[Spoonman]

10 confirmed dead - four men, three women, a teenage girl & boy and a young girl. Eight other people still in hospital, one in a critical condition with the rest stable. Gardai say that all killed were local to the Cresslough area, no other casualties are expected as no one else is unaccounted for and that suspicions as to what triggered the explosion point towards a "tragic accident".

https://www.rte.ie/news/2022/1008/1327931-creeslough/

I'm going to assume that once they're 100% sure that they've nothing else to critically recover, a forensic examination will soon start. I've heard at least two separate rumours as to what caused the explosion, but I'd rather not speculate without hearing from someone with a level of authority on the matter.

R.I.P.

[Youngian]

Conor McGregor who has announced a bid for the Irish presidency is an upmarket Tommy Robinson (was a professional MMA fighter rather than beating up rival hooligans in Luton). A grifting populist with all the bullshit including this beer hall putsch pitch to the lads. Musk has no idea what McGregor’s talking about but had heard correctly that he’s a fellow cunt.

[Spoonman]

McGregor is very much a cash-up Skanger* that got unbelievably lucky to strike at the exact right time in MMA. Nowadays his only real appeal is to "fighting Irish" >4th generation Irish Americans and a very small number of general anti-social fuckwits in his homeland - his celeb star in Ireland wore off very quickly.



* A Dublin/Irish term similar to chav or ned, you honour...

[Spoonman]

...meanwhile in McGregorland...

Conor McGregor uses sectarian slur as battle rapper claims victory over UFC star in online spat

UFC star Conor McGregor has described a man from Northern Ireland as a “little Orange c*** from across the border” and mocked his disabilities.

Scott Moore, a former Alliance Party activist and council candidate, is an Irish ‘battle rapper’ and has claimed victory over the former two-weight UFC champion.

From a Protestant background, Scott was raised Presbyterian, but has been non-religious since he was 12. As a humanist, Scott has campaigned for the rights of non-religious young people in schools in the past.

He describes himself as pro-united Ireland and a democratic socialist.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/c ... 75631.html

[Bones McCoy]

McGregor never struck me as anything more than an attention seeker with behaviour issues.

He hasn't let his riches change him.

[Youngian]

Republicans have marked Mr McGregor’s card

[Abernathy]

Sorry to see Leo Varadkar announcing his retirement from frontline politics today . Young, gay, of mixed descent, he really did seem to epitomise the new, modern progressive state that Ireland in the 21st century has become.

[Youngian]

The online nut bots appear to hate Varadkar as much as they do Trudeau.

[satnav]

Most of the right wing nutjobs slagging him off on Twitter don't like it when you point out to them that he managed to outlast Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss.

[Spoonman]

Sorry to see Leo Varadkar announcing his retirement from frontline politics today . Young, gay, of mixed descent, he really did seem to epitomise the new, modern progressive state that Ireland in the 21st century has become.

He'd started to lose popularity at home however for a number of reasons, and the recent double referendum loss would appear to be the final straw. In many ways I'd compare him to John Major - I'd disagree a good bit with him in terms of political policy (Fine Gael has its socially progressiveness tempered by an otherwise centre-right to right wing economic bent - it is a part of the EPP in Strasbourg after all), but otherwise even if Varadkar had some elements of grandeur at times about himself, he was relatable.

It looks like his successor is going to be Simon Harris, who was the Health Minister at the start of the pandemic in 2020 but is currently Minister for FE & HE - I could be wrong on this, but if he becomes Taoiseach I think he'll beat Varadkar in being the youngest ever to take up the post. ATM there's no one announcing that they'll challenge him, with three other talked about challengers ruling themselves out & backing Harris.

[Spoonman]

Also on a similar tangent, Irish MEPs Mick Wallace & Claire Daly are a fucking embarrassment to the country.

Delighted to report that both cretins lost their MEP seats in last Friday's Euro (and local) elections.

[Youngian]

Graceful in defeat https://x.com/rtenews/status/1800561940 ... Dkr8MiQKBg

Available to give Jez a hand in Islington North.

[The Weeping Angel]

Good riddance to the pair of them.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Good news for the wider world here.

Apple has lost a high-profile, €13bn (£11bn) Irish tax battle with Brussels in a decision that will bolster the European Commission’s efforts to clamp down on favourable “sweetheart” tax deals for multinationals.

Ireland is probably less pleased. In the past, certainly, they've seen these deals as an overall plus for Ireland. But they don't have to do stuff like this to keep their competitiveness, one would think.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... ll-ireland

[Youngian]

Apple, which has had its European headquarters in Cork since 1980, was found by the EU competition watchdog to have benefited from tax rulings from the Irish authorities that meant in 2014 it in effect paid a tax rate of 0.005%.

Apple had rejected the accusations, saying no state aid had been paid and Tim Cook, the chief executive, called the claims “political crap”.

The idea that corporate tax exemption sweetheart deals aren't a defacto state subsidy is also political crap.