Last week the Executive in the North of Ireland presented
its budget. It has been presented as a budget that will create jobs, improve
services and reduce poverty. A closer look reveals tax concessions and
incentives for the bosses and cuts in jobs and social spending and increased
taxation for the workers. They are preparing social turmoil in the future.
Michael Collins was a great
Irish revolutionary and nationalist who more than any one person may be
considered to have created modern Ireland. His political tragedy, like other well-meaning nationalists in the age of
imperialism was to attempt the impossible; to try to achieve meaningful
national independence, in Ireland's case uniting both Catholics and
Protestants, without breaking free from the binds of capitalism.
A Speech delivered in Barcelona Wednesday August 1st 2007 to a gathering of Marxists from around the world by Gerry Ruddy, a member of the Irish Republican Socialist Party