Category Archives: The US-Ireland Relationship

CONGRESSMAN JOE CROWLEY’S DEFEAT IS FURTHER EVIDENCE OF THE NON-EXISTENT IRISH AMERICAN VOTE

Posted on June 28, 2018 by Trina Vargo

Congressman Joe Crowley’s primary defeat this week to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will hopefully serve as a wake-up call to Ireland and anyone who cares about the US-Ireland relationship. The writing has long been on the wall but too little is being … Continue reading →

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THE NUMBER OF IRISH ILLEGALLY IN THE US

Posted on August 10, 2017 by Trina Vargo

The Irish Times ran a story this week about Irish TD John Deasy taking issue with the number of Irish illegally in the US. For years, the number 50,000 has been bandied about with no one questioning where that number … Continue reading →

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STAR WARS IN IRELAND REVISIONISM

Posted on July 17, 2017 by Trina Vargo

(Correction on blog below, Naoise Barry no longer works for Pinewood.) My experiences with the Irish Film Board (IFB) are kind of like James Comey’s experiences with President Trump — I’ve learned to take notes in the meetings, or as … Continue reading →

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I wish more people would read Vaclav Havel

Posted on January 17, 2016 by Trina Vargo

In this political season … can’t help but wish more thought like Vaclav Havel did.  My favorite quotes from his Summer Meditations.  Should be mandatory reading for every pol or wannabe pol: Times have changed, clouds have filled the sky, … Continue reading →

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Certificates of Irish Heritage Revisionism

Posted on August 22, 2015 by Trina Vargo

In 2012, when I pointed out that certificates of Irish heritage were silly, I was attacked repeatedly in Niall O’Dowd’s tabloids. Now that the Irish Government is ending the scheme, according to RTE, O’Dowd now claims he predicted they wouldn’t … Continue reading →

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Niall O’Dowd’s Irish tabloid misrepresents the Mitchell Scholarship program yet again

Posted on July 17, 2015 by Trina Vargo

If you are someone who reads Irish American newspapers, the Irish Echo tends to report facts, including the full story on the Northern Ireland funding cut for the George J. Mitchell Scholarship program. The casual reader should take with a … Continue reading →

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Enough Already

Posted on March 19, 2015 by Trina Vargo

This week was so seven years ago. Irish America publisher Niall O’Dowd may be loud, but that doesn’t make him right, or representative of most Irish Americans. In his never-ending need to ingratiate himself with the Clintons, he inducted Hillary … Continue reading →

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20 year anniversary of the Adams visa

Posted on January 31, 2014 by Trina Vargo

Twenty years ago this month, Senator Ted Kennedy was at the forefront of an effort to convince President Clinton to grant Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams a visa, so that he might briefly visit the United States.  As leader of … Continue reading →

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Seamus Heaney, President Obama, Syria

Posted on September 1, 2013 by Trina Vargo

Sometimes we don’t fully appreciate the moment when we’re in it…. It was January 1998, three months before the Northern Ireland peace agreement was achieved, that I accompanied Senator Ted Kennedy on his first trip to Northern Ireland. St. John’s … Continue reading →

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