Occasional Scribbles

Even before results come back from the lab, the story of Clare Daly's apprehension on suspicion of drink driving by the Garda is on eve...

A young woman, who has been reading the Roman Missal, that was introduced in late 2011, writes the following: How can they expect people t...

Reguarly the German Red Cross would arrive at Auschwitz and take blood from the prisoners. Anyone who has ever donated blood is aware how ...

A new all-German controversy has been sparked off by comments published by a journalist in Stern magazine about senior FDP politician Rainer...

Today is World Holocaust Day. All member States of the United Nations are invited to set this day aside as a special day of remembrance for ...

Why is it that so many publications with a church background or influence use the spelling 'organize' when all Irish newspapers and ...

RTE One's Drivetime on Friday mentioned the end of the Vietnam War. Did the programme not say it was 40 years since it ended? Hostilitie...

One quarter of all commuter rail traffic in Germany is now operated by non-Deutsche Bahn companies. The private railways are campaigning ...

This coming Sunday, January 27, is World Holocaust Day. Justice and Defence Minister Alan Shatter is speaking at a remembrance service in ...

On RTE Radio One's Pat Kenny Show today, Fr Tony Flannery was interviewed. The 63-year-old Redemptorist spoke about his current positi...

Below is Stalin's Order of the Day on January 25, 1943 to troops of the Soviet Army. I congratulate the Red Army men, commanders and p...

This evening on the Anna Will German TV show Christof Wackernagle made an impassioned appeal to the German Government to send Bundeswehr tr...

Michael Harding's column in today's Irish Times makes for an interesting read. Those who saw Bishop of Elphin Christopher Jones re...

On January 22, 1943, the starved, frozen, and exhausted Sixth Army began to collapse. A week later Hitler promoted Paulus to field marshal, ...

This blog is regularly read in Shinjuku, Tokyo. It has the busiest railway station in the world. And then there is the anonymous setting (...

A line from Hans Fallada's 'Once a jailbird'. "The chaplain - there wasn't much to be said about him. He was already ...

Two words used in today's US presidential inauguration: Unalienable and irrepeatable. Great presidential speech and then it all to fin...

Below is a piece written by Tony Flannery in today's Irish Times. Three days after my 66th birthday I find myself forbidden to ministe...

Some days have passed since RTE's Prime Time screened a section of its programme on crime in rural Ireland. Prime Time's Miriam O...

Exciting election count night in Hannover. Today's election in Niedersachsen is proving a cliff-hanger. An hour ago it seemed as if ...

Hugh Linehan's piece on Guardian editor Alan Rusbrdiger in today's Irish Times Weekend Review is a great read

"On the second day of the Polish war," recalled a Luftwaffe pilot named Pohl in conversation with a fellow prisoner of war, "...

Irish Times US correspondent Lara Marlowe packs her bags and moves to Paris. In today's paper she has a hagiography-style piece on Bar...

Worth flagging for Irish Rail passengers, who use the Tralee Dublin service. The new timetable, which becomes operative on Monday shows a ...

It was raining in Dublin today in the late afternoon. On leaving my office I intended cycing home but the rain persuaded me to take the bu...

The column below appears in this week's INM Irish regional newspapers. By Michael Commane A friend of mine worked on the PR side of ...

The piece below appears in this week's 'Ireland's Own'. The weekly magazine has a circulation of 50,000. By Michael Comma...

2013 is the UNO World Water Year. It is the 100th anniversary of Grand Central Station in New York, the 200th birthday of Wagner and Verdi a...

New rail timetable operative from January 20 will see trains running between Cork and Dublin in two hours 30 minutes. And the fastest trains...

Before Christmas Hillary Clinton was in Dublin where she spoke at DCU. Two paragraphs from her speech quoted below. As the mother of a ...

The column below appears in this week's INM Irish regional newspapers. By Michael Commane Early in December there was a news report ...