then why did you read it you goon?
Fuck off you buck toothed slaphead cunt.
Regards to the missus and the impending arrival.
Don’t know if it should be classed as woeful journalism and was debating putting it in the Things That Are Wrong Thread
Can anyone tell me what is wrong with the piece below
http://www.examiner.ie/sport/soccer/dunne-wants-city-to-put-on-a-show-167767.html
The picture at the top is Tommy Dunne the hurler?
:lol:
Is there a more idiotic, deluded, self-obsessed charlatan in this country than George Hook?
http://www.irishtime…4304403207.html
[indent=1]In defence of fee-paying schools[/indent][indent=1]AS A CHILD, only a handful of my neighbours on Albert Road in Cork did the Leaving Certificate. In fact, most of them left school with only a primary education. They were condemned in 1950s Ireland to emigration at best or unemployment at home at worst. There was a word for unemployed young men. They were known as corner boys, because every day they congregated at the street corner, playing pitch and toss for a few pennies, or passed the time bullying young kids on their way to and from school.[/indent][indent=1]We lived in a two-up, two-down terraced house with an outside toilet and no washing facilities. My father was a wages clerk with the bus company; Micheál Martin’s father collected his pay packet from him every Friday. (The supposed socially inferior bus driver Martin earned more than the white-collared Hook.) My father handed over his pay packet, unopened, to his wife, who gave him back something for cigarettes and pocket money and then worked miracles with the remainder to feed and clothe her family.[/indent][indent=1]She resolved that her son would get a better start in life than his parents, who had left school at 14. To that end, when I was seven she marched me up to Presentation College to meet the principal, Br Alphonso. The conversation is long forgotten, but the image of this strong woman in the parlour of the college with the forbidding cleric remains in my memory. She told Alphonso that she could pay the fees only in fortnightly instalments, as her husband was paid in that manner. To his everlasting credit the great man agreed, and I began 12 years of life at a fee-paying school that determined my future.[/indent][indent=1]Arthur Scargill, the former leader of the miners’ union in the UK, used to boast that he went to school without any boots. I had boots, but the soles had holes, my feet protected by cardboard. One shirt lasted a week by the simple expedient of using two sides of the add-on collar and turning the double cuff inside out when dirty.[/indent][indent=1]I was certainly the poorest boy in my class, as my classmates were invariably sons of doctors, dentists and lawyers. I have never forgotten the embarrassment of being unable to bring flowers for the altar. The houses on Albert Road did not have gardens.[/indent][indent=1]Never once, however, was I made feel inferior by the brothers or lay teachers at the school, and I was given an extraordinary education that ultimately saved my life and gave me, albeit belatedly, a career in the media.[/indent][indent=1]Br Athanasious gave me a love of Shakespeare in first year, which was subsequently fuelled by the great actor Dan Donovan. Freddie Holland and “Fox” Madden taught me the wonder of mathematics, and it was little wonder when their textbook became a staple for generations of students. Even looking back through somewhat rose-tinted glasses, I did not have a bad teacher.[/indent][indent=1]Little wonder, then, that I am a passionate advocate of the private school. In a quirk of fate, my wife, Ingrid, reprised the role of my mother in scrimping and saving to send our children to Blackrock College and Mount Anville when her husband had failed miserably as the breadwinner.[/indent][indent=1]Her commitment to private education came from her mother, a refugee from war-torn Germany, who had similarly slaved to ensure that her daughter got a chance in the dreaded 11-plus examination that decided the educational fates of British children before they reached puberty. The alternatives were grammar school and university or comprehensive school and a lottery in the British industrial workplace.[/indent][indent=1]A GROWING BREED[/indent][indent=1]Minister for Education Ruairí Quinn, a self-confessed atheist and socialist, would, I suspect, like to remove the €100 million State subsidy from the 56 private schools in Ireland. Certainly, many of his supporters would like to see private education banned outright, in order to have what they believe would be a more inclusive education system.[/indent][indent=1]In Ireland, private education has been seen as walking hand in hand with elitism; the old school tie equated with some kind of Masonic rite; and the products of such establishments seen as subversive capitalists. But it is no longer a pursuit of just the upper class. The recent news that private schools are growing despite the recession should not surprise anybody. Modern-day parents are no different from their parents and grandparents in deciding investment in their children’s education is on a par with that in food and clothing.[/indent][indent=1]Politicians are the enemy of education. Across the civilised world in their rush to judgment on so-called equality they have consistently dumbed down the system to the lowest common denominator. Yet time and again it is proven that parents want an education for their children that is different from the catch-all offered by their elected representatives. The public-school system in the US is a disaster, providing minimum education to a polyglot student population. There is a rush to enrol in Catholic schools because of their adherence to old but now derided principles of discipline, tradition and a code of ethics.[/indent][indent=1]Conversely, every morning in the townships of South Africa and the filthy hovels of Haiti, in a miracle of make-do, scrubbed kids in immaculate uniforms make their way to schools certain that the only route to an escape from poverty is education. There may not be an option of private education, but education is given its due priority.[/indent][indent=1]Race, culture and nationality are crucial in discussing education, but there is a fear to discuss it openly. For generations the classrooms were full of children who were white, Catholic and English-speaking. The minority schools differed only in the religious ethos.[/indent][indent=1]Twenty five years ago I was astonished to discover that in the school system in Providence, Rhode Island, the smallest state in the US, there were 52 languages. It made meaningful teaching impossible. I never thought we would see a similar situation in Ireland. Teachers in certain parts of Dublin face the impossible task of teaching a class where many pupils do not have competence in English. For over a decade the teaching unions have attempted to convince successive governments of the problem only to be rebuffed by their politically correct masters. The answer is more not fewer teachers or the system envisaged by the Minister will descend into the chaos of the US.[/indent][indent=1]Quinn, with the proposed new guidelines on school admission policies, wants an end to choice by parents and schools. No longer, it seems, will sons have a right to go to the school of their fathers, or siblings to the schools of their brothers and sisters.[/indent][indent=1]IT’S WORTH THE SACRIFICE[/indent][indent=1]Is the system elitist? Yes it is. But the world is based on elitism of talent, intelligence, hard work and willingness to sacrifice. Every day parents are making monumental sacrifices to give their children the best education possible. Quinn and his fellow travellers want a system that is doomed to failure.[/indent][indent=1]Nowhere on the globe has it been proved that universal access works. The good Minister might reflect on the actions of the last Labour minister for education, Niamh Breathnach, who introduced free third-level education in the belief that the underprivileged would benefit. The result was an underfunded and dumbed-down university sector that Quinn must now unravel and return, too late to save our standing in the world rankings, to a fees system.[/indent][indent=1]As the appalling figures for mathematics and science in the Leaving Certificate demonstrate, the Irish belief in a knowledge economy is as empty a boast as Mary Harney’s suggestion that we could have a health service and not pay taxes.[/indent][indent=1]Like Harney’s hospitals, Quinn’s schools will be divided between those who pay for service and those who do not. Health preference is based on insurance; education preference will be based on savings and sacrifice. Quinn, like Canute, cannot stop the tide. He dare not dismantle State support of the fee-paying sector, because the unions will not allow him. Even if he could, and made the fees prohibitive, the parents would fall back on State schools and cause chaotic overcrowding.[/indent][indent=1]This month the American collegiate football season opens, and next weekend the Solheim Cup for women professional golfers will take place in Killeen Castle. Christina Kim, the daughter of Korean migrants, will be part of the US team. Kim’s father, with little or no English, knew that he had to give his child his chance, so from age 10 she hit 500 balls a day to become a professional golfer. Across the black ghettos of the US, barely literate young black men will earn a living because at least one parent, invariably the mother, taught them to catch and throw a ball.[/indent][indent=1]I am proud that Presentation College accepted Jewish boys when the State system was closed to them. I was uplifted when I learned years later that the parents had offered Jewish families to take the children and raise them as Catholics to save their lives, should the Germans invade.[/indent][indent=1]The fee-paying sector has a proud and distinguished tradition. I will fight to retain it.
He makes absolutely no effort to point out what the actual advantages of private education are. He ignores the fact that when he was young there was no public secondary school education - therefore his mother didn’t choose to send him to a private school, she just chose to send him to school.
Does George think we care that Micheál Martin’s father got paid more than his?
Does this clown think he’s unique that he went to secondary school because of sacrifices his parents made? And if he does then doesn’t that just explain why the system didn’t work?
The article is riddled with non-sequitirs (e.g. the Micheál Martin parable) but the best pararaph is the one about Christina Kim. I think it’s worth repeating just to highlight how bizzare it is:
[/indent][indent=1]This month the American collegiate football season opens, and next weekend the Solheim Cup for women professional golfers will take place in Killeen Castle. Christina Kim, the daughter of Korean migrants, will be part of the US team. Kim’s father, with little or no English, knew that he had to give his child his chance, so from age 10 she hit 500 balls a day to become a professional golfer. Across the black ghettos of the US, barely literate young black men will earn a living because at least one parent, invariably the mother, taught them to catch and throw a ball.[/indent][indent=1]
Absolutely no relevance to private schools. None. And yet this is George’s big conclusion on why private schools should be defended. I don’t mind out-of-touch old farts with grand ideas about themselves pontificating to people trying not to listen to them in public parks or on the bus or whatever. When those imbeciles get airtime and print inches it’s fairly sickening.
[/indent]
Fair play to George. It’s high time someone decided to stick up for the middle class who are on their knees from carrying this country on their back
George plagiarizes wikipedia for his articles. His intellectual weight stops there.
Incredibly poor article by a pointless prick
[quote=“Rocko, post: 451406”][indent=1]I am proud that Presentation College accepted Jewish boys when the State system was closed to them. I was uplifted when I learned years later that the parents had offered Jewish families to take the children and raise them as Catholics to save their lives, should the Germans invade.[/indent][indent=1]The fee-paying sector has a proud and distinguished tradition. I will fight to retain it.
[/quote]
This is the funniest shit I’ve read in a while. He was uplifted by the hypothetical intentions of a few parents in Pres College (that were never tested by having a Luger put to their heads) of sheltering Jewish children. If these unfortunate Jews were going to the CBS, they’d have been given up to the Nazis immediately one assumes. He must be very proud of this brave resistance by the fee-paying schools to the Nazi occupation of Ireland that never happened.
Anyway if the fee paying schools are so good, how come he didn’t know what the Maginot Line was?
[/indent]
Those that can afford to pay fees to sit the Leaving Cert in private schools should pay full fees for their University education.
That would be a very handy earner for the state initially, socially acceptable and probably kill the grind schools overnight.
The whole grinds nature particularly of LC repeats is the antithesis of what good education should be about. Drop Maths so they can pick up home economics or ag science.
I like Ruairi Quinn, I think he is a courageous politician but I cant understand why he cant bring this law in and also stop state funding of private schools at the same time.
I’d go along with all of that.
The private schools get an inordinate amount of state funding here in Aus, a legacy of the Howard era, when the rich (or as they are now knows, the job creators) were given every tax break imaginable.
But private education seems to be a big foreign exchange earner in Aus. Education is actually one of Australia’s leading industries (believe it or not). Would there be a lot of foreign students in fee paying schools and thirs level in Ireland now?
the education industry here is linked to visas though. It is a scam basically, in the company office downtown there is a massive language school on the first floor. Some very tasty Asians floating around there but they all pay some fortune to learn English in order to qualify for their visas. It is a great earner for the country alright. Irish tradesmen going for permanent residency needs to get their skills assessed again another racket. Tightening the skilled occupation list last year hit the education industry I believe here.
Dont get me started on the educational apartheid over here. A very close acquaintance of mine teaches over here as I was telling you before. her current school - they all have Macbooks, every resource under the sun, think it works out per kid at $100k in basic fees over the 5/6 years each child spends there and thats before the extras. yet the Aussie taxpayer still subsides it.
IRA footage shown on ITV is from computer game
Footage of an alleged IRA terrorist video used in an ITV documentary was actually from a computer game.
‘Exposure: Gaddafi and the IRA’ was shown on Monday night and featured a clip which purported to show a group of IRA members shooting down a British army helicopter with a lorry-mounted heavy machine-gun.
In fact, the video was from a game called ArmA 2 — which is set in a fictional post-Soviet country.
During the scene, which charted the flow of weapons from the former Libyan dictator to republican terrorists, actor Paul McGann is heard narrating over the shaky footage.
“With Gaddafi’s heavy machine-guns, it was possible to shoot down a helicopter, as the terrorists’ own footage of 1988 shows,” he said. “This was what the security forces feared most. It may have been a lucky hit, but for the Army and crew, once was enough. No-one died in this attack but there were many other deadly arms to fear.”
According to an ITV spokesman, it had real footage of an Army helicopter being shot down in 1988 but used the incorrect clip. They said it was an “unfortunate case of human error for which we apologise”.
The problem may have been down to a YouTube video entitled ‘PIRA Shoot Down British Helicopter 1988’ (below) which features the video game clip.
A spokesman for Bohemia Interactive, developers of the game, said the company previously had requests to use game footage but had declined due to the possibility of showing the firm in a negative light.
In postings on the Bohemia forums Bohemia Interactive’s CEO, Marek Spanel said: "Sometimes creativity and realism in our games lead into crazy results and this is one of such example. I just briefly watched the entire documentary and I still can not believe it as it is overall very serious and lenghtly feature.
"We are surprised our games apparently may look real enough to some users already that they can not tell it is not real life footage.”
The footage used in the documentary is viewable on ITV player here. The clip begins at around 28 minutes, 20 seconds.
The website PC Gamer first raised concerns about the footage.
FFS Runt
That’s the second time you’ve done that.
huh?
Weird news stories. Sid posted it up yesterday.
But it’s not a wierd news story.
It’s woeful journalism
Your issue is with Sid, not me.
:lol:
This really is starting to get out of hand.