Madam,
As a one-time alcoholic and an inmate of St Ita’s, Portrane may I offer my observations of the Irish psyche.
As a nation we are inherently incapable of changing either ourselves or our nature of government, of which our leaders are only too well aware.
They realise that the only thing we are likely to do as a people is to go the pub, get drunk and bitch until incoherent about the situation, instead of doing something, anything, to change it. Some of us don’t even have to go to the local to do this.
As a result of this knowledge, they are not only quite prepared to take atrociously bad decisions, such as on Nama, in order to preserve their status quo, but to flaunt their dominance, and our powerlessness to do anything about them, as we regularly witness.
Our mindset is still the same as it was under 700 years of foreign rule, when, incidentally, we were really treated no worse than we are today, by our present generation of Irish political masters.
Yours, etc,
Liam Power,
Bangor Erris,
Ballina, Co Mayo.
That’s us in a nutshell alright!
It’s a bit of a chicken and egg type scenario: did 800 years of British rule turn us into the forlock-tugging, gombeen worshipping, alcohol abusing moral courage lacking lackeens we currently are?; or was it those inherent “qualities” that ensured we would continue to live under the yoke of a foreign power for nearly a millennium? I would tend to believe it’s a case of the latter.
Nothing will change in this country.