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THE DÁIL WAS briefly suspended today after Fianna Fáil TD Seán Fleming appeared to accuse People Before Profit TDs of being “puppets” of Russian president Vladimir Putin.
The remark by Fleming, a Minister of State in the Department of Foreign Affairs, came during a Private Members’ motion on neutrality and the “Triple Lock”.
Last month, Tánaiste Micheál Martin received Government approval to draft legislation to get rid of the triple lock and this morning’s motion, tabled by People Before Profit, called on the Government to withdraw these plans.
The Triple Lock is a mechanism that sets out the conditions under which more than 12 Irish troops may participate in overseas peace support operations.
For troops to take part, the operation must be mandated by the United Nations, approved by the Government, and also approved by Dáil Éireann.
PBP TD Bríd Smith claimed the legislation to get rid of the Triple Lock is an effort to “send Irish troops to wars at the beck and call of the US and the European Union”.
She added: “The plain reality is that you want to remove the Triple Lock because you want to move from a sideline substitute in US imperialism to a full player, that is what you want, and you want to send Irish troops abroad to fight wars on their behalf and on behalf of the European Union.”
Later in the debate, Fianna Fáil’s Seán Fleming remarked that there was “no discussion on this during the last General Election”.
Addressing the PBP TDs, Fleming then said: “I don’t know what planet you are living on? The world has changed since the last General Election.”
Fleming then referenced the ongoing war in Ukraine and added: “I have listened to Putin’s puppets over there today and this is an issue of Putin’s puppets versus the people of Ireland.”
Fleming also claimed that PBP are “on the wrong side of history”.
People Before Profit’s Paul Murphy then intervened but was told to “sit down” by acting chair Michael Ring.
Smith then called on Fleming to withdraw his remarks, but Fleming said that while he “did not direct my comment at any individual, if the hat fits, you should wear it”.
Murphy then said that it was against Oireachtas regulation to accuse a TD of taking orders from outside interests.
“That’s what Putin’s puppets means,” said Murphy, “it is very clear.”
Amid the commotion, Ring suspended the Dáil for five minutes.
When it resumed, Fleming was asked if he would withdraw or clarify his comments, and told the Dáil: “At least 15 members of the opposition have spoken, I didn’t refer to any one specific individual.
“If some members feel it relates to them, if the hat fits, they can wear it, but I didn’t put the hat on anyone here today.”
Independent TD Danny Healy-Rae was also upset at the comment and demanded he withdraw it, with Smith remarking that “all of us who have spoken this morning are liable to that accusation”.
Fleming eventually said he would withdraw the remark “as a result of some members feeling the comment was directed at them, which it wasn’t specifically.”
Meanwhile, Tánaiste Micheál Martin said the PBP motion was “problematic” and that “modification to the Triple Lock does not impact in any way on our policy of military neutrality”.
He added: “By removing the power of the UN Security Council’s permanent members to veto our national sovereign decisions, it will mean that Ireland – militarily neutral – will no longer need to seek the permission of Russia, China, Britain, France, or the US to pursue our own sovereign, military neutral interests or to participate in peace-keeping missions.”
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The leaving cert is starting next week. Enough said.
Just saw Delhi, capital city of India, just set a new temperature record of 52.3 Celsius in the Mungeshpur area of the city today. Previous record was 47.2 Celsius.
@David Jordan: Oh Odin…
I also see that water supply is being cut back to 15-20 minutes per day.
A lot of people are going to die.
@David Jordan:
As the planet turns this evening and the Sun disappears from view, the temperature will begin to fall as you and your location turn into the dark hemisphere for a number of hours before turning back into the light hemisphere, and the Sun comes back into view along with the radiation to heat up you and the surface.
All scientific method modelling, including climate change modelling, originates from clockwork solar system modelling, which attempts to disrupt those facts.
” It is a fact not generally known that, owing to the difference between solar and sidereal time, the Earth rotates upon its axis once more often than there are 24-hour days in the year” RA/Dec conclusion.
The Earth turns once every 24 hours and a thousand times in a thousand sunrise/sunset cycles.
@Gerald Kelleher: Every day you come on here and spout this nonsense. Are you trying to prove something, or do you have absolutely nothing else going on with your life? This is an article about the weather forecast, yet you try and make it about something else in an attempt to look intelligent (which hasn’t worked BTW)
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: And Mexico city will run out of water in a month unless it rains.
@Trevor McCormack:
There is something so satisfying when, at twilight, the Earth rotates into the dark hemisphere for a number of hours before it turns back into the light hemisphere while bringing the central star into view. This rotation has been going on every day of your lives as a cycle; long before the Neolithic culture built their monuments, humanity appeared on Earth, and millions of years before the dinosaurs. It has been there before life on land or life in the sea.
It is the oldest and most precious thing people have when they walk or look out their window.
Then humanity, in the blink of an eye, went on a misadventure with timekeeping to suit the agenda of scientific method modellers, the people who give us climate change modelling.
Your reaction signifies a subculture.
@Gerald Kelleher: And your reaction simply proves my point. Enjoy the weather, have a nice day
@Trevor McCormack:
When some commenter comes here and announces a record temperature to support climate change modelling, it comes from a well-financed academic community that has lost the most basic experience of one rotation, the sunrise/sunset cycle.
People don’t take any joy in knowing that long before any life on the planet surfaced, that rotation was going on and as precious to people who notice as it is not for the community who loads dire predictions on humanity, especially young minds who rely on considerate adults.
Nobody really asks how it came to be that scientific method modelling emerged from that unforgivable error of judgment and what purpose it served as vandalism against astronomy and timekeeping.
People resent the fact that the planet turns once every day.
@Gerald Kelleher: Thanks Gerald – I had no idea that humanity’s misadventures with timekeeping had resulted in people being unable to enjoy twilight anymore
@Jason Memail:
Try explaining twilight by asserting more rotations than 24-hour days in a year, as the scientific method community insists.
I don’t have to resist the most basic experience of one rotation and sunrise/sunset cycle, but everyone else does if they choose to follow empirical modelling, which originated with the clockwork solar system model.
“That the fixed stars being at rest, the periodic times of the five primary planets, and (whether of the sun about the earth, or) of the earth about the sun, are in the sesquiplicate proportion of their mean distances from the sun…. for the periodic times are the same, and the dimensions of the orbits are the same, whether the sun revolves about the earth, or the earth about the sun.” Newton
Your reaction is that of a slave
@Gerald Kelleher: Slave to the Rhythm, or a Slave to Love? Both great tunes, best listened to during twilight hours. Don’t be late though – time waits for no man, irrespective of his sense of superiority…
@Jason
People who believe the Earth is flat so they can exercise contrived reasoning play no role in connecting the planet’s rotation with the Earth’s sciences. The same goes for those who believe there are more rotations of the Earth than days because of a poor conclusion drawn in 17th-century Royal Society circles.
The difference is that those who connect the Earth’s daily rotation directly to the daily change in the position of the stars don’t realise it is a misadventure, even though it is the basis for all scientific method modelling.
Many announce climate change is a hoax or dismiss politicians, but not one person I know would lift a finger to understand that climate change modelling is a symptom of all scientific method modelling.
Resenting basic facts is crude.
I see in the article below this one about the man arrested for threatening bus loads of kids with a knife has named the man in question. Just wondering why suspects in similar crimes recently have had their names suppressed. I understand the media have to abide by the reporting restrictions imposed by judges. I suppose I am asking why these restrictions are being put in place for certain cases and not other ones such as this… is it the nationality of the person involved?
Yippee. Hooray for FGFF.
Weather forecast changed 3x during the last 3 days. I’ll believe it when i see (and feel) it
@no no no: yes, it’s as if weather is a fluid thing that’s not so easy to predict 100% accurately the further in the future it is.
It’s a forecast, or an estimate.
Not a guarantee.
Hose pipe ban on the way
I don’t beelieve it!
have your say