Sir, If it were acceptable English usage to write a report about a journey from Baile Atha Cliath to Warszawa, travelling through Cymru, England, Belgie/ Belgique, Deutschland and Polska on the way, then no doubt it would be entirely acceptable to say that the starting point had been in Eire. I suspect, however, that most adherents of correct English would object.
The Constitution quite clearly states that the name of this country is, in English, "Ireland". This name is not "rubrical", since the rest of the sentence in either language makes no sense without the word "Ireland", a grammatical point which far outweighs Mr, Myers's typographical point about italics.
The Constitution also says that the whole island is "Ireland" or, as Gaeilge "Eire". Thus "Beal Feirste" is in "Eire", just as "Belfast" is in "Ireland". It is precisely because people who regularly use "the term "Eire" place Belfast outside the scope of the term that its usage, in English, is politically loaded rather than neutral. These same people usually regard everything Gaelic as "foreign" and are thus implying that the Southern part of Ireland is alien to the North - hardly a neutral statement in the way that the mere use of the word "Germany", "France" or "Italy" is.
I agree with Kevin Myers, however, when he compares the Southern habit of calling the larger part of the island "Ireland" to the unionist habit of referring to six counties as "Ulster". The former usage is offensive to those in the North, who consider themselves Irish and who are excluded from "Ireland" by it. It is just as offensive as the word "Ulster" to mean six counties, a unionist usage which attempts to cut off fellow-Ulstermen in the three counties from Northern nationalists, who for the life of them cannot see how Donegal is not culturally, geographically, and historically part of "Ulster.
What we call the political entities on this island is up to each of us individually. No matter what terms we use, someone is likely to take offence, a sad consequence of the current political situation. I suspect that Kevin Myers knows this, too. So what light did his diary shed on the subject?
Yours, etc.,
Cromore Court, Coleraine, Co Derry.