Trump Leaves People To Suffer In Silence

Trump Leaves People To Suffer In Silence

Two weeks ago, I wrote about tinnitus - that maddening condition of hearing phantom ringing, hissing, or pulsating sounds that aren’t there. To my surprise, the reaction from readers was overwhelming. Emails and messages have been pouring in and I’m still working my way through them (apologies to anyone I haven’t replied to yet).

It turns out many of you, including people I’ve known for years, have been quietly battling tinnitus without ever speaking about it. Some have theories about the cause - standing too close to deafening speakers at gigs, car accidents, or the creeping effects of aging. Others have no clue. One day, the infernal noise just started and hasn’t stopped since….

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Killing our sense of Community

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Killing our sense of Community

Thousands of miles away, my drowsy wife was none too pleased to be woken up so early by my frantic messages. Sitting in my parent’s home in Mayo, I was shocked by the fiery images of hurricane-fuelled wildfires consuming vast swathes of neighbourhoods in Los Angeles county. My wife, on the other hand, took some persuading to open the curtains to our balcony, but she then was jolted fully awake, as a distant wall of orange flame illuminated the Glendale horizon. Black smoke filled the north-eastern sky as in a Hollywood post-apocalyptic blockbuster. Thankfully, that was as bad as it got for our location, as the winds eased and firefighters heroically battled the several blazes that had broken out over the week. After a day’s evacuation my wife was able to move back into our apartment. Many others were not so lucky, with at least 27 people killed, 12,000 structures and thousands of acres of habitat destroyed, alongside thousands of people displaced to date. When I arrived back to Los Angeles, the main threats facing the areas near the wildfires came from dangerous particulates in the air, as the winds carried all sorts of airborne contaminants from the charred remains of vegetation and buildings.

I Can No Longer Enjoy The Sound Of Silence.

I Can No Longer Enjoy The Sound Of Silence.

It was an afternoon in 2018 and I sat at my parents’ kitchen table working on my PhD thesis. I had a head cold, not in itself unusual as I seemed to always pick up any sinus illness going around, but especially that which blocked my inner ears. 

This day was a little different though and I wore headphones to listen to the soundtrack of my life as I battled my way through eighteenth-century Irish tax records, seeking some references to poteen distillers in Mayo. I then remember that a high-pitched monotone, which had been bothering me on and off that day, suddenly increased in volume. I tore off my headphones, thinking it was the music, and in a panic thought my ears would explode (I have always had a melodramatic imagination). After some minutes passed, the loudness eased and I relaxed a little — returning to my laptop but without my headphones. But this new sound remained in my head…

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Radical thinking is needed for rural Ireland

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Radical thinking is needed for rural Ireland

My final Western People article of 2024 was not in keeping with the spirit of ‘Happy Christmas’ or indeed a ‘Happy New Year’, but one I felt compelled to write as a social historian, but also a proud native of this part of Ireland. Your response to my effective eulogy on the local decline of rural communities has been both affirming and gratifying. However, a common feedback thread suggested I had failed to offer any constructive solutions to the social decay witnessed in the rural west of Ireland. That was not my original purpose, but on reflection, I now offer some ideas gleaned from both my conversations with community activists and social justice advocates, as well as a few of my own.

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The Heart Of Another Rural Community Has Stopped Beating

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The Heart Of Another Rural Community Has Stopped Beating

While I was gathering oral history for my PhD, traveling the boreens and byways of North Mayo and West Sligo, I interviewed one old man who wanted me to come outside into his garden before I left his home, after we had enjoyed a lively chat about local characters and names of fields.

“Can you hear it?” he asked, looking at me with sudden saddened eyes.

I heard only a lone dog barking somewhere and a car revving in the distance.

“Hear what?” I replied.

He sighed, turning to look in the direction of the now-closed local national school.

‘‘The quiet… I could set me watch when the children would be out playing each day and now... nothing, just meself and the wind.”

He hurried me to my car, not wanting his glistening eyes to give away the ache of community loss. As I was closing the car door, he suddenly remembered something.

“You don’t have children yourself?”

“No,” I answered and he just nodded, saying: “Ah well.”

As I drove back to my parents’ home in the spitting rain, I fought with the realisation that without children, seemingly active communities would disappear. It happened sooner than I expected.

When Shooting a Healthcare C.E.O. makes you a Hero?

When Shooting a Healthcare C.E.O. makes you a Hero?

The assassination of Brian Thompson, the powerful CEO of UnitedHealthcare has shocked corporate America. Thompson was gunned down in broad daylight on December 4 outside the Midtown Hilton Hotel, in Manhattan, where he was set to later address investors. In a premeditated attack, the killer, wearing a mask and wielding a silenced pistol, fired three shots at Thompson from behind, before cycling off into Central Park to escape. Five days later, police arrested 26-year-old Luigi Mangione in Pennsylvania for the murder. Mangione suffered debilitating back pain for many years but the media’s suggestion that his motive was borne out of a frustration with healthcare providers over his own condition is unlikely, as he was from a wealthy family.

Apathetic Democracy is a Feature not a Bug

Apathetic Democracy is a Feature not a Bug

Art O’Leary, the chief executive of the Independent Electoral Commission has just publicly admitted that the Irish Electoral Register could be inflated by as much as 500,000 names through duplication or through not removing people who have died. Thus, he warned that the disappointing official turnout of 59.7 per cent in the recent national election was ‘a very blunt measure by which to judge the performance...or the engagement of people generally with democracy’. More worryingly, Mr O’Leary did not mention those who had emigrated out of the state (such as yours truly) but are still on the register. He also noted that no-one should expect it to be fixed any time soon, adding helpfully ‘I don't know if that figure is correct or not, but it sounds to me as if it's about right’. When challenged that voter fraud was now more likely as a result, Mr O’Leary’s conclusion was hardly a resounding reassurance, ‘if it happens then it is probably immaterial, I suspect. But like I said, we have no evidence of that.[1] In short, Art doesn’t know and is guessing, but it really doesn’t matter too much, so don’t hold him to any of it, please.

Did ‘Wokeness’ cost Democrats the Election?

Did ‘Wokeness’ cost Democrats the Election?

It was 2020, during the height of the ‘Black Lives Matter’ protests when TV host, Trevor Noah, finished his ‘Daily Show’ comedy programme with a clip from a city whose name I forget. A local store (a Target supermarket I think) had been deliberately set on fire and a young black woman was interviewed nearby. She stridently defended the protesters’ actions saying (effectively) that it was the expression of their anger and a clamour for change by the local Black community. Noah, who is an upper-middle class, South African Black comedian, uncharacteristically signed off his segment without challenging her spiel, instead sombrely asking who were we to argue the Black Lives Matter protestor’s point of view.

Coincidence and Voter Fraud

Coincidence and Voter Fraud

The noise was sudden and loud, a metallic thud, followed by the screech of breaks and a second dull thump, then silence followed by shouts and excited cries. I jumped up from the meeting table and ran outside the door of our office, which exited onto the junction just below the Catholic church in Castlebar. While I sprinted down Tucker St to my jeep, my brain was inexplicably sending me images of my father and sister standing shocked in the road. I came to a small car, with the driver sobbing in gasps, wedged sideways in the street. She had failed to yield to the right-of-way at the junction and was struck by an oncoming vehicle which sent her own car, pummelling down the narrow street, miraculously missing all the parked cars, except mine and which my girlfriend was sitting in. Once checking everyone was ok, I then turned to look up to the other car and recognised it immediately as my father’s. Both he and my sister, who he had been taking to the hospital for a check-up, were shaken but okay. Later, the attending Garda (police officer) made several attempts to understand how the vehicles owned by me and my father were the only ones damaged by the errant car — especially as neither of us knew the other was in Castlebar that day. ‘It’s too much of a coincidence’ he repeated ‘what are the chances, hah?’, perhaps thinking some sort of elaborate insurance fraud on our part. But it wasn’t. Coincidences do happen even, even as our brains ascribe meaning to otherwise random events, which seem to be unavoidably connected.

The Voters are Revolting!

The Voters are Revolting!

During an episode of the BlackAdder the Third comedy series set in eighteenth-century England, Hugh Laurie as the British Prince Regent, remarks to Edmund Blackadder (Rowan Atkinson) ‘I say Blackadder, I hear the peasants are revolting in France!’. Blackadder looks over at his dogsbody sidekick (played excellently by the hangdog-looking Tony Robinson) and responds, ‘By the look of Baldrick they're pretty revolting here too’. Its funny because it’s true, as to how those in power have traditionally regarded the ordinary people when they don’t behave as they should. However, this establishment bias has persisted into the present day.

U.S. Election aftermath – Some people just don’t like mustard!

U.S. Election aftermath – Some people just don’t like mustard!

Looking forward to the impending general election of 1918, the 16 November edition of the Connaught Telegraph delivered a sharp burn of the Sinn Féin candidate for North Mayo, Dr John Crowley, stating ‘from what we know of North Mayo, Dr Crowley will be glad to return to his dispensary after the election’. His Irish Party opponent — the incumbent Daniel Boyle M.P. — received the emphatic support of the newspaper, with the Western People, also giving him their warm endorsement. Yet, the actual election of 14 December 1918 saw Dr Crowley elected in a landslide of 7,429 to 1,761 votes, with only a 43.3 per cent voter turnout, which compared poorly with other west of Ireland constituencies – even as few of them barely broke the 50% turnout mark…

Election Day in America, Tiny Margins & Luck

Election Day in America, Tiny Margins & Luck

Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone had the numerical superiority, with the English army pinned between his Gaelic forces and their besieged Spanish allies in Kinsale town. Lord Mountjoy had seriously weakened the last area of English power around Dublin (known as ‘the Pale’), by gathering as many men as he could muster from loyal garrisons, in his rush to confront the Spanish troops who had landed on the south coast on 2 October 1601. A defeat of Mountjoy’s men would have had catastrophic consequences for English rule in Ireland. With the Pale and ultimately Dublin city left in a desperately weakened state to face an onslaught of the resurgent Irish, the Crown’s remaining allies in Ireland would likely have found their reasons to change sides and O’Neill would probably have been crowned King of Ireland — but for ill-fortune.

Paradise Lost and the US Election

Paradise Lost and the US Election

With America’s Rubicon election fast approaching on November 5th, Donald Trump’s supporters seem increasingly confident of victory (at least publicly), while left-leaning commentators are sounding the alarm about troubling poll shifts in the seven ‘swing states’ that will decide the election. All other states have sizeable majorities for one party or the other, so deep-rooted loyalties and a first-past-the-post electoral system mean little chance of surprise. But with razor-thin poll margins in these ‘swing states’, polling companies ‘interpreting their results’ and a recent influx of Republican-leaning (and often dubious) pollsters, the only thing certain is a tense election night and following few days ahead. This election will likely hinge not on anyone changing their mind last minute but on sheer voter turnout (and legal actions by Republicans to stop the counting of their opponent’s votes).

A.I. and the meaning of life

A.I. and the meaning of life

Donald Trump’s face is set in concentration, wading through almost hip-high floodwaters on some overcast, unknown street. He appears to be listening to his companion, likely discussing the extent of the inundation. Both are wearing orange life-jackets as they trudge past stranded cars in the background. This photograph swept through social media, with an accompanying wave of support for the former president who — unlike his nemesis in the White House —  was heroically on-the-ground helping with the effort to save lives in the states affected by Hurricane Helene…

Who are the real Climate Deniers?

Who are the real Climate Deniers?

‘You could fry an egg on the sidewalk here…if it wasn’t already boiled in your pocket!” As I self-congratulated myself on my wit, an actor colleague from South-Korea looked at me with a mixture of incomprehension and pity, ‘why are you cooking eggs on the…ground?’. Realising he now thinks I live in Skid Row, I changed the topic from the recent insanely hot weather in L.A. to talking about the insanely wet weather in Ireland but his confusion only worsened, ‘where is ‘Ahland’?’. So I put my accent back in its box and decided to pay more attention to the Casting Director leading the class…

Slick Suits and Dangerous Talk

Slick Suits and Dangerous Talk

‘One of these candidates is much slicker than the other, is a much more practiced, kinda professional, debate-style speaker — and the other candidate won’. So went the post-Vice Presidential Debate analysis on the liberal news channel MSNBC, as summed up by panel host Rachel Maddow. Elsewhere, former Washington Post and CNN political commentator and journalist, Chris Cillizza, claimed JD Vance was ‘outstanding’ for 99 per cent of the debate, against an ‘uneven’ and nervous Tim Walz, before failing to disown Trump’s lies about non-existent election fraud in the previous election. Meanwhile, on the pro-Trump Fox News network, the CBS moderators were condemned for fact-checking Vance on his campaign’s infamous claims of illegal pet-eating Haitians in Springfield, Ohio. Meanwhile, Donald Trump Jnr crowed ‘that it was a masterclass, it was a spectacular performance’ by his father’s running mate. Immediate post-debate polls of focus groups showed Vance winning slightly. Many commentators expressed how strangely nice it was to see Republican and Democratic politicians actually discuss policy issues and avoid character assassinations, while not appearing to detest each other. In reality though, how much does any of this matter?

The Trump supporting Green party of America

The Trump supporting Green party of America

She was polite but purposeful, ‘I’m sorry to interrupt, but I overheard you said something about the Green party in Ireland?’. Her half-smile didn’t reach her eyes, and she leaned in almost anxiously, studying me. I had been chatting (clearly too loudly) to another actor at the end of a casting workshop about how online auditions (known as self-tapes) had become the norm since we all were forced online during the Covid pandemic. My fellow actor was hearing the compelling stories of how I had found myself as the new chairperson of the Mayo Greens at the outbreak and led our monthly meetings into the virtual space of ‘can you hear us now?’ chants and back-to-front cameras. Taking advantage of the interruption, he found something incredibly interesting in the far corner of the car park which required his urgent attention, leaving me with my new and insistent conversationalist.

Lies, Damned Lies and Opinion Polls…

Lies, Damned Lies and Opinion Polls…

It was one of those miserable post-Christmas weeks in Kerry a few years back when a local correspondent in The Kerryman summed up the news succinctly as: “No news this week”. A grey January in Sneem, where the biggest event might be the odd sheep wandering into the village, doesn’t lend itself to breaking headlines. But as I sit here in sunny Los Angeles, in the middle of a sprawling city brimming with election fever, I’m struggling to come up with real news myself.

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Teaching Racism While Eating Cats and Dogs…

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Teaching Racism While Eating Cats and Dogs…

How Trump’s delusional lies about immigrants fuels a deeper worry about Irish schoolbooks…

By any sane assessment, an angry and unprepared Donald Trump lost heavily in the ABC News Presidential Debate on Tuesday night last, against a confident and joyful Kamala Harris. He lied, as he does, forcing factchecks from the moderators and was easily baited by the barbed remarks of his opponent; into ridiculous claims of; his vast crowd sizes; that he had nothing to do with the January 6 attack on the Capital which was the fault of Nancy Pelosi; a migrant crime wave was sweeping the country and Haitians were eating the pets of residents in Springfield, Ohio (the last a crazy lie which normally would have concerned relatives googling costs of nursing homes).

IRISH ‘MAGA’ supporters and a canary-yellow shirt

IRISH ‘MAGA’ supporters and a canary-yellow shirt

What possessed me to wear a canary-yellow shirt to the Fianna Fáil meeting in Ballina? I was glowing in a sea of monochrome jackets, jumpers and tops, only matched by my throbbing red face. Most of the other party faithful, representing the various ‘cumann’ or local party branches in the North Mayo region, were gathered in the large, weakly lit ballroom of the Downhill Hotel. The backslapping, laughter and excited chatter had spilled slowly in, but then quickly fanned away from the TV crew from Dublin ensconced inside the door, creating a large empty gap where only a careless or unwary visitor would stray… or someone in a canary-yellow shirt.