Our
TV packed in a few days ago. The house is relatively
quiet without one and we are enjoying the break
while we wait on the replacement arriving. It would
be easy to borrow one from the neighbours in the
meantime but the temporary quietude has persuaded
us not to. Going without television has not left
us feeling deprived. It has certainly not caused
us to be less well informed.
What
we did not see but can hardly be said to have missed
was the peculiar but not unanticipated spectacle
of the Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams nominating
Ian Paisley to serve as first minister of our partitioned
statelet, so that he can administer unalloyed British
rule from Stormont Castle. A friend rang to tell
us how humiliating it was for him as a republican
to have to watch it. Well, he didn't have to bother
himself; news viewing is not compulsory. And why
he should put himself through a humiliation he had
no part in designing I have little interest in working
out. Let those who sewed reap.
How
anybody claiming to be a republican can remain in
Sinn Fein beggars belief. Still there is no point
in strutting down the path of self-righteousness
pronouncing that all those left in the party are
not republican even though the current leadership
has long since abandoned republicanism. The value
of such observations is often drowned beneath the
raucous and berating theological tone used to express
them.
What
makes the current debacle all the more ridiculous
are the attempts by some snake oil salesmen to spin
it as revolutionary and subversive. That is where
Sinn Fein is looking increasingly shaky. No amount
of dialectical waffle can paint a picture of progressive
Paisleyism or revolutionary peelerism. Nonsense
about going toe to toe with the political detectives
is believed only by those who would readily swallow,
on condition that it was whispered to them, the
suggestion that the British have left and are only
pretending to be here to lull the unionists into
a false sense of security. Describing calls for
the sectarian theocrat, Paisley, to lead Northern
Ireland as 'democratic and subversive' is as off
the wall as descriptions of Harold Shipman as a
doctor.
Those
in Sinn Fein who are both more discerning and less
duplicitous know there is nothing revolutionary
going on. Their argument is that the radical tide
is out and that the party is operating in conditions
not favourable to forward momentum. Rather than
liquidate it must, even though back peddling through
necessity rather than design, firm up the defensive
position; its retreat must be conducted in orderly
fashion rather than chaotically, in the hope that
somewhere during the plummet from the summit where
a united Ireland once seemed visible, a toehold
might present itself and allow for consolidation
and reflection.
There
is something much more dignified about this. It
has an internal coherence and it can win some pragmatic
understanding from republicans outside of Sinn Fein
if hardly sympathy or support. Conversely, what
comes out of the mouths of the revolutionary slurry
tankers invites only ridicule.
There
is a simple filter through which we can view the
current state of Sinn Fein's position. It brings
into sharp focus the disparity that demarcates goal
from outcome. It explains more than any amount of
dissembling by the fakers who exhort us not to be
'mesmerised by the tactical manoeuvring of the moment.'
Consider it and reflect.
During
the armed struggle it seemed a reasonable enough
proposition for Sinn Fein to make that IRA volunteers
would end up leading a transitional government and
Paisley would be in jail. Today the point has been
reached where Sinn Fein openly calls for Paisley
to lead a partitionist government and IRA volunteers
to be jailed. Even Freddie Scappaticci and Denis
Donaldson could not have secured worse terms had
they served as Sinn Fein negotiators.
Observing
seasoned British media interviewers engaging with
Sinn Fein spokespersons is instructive. They now
express bewilderment and incomprehension that after
decades of struggle and sacrifice republicans end
up with Free Presbyterianism rather than a free
Ireland. To which the limp response is, 'our objective
has always been to take the gun out of Irish politics.'
Republicanism
like Humpty Dumpty has fallen off the wall in front
of our noses. And pretending to be like wise monkeys
most of us neither saw, heard nor said anything.
And just like Humpty Dumpty, there is no one able
to put it together again.
