In the rule-free, amoral, unprincipled land that is the peace process, anything is possible. Chuckling terrorists have walked free from jail, while the organisation which brought civilisation to its knees on this island was unconditionally put into government. And after Colombia, Stormont, Castlereagh, the Florida and Russian arms deals, we shouldn't be astonished at any fresh capitulation by constitutional politics to the forces of crypto-fascism, least of all from Fine Gael.
After all, it has been an eager and uncritical participant in this grisly thing called the peace process, and it is many years since it showed any sing of having any principle. In this regard it is different from Derek Warfield, founder of "The Sons of Erin", who is clearly certain where he stands. Throughout the height of the IRA's fascist campaign of terror, he was loyal to the cause: and what did he sing? Ooh-ah, up the RA, Say Ooh-ah up the RA.
Innocent civilians
A naked widow was dragged from her bath, tortured, murdered, her body buried secretly, her orphaned children left desolate, weeping: Ooh-ah, up the RA, say ooh-ah up the RA. Protestant workmen taken off a bus, lined and shot down solely because of their religion. Ooh-ah, up the RA, Say Ooh-up the RA. Bombs going off on crowded streets, slaughtering innocent civilians. Ooh-ah, up the RA, say ooh-ah up the RA. Hooded men smashing limbs with baseball hats. Ooh-ah, Up the Ra, Say ooh-ah up the RA.
We know Warfield too well. In as much as he understands what a principle is - and no man is to be blamed for being stupid - he has stuck to his principles. He was an unwavering supporter of the IRA when it was wading knee-deep in blood and so in a curious way, he has a moral consistency - though it is hard to find words to define the morality of a man who rejoiced in the violence of the IRA when it was taking so many lives, and who in the process made himself so rich.
But at least we knew where he and the rest of that odious, shoddy crew, The Wolfe Tones, stood: and he clearly has not shifted his position. Nor is it surprising that the revisionism of peace process-land is permitting his grotesque new ensemble, The Sons or Erin, to create a false ballad-history of the past 30 years. After all, it was done before, for the period of 1919-1922, after which all manner of republican atrocity was either sanitised or forgotten: thus an Irish musical solution to an Irish historical problem - leprechaun-violence, without a body count or grieving orphans. "Oh we're all off to Dublin in the green, in the green. . ."
Modern Fine Gael
So I don't blame Warfield in the least. He is what he is: thoroughly disgusting. But it really does define the essence of modern Fine Gael that its leaders know so little about reality that they could have booked such a man to entertain them. And if Fine Gael cannot be expected to remember the events of the past 35 years, what hope can we have for Fianna Fáil? And then, we might ask, what hope is there for us all? After all, the Fine Gael activist who booked Warfield, John Perry, is Fine Gael TD for Sligo-Leitrim, a constituency which should have a very clear memory of what the IRA did and what it is. It was in that constituency that a boating party of octogenarians and children were blown to smithereens by the IRA; in that same constituency also a Garda recruit and a soldier were murdered by the IRA.
Yet why should we expect much from the modern Fine Gael? It was in power when the IRA shot dead Garda recruit Gary Sheehan and Private Patrick Kelly in 1983. As the party in government, it could have used those murders as a political opportunity to crush the IRA, especially with the Harrod's bombing two days later, which killed six people. Instead it did what Fine Gael does best. It did nothing.
Instead, perhaps we should ask The Wolfe Tones why they never sang the Sligo Boating Song: In Mullaghmore, one Monday morning, and all is going well, As the limbs of slaughtered children, Bob so gently in the swell. Why was there never a song with which to regale Fine Gael party revellers about the Don Tidey kidnap? What a rousing IRA ballad one could write about a boy Garda and a soldier, both cut down in their prime.
Christmas casualties
And there was never a Harrod's song either, which is odd, because it was so very seasonal, just a couple of days before Christmas, and it netted such a fine harvest of casualties. A 25-year-old mother: a young man who was his parents' only child; a visiting American; and three police officers who gave their lives evacuating the area. Still, it's not too late for Mr Warfield and his chums to rustle up a few musical commemorations of that stunning IRA blow for freedom.
Derek Warfield is what Derek Warfield is. The IRA is what the IRA is. These things we know. But what in the name of Christ is Fine Gael? It used to be the party that was proud of having founded this State. It once knew what it stood for. Does the party stand for anything at all now? Has it any core beliefs? Or is it a shower of witless, unprincipled harlequins who will dance giddily to any voguish, peace process piffle?