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Interested in maladministration. Estd. 2005

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offsite link News Round-Up Fri Jun 06, 2025 00:55 | Richard Eldred
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offsite link The Conservative Political Thinker Shunned for Being Right Thu Jun 05, 2025 19:00 | Michael Rainsborough
Academics can be cruel to dissenters from 'progressive' dogma, even more so when they're right. Dr Michael Rainsborough pays tribute to his late friend Dr David Martin Jones, who deserves to be much more widely read.
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offsite link Green Rules ?Stop Europe Preparing for Russian Invasion?, Warn Defence Ministers in Leaked Letter Thu Jun 05, 2025 17:00 | Will Jones
Europe's mountain of onerous green rules is stopping nations from preparing for defending against?a possible Russian invasion, the continent's defence ministers have warned in a leaked letter.
The post Green Rules “Stop Europe Preparing for Russian Invasion”, Warn Defence Ministers in Leaked Letter appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link Police Adviser Cancelled for Daring to Claim Women Commit Just as Much Domestic Violence as Men Thu Jun 05, 2025 15:00 | Bettina Arndt
Studies consistently show that domestic violence involves just as many female as male perpetrators. So why has top researcher and police adviser Dr Fiona Girkin just been cancelled for pointing this out?
The post Police Adviser Cancelled for Daring to Claim Women Commit Just as Much Domestic Violence as Men appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link When June Became the Cruellest Month Thu Jun 05, 2025 13:19 | Paul Stevens
Five years ago this month, the world changed. Manipulated by the media and deranged by politicians' daily podium pronouncements, the population lost its grip on reality and succumbed to mask mania, writes Paul Stevens.
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Voltaire Network
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offsite link Will intergovernmental institutions withstand the end of the "American Empire"?,... Sat Apr 05, 2025 07:15 | en

offsite link Voltaire, International Newsletter N?127 Sat Apr 05, 2025 06:38 | en

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Paddy in The Shed - poem of the Great War

category galway | anti-war / imperialism | opinion/analysis author Thursday April 13, 2023 19:57author by Fred Johnston - Private Report this post to the editors

Poem around my late grand-uncle in Dublin


A poem retrieved from memories of my teenage years listening to tales of The Great War from my grand-uncle, Paddy Caffrey, who remained affected by it decades afterwards.

PADDY IN THE SHED

Paddy’s gone into the shed again
Shivering from his war
Till he fell down the stairs in Gardiner Street
And died behind the door

My grand-uncle was a dapper lad
Even in later years
A handkerchief in the breast pocket
He was fond of his few beers

He’d had a few when he tumbled
Down the tenement stairs
He’d survived his war and made it home
But he fought on for fifty years

I was a raw teenager then
The same age, more or less
He’d scuttled off to Flanders fields
On the Kitchener Express

He had some great yarns of courage
And a few about losing your nerve
And one of a young lad tied to a post
And shot for refusing to serve

He rode on a two-horse and limber
And one day while standing at ease
Came the whack of an Albrecht mortar
And blew one horse into the trees

My Granny would tell him to shut it
His stories were gory and rough
Too nasty and brutal and bloody by far
For young lads to hear, shocking stuff

As if we didn’t see him
Shivering in the back yard shed
When he reckoned that no one would miss him
If he popped out to chat with the dead.

FRED JOHNSTON

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