Monthly Archives: April 2013

Screen Shot 2013-04-04 at 09.04.34Further to legal threats by David Quiinn of the Iona Institute against two Trinity College newspapers.

Rónán Burtenshaw, editor of Trinity News, responds:

On February 6th, 2013 we reported that David Quinn, head of Christian conservative think-tank the Iona Institute, had issued legal threats against The University Times over articles they had published the previous month. The news story can be read here.

On February 8th a lecturer in the Law School of Trinity College, Dublin, Dr. Eoin O’Dell, who is acting on our behalf in this case, informed us that Mr. Quinn’s solicitors had made contact in complaint at the article. This was followed by three solicitors’ letters in which Mr. Quinn’s representative made five demands in relation to the story: that it be retracted, that we issue an apology for its publication, that we offer Mr. Quinn a right-of-reply inside the next print edition, that we offer his representatives editorial oversight over a subsequent article on The University Times‘ settlement of their case, and that we make a contribution to Mr. Quinn’s legal costs in pursuing this case. We were unwilling to meet these demands.

In settlement we offered to correct a factual error contained in the article by means of clarification. Despite this offer being rejected we added this clarification in the interests of accuracy on the 11th of March: “This article initially stated that Mr. Quinn “contested” Google’s claim that the Iona Institute’s YouTube account was not closed for reasons of censorship. In fact, while he initially contested this, he later accepted that this was an “automatic procedure on their part“.”

On March 13th we also ran a news story on the University Times’ settlement with Mr. Quinn. This article can be read here. We did not give Mr. Quinn’s representatives editorial oversight over this article, but we did include reference to the clarification we added to the original news story.

We have encouraged Mr. Quinn and his representatives to pursue this matter through the Press Council but, at the time of writing, the threat of legal action remained outstanding.

Some details of this case were published by UCD student newspaper The College Tribune on April 1st.

Trinity News’ position is that we stand by our reporting and are prepared to defend it.

We Stand By Our Reporters (Editorial, Trinity News)

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The outlook for economic recovery remains “highly uncertain” over the medium term, a new International Monetary Fund report has warned.

The staff report concludes that the Government has achieved strong policy implementation of the bailout programme so far, and it refers to the fact that market access has markedly improved.

But in a relatively downbeat assessment, the report also flags as as significant hurdles declines in domestic demand, high public and private debt, ongoing problems with profitability and lending in the banking sector.

[…]

Referring to inadequate progress by banks, the IMF staff appraisal is that a sharp improvement is needed in dealing with non-performing loans. This is “critical to strengthen prospects for recovery”, it has stated.

 

Seems Chomsky was being optimistic.

Economic recovery in medium term ‘highly uncertain’ – IMF (HarryMcGee, Irish Times)

Yesterday: Specialist Eviction Judges, You Say?

(Sam Boal/Photocall Ireland)

mobile

A historical series of nesting phones by UK artist Kyle Bean celebrating four decades of the mobile phone.

In early April 1973, engineer and inventor Marty Cooper made the first mobile call on a Motorola DynaTAC 8000x to rival engineer Joe Engel at Bell Labs.

Just trollin’.

The Verge Interview: Marty Cooper, Father of The Cellphone (The Verge)

dailywhat

ChomskyGuinnessNo Certificate of Irishness though.

Noam Chomsky having a tipple with Mary Lawlor, founder and director of Front Line Defenders (in red dress), at a Dublin pub tonight {location unknown]

Meanwhile, earlier…

Choms1

Choms2Chomsky at the RDS, Ballsbridge, Dublin, this evening, where he was interviewed by Bryan Dobson and took questions from the audience.

From our notes:

On foot of being asked about the austerity measures being imposed on Ireland and across Europe, Chomsky said there’s no question austerity is destroying the social fabric of Europe and pointed to an interview ECB president Mario Draghi gave to a reporter with the Wall Street Journal.

He quoted Draghi as saying the social contract in Europe is dead. He said the destruction of the social fabric is a “predictable consequence” of the programs that are being carried out, saying austerity measures being implemented at a time of recession or stagnation leads to “disaster”.

In relation to Ireland, he said: “The policy here is to bail out the criminals and let the taxpayer take the burden. This is pretty much the same everywhere but it’s extreme in Ireland.”

Chomsky also recalled a request made by the left-wing Syriza party in Greece last September, in which head of the party Alexis Tsipras asked for the EU to do for Greece what Greece did for Germany in 1953 – write off a large portion of its debt after the war. “That would be a sensible policy, ” Chomsky said.

Another member of the audience asked about the controversy surrounding the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and their lack of support for three Irish-trained medics who were arrested in Bahrain.

The RCSI has a medical campus in the city since 2004 and the three medics were arrested during the Arab Spring when there was a crackdown on pro-democracy rallies.

The RCSI contributes about €70million to Bahrain. The lady asked how Ireland could act responsibly without affecting their medical credibility. Chomsky said: “The only way to do it is to organise active effective public opinion.”

He also warned about surveillance drones being the size of flies, how US President Barack Obama has punished more whistleblowers than all the previous US administrations combined and highlighted out Ireland was one of the 54 countries
which were complicit in the CIA’s global kidnap, detention and torture programme after 9/11.

He said people shouldn’t pay any attention to terrorist lists, pointing out that Nelson Mandela was deemed a terrorist until four years ago, and he warned trade unions are under threat, just as democracy is under threat.

He then put on his coat and asked : “Where the chicks at?”

(Pics via Paul Reynolds)