Séighin Ó Ceallaigh

  Falling asleep in the middle of an international climate conference, representing a country with a lot to do when it comes to tackling emissions, may not have been the worst part of ‘Sleepy Joe’ Biden’s week. It was a name that gained traction during the 2020 Presidential Election, discrediting him as an old man who wouldn’t be up to the job. It was a tactic successfully used by former president Trump in 2016, when he accused Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton of not having the ‘stamina’ to be President of the United States. Though he used personalised attacks unsuccessfully in 2020, this one seems to be somewhat true of Sleepy Joe, who dozed off with his arms crossed mid-conference; and let’s not forget falling up the stairs along with his numerous ‘gaffs’. But it the nightmare for Sleepy Joe was not falling asleep, but what happened in a pretty blue state, close to his homestate of Delaware (it’s no longer Pennsylvania since he won the election). In a state where he d...

  BOOK REVIEW : ANIMAL FARM   There is no doubt that George Orwell’s classic Animal Farm will divide opinions depending on what side of the political spectrum that you stand on, and your understanding of late imperial and early soviet Russian history. I tried to put the historical reflection to the back of my mind while reading this book, and as a historian it was rather difficult. Some of the analogies were downright wrong, many were open to interpretation, and some were fair. What I gathered about the author from this read was that he was a diehard Trotskyist, eulogising the assassinated liberal-left ideologist in the form of Snowball the pig, and Communist leader Vladimir Lenin in the form of Major the pig; while vilifying Josef Stalin in his depiction as tyrant pig Napoleon. While the pigs represent Soviet leadership, the dogs represent the Soviet Army and Police, and the other animals the general workers of the USSR. I would argue that more time is spent vilify...