From top: Hawkins Street, Dublin in the 1980s: The Metro Burger sign prepares for its return

Free tonight?

Dublin Ghost Signs writes:

The Metro Burger Dublin sign [formerly of hawkins Street by The Screen on the Green] has been given a new lease of life.

Join us in Lucky’s beer garden [Meath Street, Dublin] to raise a drink to this rare and wonderful thing: a Dublin sign which escaped the skip and has lived to tell the tale!

From ‘7-ish’.

Metro Burger Dublin Launch at Lucky’s

Metro Burger Dublin (Dublin Ghost Signs)

From top: Brendan Kennedy (left), CEO of Tilray and investor Peter Thiel; Johnny Green

On July 11 the announcement was made; meet Tilray (TLRY) your medical cannabis supplier, imported for distribution and sales, and dispensed in oral solution form on prescription.

Neither the bold Minister nor the HPRA made any announcement, nor are any details available at either’s web site detailing the decision process or the criteria applied that signed off this import licence.

Instead You and I, Patients and their Families, and everyone else must rely on Tilray‘s press releases and tweets; and since Tilray is a PLC (most of the time) their communications tend to be investor focused, and primarily aimed at nervous bankers and upstart analysts.

This should not surprise since Tilray’s CEO, Brendan Kennedy tBrendan Kennedy, is the same man that at the start of the equity fund that backed Tilray to get out of the ground.

Privateer Holdings as they say on the tin are equity specialist fund focused on Legal Cannabis start-ups, so Silicon Valley was as good a place as any to grow from.

Especially as the source of their own funds, the man behind their own curtains; Peter Thiel is no stranger to that community himself.

I can totally identify with Tilray communications policy mirroring the tone of a private equity fund.

But this is not how you inform the medical community who are required to accept responsibility for prescribing amongst other things, and as duly noted by the Irish Medical Journal themselves, and as pointed out here.

Likewise, for patients and their families and carers.

Is investor and analyst focus communications all anyone needs to know about the medicine being imported, without competition or alternatives for clinicians to treat Irish patients?

Meanwhile, we do know a few things about Tilray / Privateer and its biggest investor (and largest shareholder) Peter Thiel.

Before we go further, Peter Thiel has never really built anything, or designed anything, or even grown anything; besides money.  He is but a source of capital, undoubtedly one the most successful ones with an eye and a nose for start-ups that is rarely seen.

So you may not think anything of his funding of Hulk Hogan’s case against Gawker, it might have been clouded in secrecy but it catapulted this Ann Rand discipline onto the front pages along with its bankrupting Gawker.

For someone with a strong urge to protect and defend privacy rights, by litigious means if necessary (now who does that remind you of), he makes his donations to Donald Trump very public as well as his politics.

This post is really not about one of Tilray’s largest shareholders Peter Thiel, or his private life since there are servers of web pages, blogs and books dedicated to him; he’s even in today’s papers over comments suggesting that the FBI and CIA need to investigate Google for treason.   And supported with a Presidential seal;

Nor is he being introduced through his various investment funds and vehicles to suggest connecting dots with other funds close to the decision.

Peter Thiel being introduced here to further the point that Minister Harris and the HPRA need to approve other companies, and not just to have healthy competition but to provide patients and their care teams wider options.

Many people will find Thiel’s activities troubling, for example, one of his investments (Palantir) has significant contracts with ICE which has spurred on Facebook employees to have him resign from the board

If it is enough for employees of the company he was the first in with his $$$$$$$, then why shouldn’t anyone else, least of all the Country that hosts so much beneficial support for Facebook.

Tilray, in fairness, is a good company, and has funded research into Dravets syndrome.   Which you will be familiar with through the heroic efforts of Vera Twomey.

But when Tilray introduced this medicine in Canada it was ’sold at an introductory discount prices as well as in compassionate pricing program based on financial need’.

I am not going to incite any notion that the Minister or the HPRA didn’t negotiate any introductory pricing, besides, we can do a price comparison when the prescriptions start to get filled and judge for ourselves.

So, who will it get this onto those pharmacy shelves? Say hello to Novartis AG.

You will know them already as they have significant presence in Simon Coveney’s home ground in Cork.

But here’s how they will look like, and in the words of Tilray CEO and Privateer Founder Brendan Kennedy;

“If a product comes into a pharmacy with the Sandoz logo co-branded on it, or if a pharmaceutical sales rep is talking to a physician about a product that’s branded as Tilray and Sandoz, it lends credibility to that product.”

You would think that this big fat Greek scandal / may have caused the Irish Government to pause and consider the optics of awarding the first medicinal cannabis import license to a company controlled by Peter Thiel via a JV with this scandal ridden pharma company?  (Or even a journalist.)

Not a bit of it. It’s all right up their street with Big Pharma and Jobs for the Boys.

Have you noticed yet that this is the same company that was very kind to a Mr Cohen

He of the “U.S. President Donald Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen testified on Wednesday that Swiss drugmaker Novartis AG initially wanted him to lobby for the company when it retained him with a $1.2 million contract, but that Cohen refused.”

But what about the rest of us? Meaning you, well nothing actually.

Tilary has done a Websummit and chosen Portugal for its EU operations.  Ireland is good enough for Facebook and Paypal and all those Tilray big Pharma partners but not for Tilray’s EU HQ; anyone know why?

Far be it from us to know any better since Mr Kennedy is paid the big bucks to make those decisions, $250m last year as it happens. Beaten into second place for the year by Elon Musk; maybe next year Brendan.

No wonder Fine Gael Ministers are like teenage boys backstage at an Arianna Grande concert.

So, the good news is that medical cannabis should be in pharmacy drawers by the time Slade is back on in shops and elevators, but the bad news – your very typical Nothing to see here is being pulled over your eyes.

Ireland needs more to pick from than just Tilray.

Ireland needs to allow patients grow their own rather than service Big Pharma’s reps ‘commissions.

Ireland needs to roll out its own commercial producers.

Ireland needs an Independent Cannabis Regulator.

The Roll Up column by Johnny Green will attempt to keep Broadsheet readers up-to-date on the growing cannabis industry worldwide. Follow Johnny Green on twitter for even more updates.

Top montage: Joel Arbaje for Barron’s

Meanwhile…




This afternoon.

HOUSE, Leeson Street, Dublin 2

Model Simona Gagyte – wearing an array of bespoke headpieces crafted by Irish Milliner Margaret O’Connor – launches ‘Great Lengths – The Mane Event’ (hat and hair competition) in HOUSE on August 8 .

Great lengths

Pics: Mark Stedman

Orla Gartland – Inevitable

The Dublin-born, London-based singer/songwriter is a YouTube sensation with over 210,000 subscribers to her channel and 1.7 million views of her video to last year’s single I Go Crazy.

The 24-year-old makes a cameo appearance as the music teacher in her excellent new video from her recent EP Why Am I Like This?.

Directed by Guy Larsen, it’s both a touching ode to family life and a warning about the dangers of letting Yer Da near a camcorder.

You can catch Orla live at Dublin’s Iveagh Gardens this Friday supporting The Academic.

What are the chances she will headline herself there one day?

Nick replies: Inevitable.

Orla Gartland

Cram school: Two-thirds of primary school pupils stuck in overcrowded classrooms (Independent.ie)

Pic: INTO

From top: Taoiseach Leo Varadkar; Galway City Councillor Owen Hanley

This month Taoiseach Leo Varadkar unveiled a climate action plan nobody really believes in to do something that he never seemed to care about to appeal to voters who never elected him as Taoiseach.

It’s an odd intersection of politics where the news cycle is mostly going through the motions. That said there are some really good things in the Climate Action plan including the incorporation of climate duties under the role of Taoiseach as well as having a more rigorous review process of the government’s track record on climate and biodiversity action.

But in the end it felt like another peg in a premiership that hasn’t really done anything meaningful.

That’s not to fall into a political trap of criticising every aspect of Varadkar for the sake of it. The current minority government situation is stretched to a limit. And I even met him once and annoyingly he was likeable.

But I don’t understand him. Or why he does what he does other than that he’s doing it.

If I genuinely ask myself why is Leo Varadkar Taoiseach I have no answer.

Like too many in politics he was planning for the next job.He was a Councillor so he could be a TD. A TD so he could be Minister. A Minister so he could be Taoiseach. But now that he’s arrived here, what’s it for?

And specifically I’m talking about the role of Taoiseach.

I can understand why someone would want to be TD or Minister. Step up and take the extra influence for your area and get paid a bit better, even if it means more scrutiny and less family time.

But to want to be Taoiseach should surely offer such unifying personal reasoning that it’s obvious to everyone who sees them in action. Why else go through all the scheming and negotiating and double-speak required?

For the past two years Leo Varadkar has been primarily defending himself against charges by Fianna Fáil’s Micheál Martin that he’s all spin, no substance.

That criticism bothers me for three reasons. One is the fact that Martin’s substance is a decade of Fianna Fáil blunders that lead to a decade of recession and austerity.

Two, the hypocrisy of using a test-group focused line to death to criticise marketing spin is neverending.

And three, it let’s Leo Varadkar away from the main criticism the opposition leader should ask. Why you?

Why when homelessness soars to the highest in our nation’s history should you lead us?

What does your brief tenure as Minister for Health say about your vision for healthcare?

What are the new ideas and ambitious qualities you bring the highest role of governance in the land?

It wasn’t really a question the Fine Gael parliamentary party asked either when they ignored their own members and choose him as Taoiseach.

It’s undeniable that electoral success was their primary concern, and as they should have the right to as any party.

But now that success seems less plentiful we’re left to wonder did they ask themselves who is the Taoiseach they choose for us?

A directionless Taoiseach creates a directionless party. Hence, why Fine Gael probably got hit hard in some spots during the Local Election. In contrast the Social Democrats’ focus on quality of life and the Green Party’s message on climate action resonated with people.

Enda Kenny was elected during an unquantifiable crisis. He ran and was elected to be a prudent overseer. The ultimate civil servant. You can argue the merits of that.

But we don’t need a civil servant to lead the country today. The housing and homelessness crisis requires massive state intervention. Healthcare needs to see radical transformations to transition to a single-tier Slaintecare system.

Transport demands bravery as we see a modal shift that compliments our higher density living and supports rural Ireland.

Ultimately, all this leads to the thought that Varakdar is just another man who at 18 decided he deserved to be Taoiseach and did everything to achieve that without asking why.

What was he trying to fix? What problems in the world bothered him the most? Why is it he should lead the country?

As I’ve tried to stress I’m not going intentionally force false narratives about greed or ego. But neither do I think we should allow basic ideas of doing a better job or it has to be someone so why not me be good enough.

He’s neither incompetent nor the Taoiseach we need.

It’s a hard job, you get criticised all day, and you sacrifice a lot to do it. I’m sure he has good intentions and is trying his best.

But why? Where is it going?

And in the end what kind of Ireland will he leave behind?

Owen Hanley is a Councillor on Galway City Council for the Social Democrats and has a background in human rights law

Rollingnews

Maybe not.

Turn around.

Banner in Dublin 6 warning of a ‘Treeless Desert’ due to ongoing council felling measures

Richard Talbot writes:

Spotted on Terenure Road East. Spare me from the D6 NIMBYS and their outlandish claims!

To what authority should I report this banner to?

Anyone?FIGHT!

Previously: Don’t It Always Seem To Go

Mneanwhile…

Yesterday.

Church of St. Nicholas of Myra, Francis Street, The Liberties, Dublin 8

From pic 2: Daniel O’Donnell; Brendan O’Carroll; Dickie Rock; Marty Whelan; Anne Doyle; Bertie Ahern; Micheál Martin; Paddy Cole; June Rodgers;  Noel V. Ginnity and Twink.

Earlier: Grace Note

Yesterday: Meanwhile, In The Liberties

Broadsheet.ie