Andy O'Mahony remains one of RTÉ's best broadcasters. Correction, one of radio's best broadcasters. A wonderfully mellifluous voice, great intelligence, coherence and fluency. His Off the Shelf programmes on Saturday evenings are one of the joys of radio. His programme of 6 May, was a particular delight. It was a discussion of Postwar: A History of Europe by Tony Judt and the participants were Alan Dukes and two historians, Judith Devlin and Michael Laffan.
Tony O'Reilly is set to add to his fortune a further €1.4 billion from the development of oil and gas prospects off the west coast of Ireland, a resource given to him for virtually nothing by the State and from which the Exchequer will gain almost nothing. By Frank Connolly
There has been particularly bad media coverage of the Rossport/Shell protest and case.
Government employees must rank as Irish newspapers' most avid readers, with the various departments spending over €650,000 on papers in 2005. According to the figures released, the Irish Times is by far the most popular daily for civil servants, with Government departments spending over €150,000 on this title alone in 2005.
Three years ago in November 2003, 108 successful candidates were elected to the Legislative Assembly at Stormont. That Assembly has never met. On 15 May, these members will gather there, at the call of the British Secretary of State, Peter Hain. But the Assembly summoned together by Peter Hain is not the Assembly to which these MLAs were elected. It is not the Assembly contained in the Good Friday Agreement. Instead of convening that Assembly, Peter Hain recently introduced legislation at Westminster.
With the arrival of the hurling championship it's time once more to dig out Denis Walsh's brilliant book, Hurling: The Revolution Years.
Fine Gael is riding high in its self-confidence after Enda Kenny's most polished, assured and professional performance as party leader in his keynote address at last weekend's ard-fheis.
Ireland's first ever not-for-profit community television station will be available to NTL Digital subscribers by early 2007. By John Byrne
Donna is bored. On Second Avenue, she is bored. As bored as a staircase. She stands and warily watches the visitor trump up the one flight from 43rd Street. He doesn't exactly look like a live one. A bit of Prufrock to him. Bald spot in the middle of his hair. Up the narrow staircase he comes. Half-swaying on the banister. She looks down upon him and asks him in her New York nasal: "You gotta coupon?" The visitor stops and shakes his head.
An Irish Times editorial on 1 May laid out the various options open to the UN Security council for dealing with Iran's nuclear threat. These ranged "from a solemn statement warning Iran to comply to consideration of sanctions or military force under Chapter VII of the UN Charter". The paper of record nailed its colours to the mast by favouring negotiations and UN action, while declaring that "military action by the US outside UN auspices would be a dangerous folly".