I SEE THAT Conor Cruise 0 'Brien has been sacked by the/Observetr. Of course it hasn't been described as a "sacking". "Mutual agreement", "parrting of the ways", all that guff. Reeminds me of the rock singer who left a band in Dublin and told Hot Press it had been on account of "musical differences". When I met him drunk (both of us) in the Baggot and asked him to elaborate he explained: "I was musical, they were different."

Walk in the door and Oh Lord, so it's going to be one of these. There he is, talking out of one side of his mouth, drinking a pint of Harp through the other. Tosh Finnegan doesn't like to waste good drinking time. Shudda known he'd be here.

Whatever the Government White Paper on Industry offers local industry in terms of grants and tax concessions, the prevailing public image of high technology companies is one of multinational companies which will continue to use this country as an assembly line until such time as it is unprofitable to do so.

Young Fine Gael is distressed about Garret's neglect of policies. Mark Brennock reports.

IN JANUARY THIS YEAR a meeting was held between the senior garda officers innvolved in the Nicky Kelly case and the Director of Public Prosecutions. The DPP wanted to know why John Fitzpatrick had not been arrested and charged with the Sallins train robbery which had taken place eight years earlier. The meeting discussed whether it was now possible to charge Fitzpatrick with the robbery.

Mark Brennock with the Irish troops in Lebanon

EIGHT AM IN TIBNIN AND THE SOUND OF THE PIPE BAND playing "Twenty Men from Dublin Town'. echoed through the prefabricated billets of Camp Shamrock, making sleep impossible for those who had not yet emerged from under the mosquito nets.

"THANKS," SAID THE WOMAN HANDING KEN Livingstone a copy of his new biography to sign. "Thanks for everything you're doing for us." She was neat, spinsterish, and timid. Livingstone handed her the signed book. "I hope we can keep on doing it," he said gently.

In March 1983 a 'Today Tonight' programme on the connection between an Irish woman and a plot to kill the Pope was watched by the largest audience 'Today Tonight' has ever had. The following two Sundays the Sunday Press ran major articles on Marie McCarthy (photo inset) and claimed she had information which proved that the CIA was involved in the plot to kill the Pope. By Colm Toibin

Bloody heat.

Bloody bus strike. A CIE management that sends redundancy notices to men dying of cancer. You wonder why there's a bus strike. Bloody CIE.

THERE is nothing in the report of the British House of Commons Public Accounts Committee on the de Lorean scam which was not forseen back in 1979 when the Detroit dope dealer was pushing his project in the North.