News Opinion

MICHAEL WOLSEY: In the name game it always pays to be polite

By Kilkenny Now 26th February 2022 0

My granddaughter goes to a primary school where the children call the teachers by their first name. It is, from what I can judge, a very good school and she is happy there. But, as a general policy, I feel a bit uneasy about this first name thing. I certainly wouldn’t like to see it […]

News Opinion

MICHAEL WOLSEY: Come back nuclear energy, all is forgiven

By Kilkenny Now 2nd January 2022 0

In 1978 Ireland was getting ready to produce its own nuclear-powered electricity but Christy Moore sang us out of it. He wasn’t alone. Donal Lunny, Andy Irvine, Clannad, Styagalee, and a  host of other musicians, joined him to protest at Carnsore Point, in Co Wexford,  where energy minister Des O’Malley planned to open the first […]

News

MICHAEL WOLSEY: Want to be a soccer star? Get yourself a hyphen

By Kilkenny Now 6th November 2021 0

There was a time when you could safely assume that anyone with a double-barrelled name was a chinless wonder, an upper-class toff like Britain’s former prime minister, Alec Douglas-Home, or its would-be prime minister, Jacob Rees Mogg. Now he (or, indeed, she) is more likely to be a professional footballer. You can accelerate with the […]

News Opinion

MICHAEL WOLSEY: The only deal that interests Boris is a good deal for himself

By Kilkenny Now 16th October 2021 0

The term Perfidious Albion has never been more richly deserved than now, because of the two-faced contortions of Boris Johnson’s government over Brexit and the Northern Ireland protocol. Consistency is not a quality associated with politicians in general, but I cannot recall the leader of any other democracy ever threatening to renege on an international […]

News Opinion

MICHAEL WOLSEY: How our TDs squander €25,000 a day

By Kilkenny Now 19th May 2021 0

So what Covid restriction will you be most happy to abandon? Masks, many people will say. And I guess that if I had to wear one all day, while working in a surgery or school, I might  agree. But popping on a mask before going into a shop or onto a train is not a […]

News

MICHAEL WOLSEY: 17th Century Man makes a bid for power

By Kilkenny Now 5th May 2021 0

Of the many changes Ireland has seen in recent years, none has  been more dramatic than the collapse of organised religion. It is in decline all over the western world, but the retreat, which has taken the best part of a century in, say, Britain and France, has been condensed into a few decades here. […]

Opinion

PAUL HOPKINS: Life in the time of coronavirus: A diary of self-imposed isolation

By Kilkenny Now 26th March 2020 0

Bright yellow bandana, and a sandwich tern heading for sea Day 11 in self-imposed isolation I am definitely an ‘extra’ in a Sci-Fi B movie where things are beginning to feel somewhat surreal. Getting stir crazy too, so I head off for a spring walk over the mill and down the playing fields. There’s more […]

News Opinion

MICHAEL WOLSEY: Standing room only on the Misery Express

By Kilkenny Now 6th November 2019 0

It is 8.14 and I am standing in a corridor on the Misery Express, as regulars call this morning train that runs from Dundalk, in Co Louth, to Bray in Co Wicklow. I got on at the fourth stop, so my chances of being seated were nil. But we are standing comfortably enough with some […]

News Opinion

MICHAEL WOLSEY: Here’s a radical cure for obesity – eat less

By Kilkenny Now 16th October 2019 0

IRELAND fared badly in a fat report produced by the OECD to mark World Obesity Day. We have one of the highest rates of obesity in Europe, apparently, with one in four adults now classed as obese and one in four children overweight. The problem is the low-level of treatment, according to the Irish Society […]

News Opinion

MICHAEL WOLSEY: How should we honour this extraordinary Joe?

By Kilkenny Now 25th September 2019 0

WHEN Jack Charlton brought the Irish football team back from its first international tournament, the Taoiseach, Charles Haughey, made him an honorary Irishman. It was a meaningless gesture, but it captured the mood of the country which wanted to reward this visitor who had brought us a small measure of success and a great deal […]