Similarly, Shane Horgan isn't fully fit yet, and this would have been an opportunity to see if Tommy Bowe's recent run of good form for Ulster could come through when he's wearing a green shirt. His last appearance for Ireland wasn't a happy one, but there should be an opportunity for him to redeem himself, given the shocking performances by several more senior and regular internationals over the course of this season.

I didn't get to see the Scotland-France match, but by all accounts, Les Bleus look like a formidable outfit under their new coach. Given that we couldn't beat them under Laporte, probably the worst French coach in a generation, we have little hope of overcoming them under the nouvelle régime. Especially as the match is in Paris, where we have one just once since 1972.

There is an interesting parallel with the 2006 season here. Back then, Ireland struggled to overcome Italy in their opener at home. They went to Paris the next week, and got shat on from a great height for the first 50 minutes or so, conceding six tries. But then they decided to start playing as they knew they could, and ran in four unanswered converted tries and finishing 12 points behind the French.

It's good to see that O'Sullivan is prepared to make some changes for Saturday, but I don't think there is enough team spirit in the squad to do the business.

France with 20+ to spare.

Tonight, four families from Limerick, Poland and Italy are mourning the loss of loved ones as a result of an horrific road accident here in Co Laois today.

I only heard about it this evening on the news. The poor performance of the Irish rugby team doesn't seem so important any more, does it?

I am paranoid about backing up. I use SuperDuper to back up my entire hard drive to an external HDD. I have complete copy of all my 4000-odd photos on a Flickr Pro account. And last month, I signed up to Mozy.

Mozy is an online backup system. It costs $100 for two years, and you back up all your data and media files to a server somewhere in California. If you have a lot of data to back up, this can take some time, given the pathetic upload speeds offered by Irish broadband providers.

I signed up exactly a month ago, and today the last of my 37GB of files got backed up.



From now on, it runs in the background. It also slowed my connection something chronic.

Well, that was a pile of shite, wasn't it?

I can't believe I spent €70, gave up my Saturday, and practically froze me bollocks off sitting in Croke Park to watch such a dreadful performance. As suspected, no lessons have been learned from the World Cup. This was a cagey, inept showing by the Irish team. There was no creativity, just aimless punting of the ball upfield.

Our lineout was a joke. Maybe the calls were practiced in Irish, and no-one remembered that Rory Best, being from Ulster, probably doesn't speak Irish.

Last season, Ireland put eight tries on Italy in Rome in their last game of the Six Nations. Today they huffed and puffed to finish 1-1. There is no spark left in the Irish team. Their spirit seems to have been hollowed out. Contrast today's performance with Munster's win over London Wasps a couple of weeks ago. In Thomond Park, we had control, discipline and a game plan. They knew what they had to do and they did it. At one point in that game, Munster went through 22 phases of recycling the ball, and ended up with a try. Today, they never looked like completing half a dozen phases. Their control and discipline just wasn't there.

We're going to get stuffed by France next week. We'll probably lose to England and Wales too, if the brilliant match between them this afternoon was anything to go by. We might just squeak past Scotland, but then again, we might not.

I predicted Ireland finishing second or second last. After today's performance, I fear it will be the latter.

Here's another thing about Eddie's conservatism. If we fail to develop talent for the national squad, there is a good chance we could lose them for good.

Take Shane Geraghty for example. Though born in England (parents from Mayo, as far as I know), this lad played under-16 for Ireland. He's a versatile back, who can play centre or out-half. He has declared for England, and this evening was one of the Saxon players that destroyed the Ireland 'A' team. He's 21. He could have been ROG's or BOD's understudy, but he slipped through Ireland's fingers.

This could also happen to Irish-born players. We only have four professional teams in Ireland, which clearly isn't enough to accommodate all the professional-standard players coming through. So they go away to Britain or further afield in order to develop their careers. If they get overlooked by the IRFU for international potential, they could end up qualifying for their host country under the residency rule.