Madam, – Almost four decades ago Conor Cruise O’Brien wrote that the people of the south (the Republic) were now more anglicised than at any time under English rule, adding: “television is a more powerful weapon of acculturation than bayonets.”
Queen Elizabeth should feel at home when she visits here. As an anti-monarchist, I’m not looking forward to a royal state visit – or to the inevitable obsequiousness that will surround it.
Already the siren voices of the Commonwealth lobby are getting louder. And, no doubt, as the visit date gets closer, sundry royalists and loyalists will swarm out of the woodwork. I still cringe at the memory of John Bruton’s unctuous welcome for Prince Charles. – Yours, etc,