Ian Paisley admitted to hospital

[Paradosis]

To bring down the Sunningdale power sharing agreement using masked UDA thugs (and there is a lovely picture of Paisley standing in front of ranks of them).

How did that work out for yous? No to sharing power with the SDLP, and now you get to share it with the IRA.

I thought I was a Loyalist troll you werent going to engage with? The Sunningdale agreement in particular with the comments that SDLP made about it really did seem like a huge step towards a "United Ireland" as did the Anglo-Irish Agreement. Power sharing wasnt the problem, being in the complete control of people like you who hate us and wish we didnt exist was. The UDA came out with what was basically the GFA in the 1980s. Also to be remembered is that Loyalists suggested an independent Ulster to the IRA as a possible solution in the 1970s and they rejected it. The fact of us accepting power sharing with the Provos shows how basically either cowardly or reasonable we are, but going happily destruction....That is a bridge to far.

[Roisin3]

I thought I was a Loyalist troll you werent going to engage with? The Sunningdale agreement in particular with the comments that SDLP made about it really did seem like a huge step towards a "United Ireland" as did the Anglo-Irish Agreement. Power sharing wasnt the problem, being in the complete control of people like you who hate us and wish we didnt exist was. The UDA came out with what was basically the GFA in the 1980s. Also to be remembered is that Loyalists suggested an independent Ulster to the IRA as a possible solution in the 1970s and they rejected it. The fact of us accepting power sharing with the Provos shows how basically either cowardly or reasonable we are, but going happily destruction....That is a bridge to far.

You're a loyalist troll and I'm mocking you.

Do you like sharing power with the people who hated you enough to kill loads of your people? You have to get their sayso on everything now, that's how it works now.

[theloner]

What do you want or expect them to say?

The truth about the man would be nice, or perhaps a short and sweet RIP and spare us the usual bollox they've spouted about out reach and insincerity since they became a mainstream party.

[Des Quirell]

I'm cringing already at the SF press release on news of his death. How he was such a good man and helped pave the way to the current peace process. Would make you vomit.

The things is that the GFA changed a lot of things.

It did for me, in any event.

One of those things was they way I viewed the demagogues of both sides. Since the agreement allowed for the release of prisoners, I took that to mean that a line was being drawn under the events and that this was a fresh start. A reboot, if you like.

The releases were a tacit admission that extreme circumstances resulted in extreme acts of violence, but that in a changed environment it was possible to get a fresh start. I applied this spirit to *all* the participants - including those who were never jailed.

It was by this logic that I felt that McGuinness had a right not simply to run for President, but that past acts shouldn't be a factor in his public debates.

It would be hypocricy to defend McGuinness' candidacy and to meanwhile judge Paisley based on his pre-GFA record.

There's no (as one poster put it earlier) amnesia involved. I'm aware of his biography. It's just that I apply the spirit of the GFA when judging the various characters involved.

[FrankSpeaks]

Paisley was a poisonous bigot in his day and so were many more like him including Adams and McGuiness on the other side. Paisley was the last of the well known powerful bigots to see the light and it could be argued that he single-handedly prolonged the troubles by many years.

[Murph]

On the other side?

What about the clean decent neutrals Frank -the brits? and then there people like you

[Aindriu]

"Also to be remembered is that Loyalists suggested an independent Ulster to the IRA as a possible solution in the 1970s" You can't have an independent Ulster because it is comprised of NINE counties and there are only SIX in the statelet of Northern Ireland! You can have an independent Northern Ireland if you wish?

[Just Jack]

What do you want or expect them to say?

The IRA denies any involvement

P O’Neill

[Chrisco]

Power sharing wasnt the problem.

That is a rather fanciful rewriting of history.

[former wesleyan]

No one cares whether Norris is an Anglican or not, he's not responsible for the past history of Anglicanism in Ireland, the west-Brit thing is annoying because it's patronizing. The country is full of them, so what, now that peace is bedding down their anti-republicanism just looks petty. Hate is a two way street, things have progressed and it's time to bury the hatchet. Everyone has to get on with their lives and stop living in the past. It's not the 1970s anymore, the ROI is not a catholic state anymore. If re-unification were to happen, the new state would have no religious identity. Who knows how things will work out, I can honestly say no one down here gives a crap about what religion people are, if the chuckle brothers could get along then anything is possible.

Lately. Very, very lately. It'll take a while for the rumour to get around up there.