Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.
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19 ways Bertie Ahern is laughing at you
I just listened to Willy O’Dea on Saturday view. After the evidence of Padraic O’Connor this week, it now seems that the Government’s line on it is that NO conflict exists between the story of Ahern and the story of O’Connor. There is only conflict between Des Richardson and O’Connor. This is clearly a lie.…
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Ahern's web of deceit
That’s the most polite way I can put it. Piece by piece Ahern’s story of dig-outs and donations is falling apart. And it will continue to fall apart. Both of the so-called digouts no longer stand up to scrutiny. They were not friends helping out a pal in need. They were people with vested interests…
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Des Richardson
What fascinating stuff. I really am going to have to put together a proper narrative on his evidence to the Tribunal. And he seems like a man who has his fingers in a lot of pies.
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Technorati ranking
I have long since fallen behind in ranking on Technorati, especially after they reviewed the way they rank blogs, prioritising freshness of links over volume. But of late there has been a resurgence, probably because I’ve started blogging daily again. Taint keeps a list of Irish blogs by rank, and at the moment I’m somewhere…
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Tribunal malaise
So I do tend to read Tribunal transcripts quite a lot. This week has been thrilling to say the least, much new detail has emerged. One thing that I ask myself now is not about whether Bertie Ahern received large sums of cash. The question I am asking myself now is exactly how connected is…
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I love it when a plan comes together
As P O’Neill says over on Irish Election, Richardson is joining the dots. This is the first mention of US dollars being used in relation to FF donations. And as we all know by now, Ahern denies having received $45,000. Or does he? As I have blogged before, his statement was very carefully phrased: The…
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Brennan's whip-round
This went completely over my head it seems. Solicitor Gerry Brennan, the man who did the whip-round for Ahern in order to pay Ahern’s legal fees, was in fact the solicitor acting for Ahern in the proceedings. So Brennan knew how much Ahern would owe in legal fees because he was the man charging Ahern…
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The St Luke's deal
It is worth noting that in relation to Philip Murphy’s testimony at the Mahon Tribunal, and the loan application form filled out by him for Ahern, that some issues arise. Ahern says on the application that he is the ‘owner’ of St Luke’s, and that it is worth, in 1995, some £90,000. This forms part…
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Ahern's loan application form
Another day for former AIB assistant manager Philip Murphy. Certainly some curious things are coming up. Transcript here. One thing that stands out is that when Murphy went over the review of the loan with Ahern in 1995, and an application form was finally filled out (in May 1995, 18 months after Ahern had got…
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Debating Iraq’s Transition
Things seem to be going well in Iraq of late. Tom Friedman asks why Rice isn’t not on the diplomatic offensive combined with the military surge. He is hinting at what I suspect – there’s a real chance that the insurgency is simply holding fire until the surge has run its course. Is she just…
Got any book recommendations?