The inaugural Silicon Valley Sevens gets under way November 4 and 5 in San Jose, California. Not only will the occasion mark the return of international sevens competition to the golden state, it will see one of the sport’s true powerhouse nations make its first trip to the United States to compete in the short code.

Fans of Irish rugby will have a lot to look forward to. The past year has proven extremely successful for Irish national teams venturing to the United States. The last two times an Ireland men’s national team journeyed to North America, the fifteens side registered a first-ever victory over world number one New Zealand in front of a crowd of more than 64,000 at Soldier Field in Chicago and they bested the USA Eagles at the Red Bull Arena in New Jersey.

As a nation of more than 33 million persons claiming Irish heritage–roughly 10.5% of the population–it is unsurprising that the United States proves a welcoming environment for Irish national teams. As Ireland’s director of sevens rugby, Anthony Eddy, acknowledged, there is a strong connection between the history of many Americans and Ireland, which has resulted in tremendous support for Irish teams traveling state side. Although it will be the first time that Ireland’s men’s sevens team makes the trip, there can be no doubt that the team will experience the same impressive support that the fifteens and the women’s sevens teams have experienced.

Coincidentally, the anniversary of Ireland’s historic triumph over New Zealand, last year in Chicago, falls on the second day of the Silicon Valley Sevens. Ireland, semifinalist at the inaugural Rugby World Cup Sevens, missing out on the final by a last-second converted try, will be looking to celebrate that anniversary by building on a strong run the past two years back to prominence.

Beginning in 2014, Ireland began an increased focus on sevens and has burst onto the scene and not looked back. In June 2015, the nation was slotted into Division C of the European Olympic qualification. Running undefeated and unchallenged to the Division title, the team advanced, the following month, to Division B and repeated its dominant effort from June. Having earned a bid to the repechage tournament, a tough loss to Russia in the semifinal is all that prevented Ireland from an undefeated three-tournament swing, settling for third with a victory over Georgia.

Although the Irish settled for third, that day, it was enough to book a spot in the final Olympic qualifier in Monaco. A flawless showing in pool play, which included a victory over perennial power Samoa, saw Ireland into the quarterfinal against Spain. A narrow loss to eventual champion Spain, the newest core team on the Sevens World Series, ended the 2016 Olympic dream, but left the future bright.

The 2017 European Sevens Grand Prix showed just how ready for the bright lights Ireland is. With tournament titles in Moscow and in France, the Irish finished in the top three in each tournament and narrowly (2 points) finished behind World Series core-team Russia for the series title. As for that Spanish team that edged Ireland in 2016, it was left looking up at Ireland from third-place.

This trip to California will not be Ireland’s last. Having qualified for the 2018 Rugby World Cup Sevens, the team will return in July to compete for the World Cup in San Francisco. But the Irish will have their hands full in a tough Pool A in San Jose, which includes three nations that combine for 30 World Series cup victories and four of the last twelve. But Ireland has named a strong squad.

Drawing from a club and provincial structure that has led the fifteens team to three six nations titles in recent years and seen the professional clubs dominate the Pro 14 and in European competition, the sevens squad will be a very tough out in San Jose. Three standouts to keep an eye on will be Jordan Conroy, Jimmy O’Brien, and Harry McNulty. O’Brien, a product of the Leinster system, in the sevens program for the last year has quickly taken to the short code and demonstrated good speed to keep opposing teams on their heels. The young O’Brien is just over a year removed from Ireland’s U20 Six Nations squad, with a bright future ahead.

12 of the best international #rugby teams in the world are coming to San Jose's @AvayaStadium this November 4 & 5 ➡️ https://t.co/xcyAqhbjwX pic.twitter.com/n0S63LFpnD

— USA Sevens Rugby (@USASevensRugby) October 9, 2017

Despite O’Brien’s impressive speed, the true speed burner on the team is Conroy. The 2016–17 Connacht Club Player of the Year and Ulster Bank League Player of the Year, Conroy has proven himself a try-scoring machine on the wing. In four stops on the Grand Prix, he accounted for 17 tries, sixteen in the last three tournaments. Anthony Eddy freely described Conroy as one of the fastest players in all of Ireland. In the final leg of the 2017 European Sevens Grand Prix, Conroy was named the player of the tournament.

Joining Conroy in the squad is a man who came close to stealing that player of the tournament award in Exeter: Harry McNulty. Only by Conroy’s remarkable 17 tries does McNulty’s 11 in the Grand Prix seem small. Described by Eddy as a hard-working, disciplined player, McNulty has a tremendous work rate, playing just about every minute of every game. A fixture of the squad since its rejuvenation, McNulty’s intelligence on the pitch has been a great compliment to what Eddy is trying to accomplish with the team.

As a non-core team, in regards to the HSBC Sevens World Series, Ireland is hungry for top-tier competition. Having excelled in the Grand Prix, Ireland has both booked a spot in the World Cup and the World Series qualifying tournament at the Hong Kong Sevens in April. The team will also benefit from inclusion as the non-core invitee to the last two legs of the Series in Paris and London. But those three occasions are not enough to sate Ireland’s thirst for competition.

As Eddy put it best, “We’ve accepted every opportunity that’s been thrown at us.” Most recently, that opportunity was the DHL Oktoberfest 7s in Munich, Germany. Drawn into a pool alongside Fiji, Australia, and Chile, Ireland played remarkably well to advance to the quarterfinal. Chile was a strong contender for core-team qualification last year, and Fiji and Australia are two of the bluest bloods in sevens, with Fiji having won two of the last three series titles and Olympic gold last year. Fiji pulled away for a comfortable victory, but Ireland pushed Australia close and notched its own comfortable victory against Chile. An unfortunate pairing against defending World Series champion South Africa, knocked Ireland out of contention. But a victory over France to close its competition ended Ireland’s run on a high note.

Ireland will swing into Spain for a training tournament ahead of boarding the flight to California for the Silicon Valley Sevens. Outside of the Sevens World Series, which will itself head stateside in March with the annual USA Sevens in Las Vegas, it is almost impossible to find a competition with more top-tier talent than will be on display in San Jose. It is tournaments like this that Ireland will need if it is to be prepared to return to glory at the World Cup in San Francisco.

In a team that has already met very high expectations and goals so far, the next major goal for Ireland sevens is to claim core status on the HSBC Sevens World Series. At this point, it looks like the team will enter Hong Kong as the strong favorite to do just that.

The future is bright for Irish sevens and they will doubtlessly be a major factor in San Jose and years to come.

For more information visit www.sevensrugby.com.

An Irishman who committed the horrendous act of strangling his pet border collie and cooking it in a stew to feed to his other dog has received a prison sentence after his guilty verdict. 

Dominic Carter O'Connor, 28, from Kircubien in Co. Down, admitted to acquiring a dog for free via Facebook, strangling it with a leash, and chopping the poor creature up with a bread knife before cooking it into a stew to feed to his other dog. 

It took a jury less than 5 minutes to find O'Connor guilty of causing unnecessary harm to his pet border collie, Jess. 

O'Connor's cruel act came to light after he confessed to a psychiatric nurse at Ulster Hospital A&E, where he was receiving treatment for a personality disorder, Belfast Live reports. 

The nurse then alerted the Police Service of Northern Ireland, who searched O'Connor's home and found dog hair and bone fragments in the fireplace and “stringy type of meat like stewing steak” in a pot on the stove and in a dog bowl next to the stove. 

DOMINIC CARTER O'CONNOR‼Strangled dog before butchering and cooking it~Abhorrent‼ HORRIFIC & CRUELLY DISTURBING😡😡😡 https://t.co/iAmKX2OHqi

— msmorgan1968 (@msmorgan1968) October 25, 2017

O'Connor confessed that, after getting the dog for free thanks to Facebook, he attempted to strangle it with one leash, and then went on to use a different one when his first attempt was unsuccessful.   

“I strangled it with the shorter lead. Then I cut it up and cooked some of it and fed it to the dog and put the rest of it on the fire. I cooked it and fed it to the other dog with a few onions and an Oxo cube and salt and pepper.”

He added that he had initially tried to butcher its body with an axe but then switched to a bread knife when that proved too difficult. 

He then burned what was left of the dog and put the remains in his trash bin, but admitted that he later dumped them in Portavogie harbor. 

A friend of O'Connor's testified to the court that she had met the dog, which she guessed to be four-years-old, the day that O'Connor had got it, and asked him where it had gone when she visited him again the following day. 

“He was just his normal self. He told me he had rehomed Jess," she said. 

She also testified that he had said “I told you I was going to get another dog and let you taste it" to his other dog, Shadow. 

O'Connor did not take the stand in his own defense. 

A spokesman for Northern Ireland Says No To Animal Cruelty said: “This conviction opens up the new legislation of a five-year maximum sentence.

“This is among the worst cases we have heard of and feel it deserves the most severe sentence.

“In reality though, they will consider the time he had already spent in prison and other mitigating factors. The final stage is down to the judiciary. We live in hope.”

O'Connor will remain in police custody until sentencing on November 21. 

Historian Van Gosse penned an article questioning why so many conservative “loudmouth” TV hosts are Irish and controversially concludes they are barely Irish at all.

Writing in Newsweek Gosse mentions that years ago he noticed that, “the right-wing chorus pontificating from screens in bars and shops was filled by men with names like Hannity, O’Reilly, and Buchanan.”

He continues by asking why, “Why has the ascent of a bunch of people who in an earlier period might have been called Micks [a contentious word for Catholics] drawn no notice at all?”

Gosse, who says his own great-great-grandfather immigrated from Ireland to the States and lived himself in the Emerald Isle for a time, believes, “Irish-Americans are very different from the Irish-in-Ireland, and often have no sense of themselves as connected to the island and its history.”

The “loudmouths”, he contends, are in fact the ideological descendants of Joe McCarthy, who “untethered Irishness and made it into a certain kind of masculine assertion, free from any institutional power… It established the pattern of a certain kind of 'ethnic' man claiming working-class antecedents (and I stress the claiming rather than actual class status), who portrays himself, and is accepted, as a tribune for all white men in America, a 'hyper-American.'”

“Buchanan, O’Reilly, Hannity, Bannon,” he concludes, “none have any connection to Ireland or organized Irish-American life.” (He misses the fact that Bannon's last wife was from Ireland)

“They’re no more Irish than I am,” he ends with a flourish.

Who exactly is an Irish American has always been a contentious topic – on both sides of the Atlantic. Still more controversial is whether Irish American ethnicity compels an individual to adhere to a set of beliefs.

Earlier this year IrishCentral Editor Niall O’Dowd wrote that Breitbart News founder and then Senior Counselor to the President Steve Bannon’s views on immigration made him, “a disgrace to his Irish Catholic roots.”

Read More: Steve Bannon a disgrace to his Irish Catholic roots

Bill O'Reilly, before he was disgraced, used his Irish heritage a bit. Last year O’Reilly said that he would move to Ireland if ever Bernie Sanders was elected to the Presidency.

“I’m fleeing,” he told the Huffington Post.

“I’m going to Ireland… But I’m not going to pay 90 percent of my income to that guy. I’m sorry. I’m not doing it.”

O’Reilly is unlikely to qualify for citizenship as his last discernible Irish-born ancestor was a great-grandparent (usually the cut off point is a grandparent) but, even after forking out millions of dollars to women who claim he sexually harassed them, he should have an annual income in excess of the $120,000 needed for a retirement visa.

Read More: US couples wanting to retire to Ireland launch petitions to lower financial requirements

However, Ireland might have become too liberal for them. Though Ireland still has near complete bans abortion – on both sides of the border – the Republic voted for gay marriage, has a gay prime minister and no real right-wing parties. Medicine is basically socialized and grants and payments to unemployed are really quite high.

Last year Sean Hannity told our sister publication, The Irish Voice, that his grandparents immigrated from Cork and Down to the US and that he plans to visit – on an Irish passport as well.

Read More: Sean Hannity on the real Donald Trump, his own roots and getting that Irish passport

“My sisters have all been to Ireland. I am the only one who hasn’t been, and I am planning to go there. I want to get my Irish citizenship – my mother had dual citizenship – and I’ll do the same,” he told the paper.

He says Irish attitudes in his family were pervasive and that if they could see his closeness to Trump they’d be proud of what they saw.

“Would my parents be stunned about my closeness to Donald Trump? There is no doubt they would be stunned,” he mused.

“What a validation for the risk they took. Imagine my grandfather Cornelius at 18 or 19, getting on a boat and there’s the Statue of Liberty – good luck kid. That was most immigrants from Ireland. I think they would be particularly proud.”

Certainly, the latter two would seem to have no strong connection with modern Ireland, but as Gosse himself asserts there has long been a certain type of Irish American that is strongly Republican. One study even suggested Trump’s victory last year boiled down to his strong performance amongst midwestern Catholics.

Read More: The one big reason Hillary Clinton lost the White House

So nothing about being a Republican precludes an individual from being Irish American.

As for being a “loudmouth,” is that not a matter of opinion? You could claim the left has Stephen Colbert, Bill Maher, Chris Matthews, equally loud and opinionated.

The Irish passport ranking is now the sixth most powerful in the world.

For such a tiny document, the Irish passport certainly packs a lot of power, allowing you access to 154 of the 193 United Nations member states, as well as the Vatican, Palestinian Territory, Kosovo, Macao and Taiwan.

And for anyone who's lucky enough to be an Irish passport holder, be safe in the knowledge that you now hold in your possession a document ranked as the sixth most powerful passport in the world.

Currently resting in sixth place alongside the US, Malaysia, and Canada, the Irish passport has only been gaining power in the rankings throughout the first year since Trump’s presidential election, with some countries choosing to revoke entry to US passport holders because of the 45th President.

Countries such as Turkey and the Central African Republic revoked the US visa free status after the election, putting the power of the US passport into decline.

Read more: Why the Irish passport is among most powerful in the world

The 2017 Global Passport Index, developed by advisory firm Arton Capital’s Singapore Office, ranks the 193 countries within the UN depending on their visa-free access to cross the borders of another country within the UN. Passports are given a “total visa-free score,” awarding a point for every country holders can travel to visa-free, with a visa on arrival, or via electronic travel authorization.

Singapore has the most powerful passport in the world 

Coming top of the list this year was Singapore, the first time an Asian passport has held the top spot alone. With access to 159 countries, they are now just one spot above Germany on 158, with thanks to Paraguay recently  removing restrictions on the Singaporean passport.

"Singapore is not locked into a common travel zone (e.g. with other ASEAN countries), and never had to impose visa restrictions on foreign nationals only because other ASEAN member countries have restrictions," stated Philippe May, managing director of Arton Capital's Singapore office.

If that is the case, perhaps the UK may not have as much to worry about after all following Brexit, despite fears that a hard Brexit may see British passport holders having to apply for visas to travel to countries within the EU. Currently the UK passport is still faring well, however, coming out above Ireland and the US as one of the fourth most powerful passports in the world.

Fearful that the US could drop further and want to get your hands on an Irish passport? Find out how to apply in our guide here.

Click the image to open the full interactive version (via Go To Court).

Do you own both an Irish and US passport? Have you noticed any difference in using them or do you always just stick to one? 

The Irish American characters and author of book and movie “Gone With the Wind” are receiving much criticism for their alleged racism but should it be banned?

“Gone With the Wind," the classic novel and movie about the old South, is suddenly getting a very frosty reception.

Author Margaret Mitchell, a proud Irish American, built the plot around Scarlett O’Hara, the daughter of an Irishman living in a mansion called Tara in the South before and after the Civil War. Scarlett is arguably the most popular female movie character of all time.

Adjusted for inflation, the four-hour epic has made $2 billion and still continues to make millions in syndication every year. But will its alleged racist message finally close it down?

Mitchell modeled Tara on local plantations in the area of the country where she lived pre-Civil War, particularly the Clayton County plantation on which her maternal grandmother, Annie Fitzgerald Stephens (1844–1934), the daughter of Irish immigrant Philip Fitzgerald and his American wife Eleanor Avaline "Ellen" McGhan, was born and raised.

Read more: Trump’s sinister refusal to call white supremacist evil by its name

But now there is trouble looming for the movie. After Charlottesville and the Nazi marches aimed at keeping Confederate statues in public areas, a reappraisal of "Gone With the Wind" and its embrace of slavery as a happy institution has come into question.

Slate Magazine reported this week that the annual showing of the film to 1,500 southerners in Memphis, Tennessee, at the Orpheum Theatre has been discontinued, breaking a 34year run. “The Orpheum Theatre Group has decided not to include ‘Gone with the Wind’ in its 2018 Summer Movie Series,” a statement from the theater begins.

“As an organization, whose stated mission is to ‘entertain, educate and enlighten the communities it serves,’ the Orpheum cannot show a film that is insensitive to a large segment of its local population.”

The main objection is to the "Lost Cause" theme of the movie which claims the Civil War was not really about slavery, which it most certainly was, and much more about the nasty Yankee invasion of the South.

"Gone With the Wind" has been accused of whitewashing slavery

Journalist John Beifuss says the movie completely glosses over the slavery issue writing “....but it's a whitewash of slavery – its’ suggestion that the true ‘Old South’ was a place of happy 'darkies' who benefited from the gentle temperaments of their owners – popularized a myth that’s proved as hard to kill as a boll weevil.

“As Scarlett’s beloved father asserts early in the film, in defiance of 'Yankee' objections: 'We’ll keep our slaves, with or without their approval.'”

Lou Lumenick, the New York Post critic, certainly saw the movie as unsuitable for the modern era in 2015. At the time he stated “'Gone With the Wind' should “go the way of the Confederate flag,” or at least its predecessor “'The Birth of a Nation,'” studied as a racist symbol rather than exhibited as entertainment.

Read more: Call for removal of Confederate plaque in Ireland

“True, ‘Gone with the Wind’ isn’t as blatantly and virulently racist as D.W. Griffith’s ‘Birth of a Nation,’” Lumenick wrote, but the “more subtle racism of ‘Gone with the Wind’ is in some ways more insidious, going to great lengths to enshrine the myth that the Civil War wasn’t fought over slavery – an institution the film unabashedly romanticizes.”

Betsy Hancock of the Tennessee Theater stated if they showed the film again they would be presenting it with a program note: “I think what I’m gonna ask of our audiences if we—when we—show ‘Gone With the Wind’ again, is … what was [the depiction of slaves] saying not so much about the Civil War, but about the United States in 1939? And what was it saying about the proliferation of the Lost Cause myth?”

"Gone With the Wind" author Margaret Mitchell's Irish roots

Margaret Mitchell would surely be taken aback. She was a feminist and very forward-looking woman who would hate what is now being made of her best-seller.

She was Irish through and through and would likely argue the book humanizes the slaves rather than having them as mere props. One thing for sure, her Irish blood would be up as so much of the film was based on that lineage

As our sister publication Irish America Magazine noted: “Central to Mitchell’s Irish identity was the couple represented by her grandfather, Irish-born John Stephens (1833-1896), and his wife Annie Fitzgerald (1844-1934), whom he married in 1864 in Atlanta’s Immaculate Conception Church as Sherman’s troops were heading south toward Atlanta.

Read more: Two Irish groups still fly racist Confederate flag, says Washington Post

“It is widely believed that the cantankerous and headstrong Annie Fitzgerald Stephens was the principal model for Scarlett, although Mitchell would deny that there was any connection between her work and her family. Annie’s father, Philip Fitzgerald, who was born in Tipperary, owned the family plantation located about twenty miles south of Atlanta. They called it ‘Rural Home’ or ‘Home Place,’ and it would later become the Tara of ‘Gone With the Wind.’

“According to Mitchell’s biographer, Darden Asbury Pyron, ‘These two Irishmen [Stephens and Fitzgerald] helped shaped the most fundamental stuff of Margaret Mitchell’s imagination.’ Of her grandfather and great-grandfather, Mitchell said: ‘They were both Irishmen born and proud of it and prouder still of being Southerners.’”

In the end, that was the tradition that Margaret Mitchell arose from. Being attacked as a pro-slavery person would have wounded her very deeply.

Is “Gone With the Wind” really racist? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below?

The days of "No Irish Need Apply" were a dark chapter in the journey of the Irish in America.

From the 1840s and 50s, when the Irish arrived in America by the hundreds of thousands, fleeing the devastation of the Great Irish Famine, to the turn of the century, discriminatory ads and job listings were commonplace throughout the United States. 

"No Irish or Catholics wanted," some read. "Positively no Irish or Jews need apply," others declared. 

As we now know, in spite of these challenges the Irish were able to set down roots and forever change the course of American history, with Irish immigrants and their descendants building skyscrapers and digging subway tunnels; becoming Hollywood icons like Philadelphia-born Grace Kelly, captains of industry like Chicago-born Walt Disney, and even presidents of the United States.  

Tullamore D.E.W., the world’s second largest Irish whiskey, has launched a stunning new campaign inspired by the amazing journey of Irish emigrants in America, the struggles of the days of 'No Irish Need Apply', and the strong, diverse communities that have been forged since then.

One of the brilliant new ads in the Beauty of Blend campaign harkens back to the days of No Irish Need Apply when Irish immigrants to America faced discrimination in housing and employment as they attempted to build new lives.  

The short film centers on an Irish bartender who keeps a No Irish Need Apply sign behind the bar as a reminder of how far the Irish have come.

“No Irish Need Apply,” he says, ruefully shaking his head before launching into a powerful monologue.

“Who built the bridges?” he asks, as the Brooklyn Bridge comes into focus outside the window. “Scraped the city skies? And bled with your sons?”

“Blend is the backbone of this place,” he declares.

“We were all them once. Now we’re just us. Just U - S.”

“I am blend. So are you, and you, and that other fella, too. We are all blend, from the beginning to the end.”

Then they raise their glasses and toast to the beauty of blend.

The campaign was created by New York agency Opperman Weiss, with the No Irish Need Apply ad and another film set to the Irish air Danny Boy both directed by award-winning filmmaker Laurence Dunmore. Tullamore D.E.W. previously worked with Opperman Weiss and Dunmore on their award-winning 2013 ad set to the song The Parting Glass, which Creative Online hailed as “The envy of other booze ads."

This time around, Tullamore D.E.W. decided to focus on the Irish emigrant story because of how integral it is to the global success of Irish whiskey and of Tullamore itself. The distillery first opened its doors in 1829 in Tullamore, Co. Offaly, reaching new levels of success when the fortuitously initialed Daniel E. Williams worked his way up from a stable boy to the owner. But it was emigrants who helped it grow to become a global powerhouse - currently the world’s second largest Irish whiskey brand, selling 1.1 million cases annually.

“Irish whiskey in 1800s-1900s couldn't have been dependent on the Irish market because the population was too small," Global Brand Ambassador John Quinn explained. “So instead it followed its emigrants around the world. Irish emigration is part of our DNA.”

So much so, he explained, that when Tullamore D.E.W., - which is now owned by William Grant & Sons - was acquired by John Powers & Son in the 1960s, it was strategically decided that Tullamore D.E.W.’s focus would be the export market.

“As a brand, we wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for Irish emigration,” agreed Caspar MacRae, Tullamore D.E.W.’s Global Brand Director. “Where they moved they took their love of Irish whiskey and we grew as a brand, meeting the demand of emigrants around the world.”

He explained that for this campaign, Tullamore D.E.W. had been interested in exploring “the social history of Ireland and Irishness around the world. Opperman Weiss came up with this proposal, and it drew a parallel with what happened historically, what people go through today, and the benefits emigration can bring. It's a heartfelt reminder.”  

That spirit is also embodied in Tullamore D.E.W.’s signature triple blend, a triple distilled blend of all three types of Irish whiskey – grain, malt, and pot still. The sweet softness of grain whiskey, the light spice from the pot still, and the fruitiness of the malt come together to create a unique of flavor that makes Tullamore D.E.W. stand out among Irish whiskeys.

For MacRae, this also gets at the essence of what sets Irish whiskey - and Tullamore D.E.W. in particular - apart from all other whiskeys and scotches.

“There's a big difference in how whiskey is enjoyed in Scotland and in Ireland,” he said. “Single malt is about exclusivity, solitude, connoisseurship, whereas Irish whiskey has a much more social history and present.

"It’s about the local community, the pub culture, great conversation, and bringing people together.”

This post is proudly produced in partnership with Tullamore D.E.W. Find out more on IAmBlend.com

Check out Tullamore D.E.W's other short film "Danny Boy".

Pop-Up Gaeltacht has quickly spread around the world and now you can visit it live!

Join IrishCentral as they visit a Pop-Up Gaeltacht in New York.

What is a Pop-Up Gaeltacht you ask? Well, in Ireland, the name given to a region of the country that is Irish-speaking and where a majority of Irish-language speakers live is the Gaeltacht and some enterprising young Irish speakers in Dublin decided to start up their own. 

Sick of hearing the same old excuses that the Irish language is dead and that nobody is speaking it, two friends, Peter Kavanagh and Osgur Ó Ciardha, decided to take to Dublin's pubs to prove all the nay-sayers wrong. 

Marketed as a chance to meet up with a few friends, have a few pints, and solve the world's problems over them through Irish, the first one was held just last December and it wasn't long before it became a national and international phenomenon. 

Just for example, the monthly Pop-Up was held in Dublin this evening and look at this crowd who turned up to use their cúpla focal in Irish and to enjoy each other's company while using the language. 

Támíd anseo. #hup #PopUpGaeltacht pic.twitter.com/xnNwmFSYMh

— Rónán Ó Muirthile (@AnRonanEile) October 26, 2017

And that's just tonight in one place in the world. New York happened to hold the second ever Pop-Up Gaeltacht, taking it international immediately, and now on their third gathering, IrishCentral is popping along to see what all the fuss is about. 

Join us as we go live from William Barnacles Tavern at 8.30 pm (EST) tonight (Thursday, October 26) to speak to the learners and Irish speakers about Pop-up Gaeltacht and why they love it so much. 

Beatha teanga í a labhairt! (The life of a language is in speaking it!)

You can find out more about the Pop-Up Gaeltacht movement here.

Have you attended a Pop-Up Gaeltacht before? Let us know what you thought and whether you'd like to organize one yourself. 

Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe has been admonishing the heads of 11 banks and financial institutions over a rip-off mortgage scam which wrested extra income from thousands of customers and even cost some their homes in repossessions.

In a series of meetings over three days, concluding on Wednesday of this week, the minister has been urged to threaten the banks with heavy fines and to fast-track legislation to impose the penalties.

Up to 30,000 customers have lost hundreds of millions of euros in what has been dubbed the tracker mortgage scandal.

Taoiseach @campaignforleo speaking on the tracker mortgage crisis at an event in Donnybrook with @MurphyEoghan pic.twitter.com/5Kcxm6Mqt4

— harrymcgee (@harrymcgee) October 26, 2017

Effectively what happened is banks are accused of wrongly raising extra interest when they forced customers off loss-making tracker mortgages in the post-crash period.  Some of those who were overcharged struggled to meet their increased repayments, and some lost their homes.

On the first day of this week’s meetings just one bank publicly apologized.

Permanent TSB’s chief executive Jeremy Masding said he was “sorry” to those overcharged.

On Tuesday AIB, which is 71 percent state-owned, and Ulster Bank apologized publicly.

But Bank of Ireland and KBC, which has its parent company in Brussels, declined the opportunity to show remorse for those who have lost their homes when pressed by reporters on Monday outside the Department of Finance.

Sinn Fein’s finance spokesman Pearse Doherty insisted banks should be hit hard in the pocket by reversing sweetheart tax deals if they don’t move fast to compensate victims of overcharging.

Opposition politicians call for greater accountability from financial institutions following tracker mortgage issue https://t.co/3rRi8j06lY pic.twitter.com/bXXqkhZiog

— RTÉ News (@rtenews) October 25, 2017

Joan Burton of the Labour Party has accused the banks of being in a “cartel” – and of operating an “organized conspiracy” to defraud mortgage holders in the trackers scandal.  She said it was time for the gardai to open its own investigation.

The government is now expected to largely accept a Fianna Fail motion calling on the banks to outline a compensation timetable. The motion, being debated this week, calls on the banks to formally apologize to customers and says the government and the Central Bank should consider drastic action to end the controversy.

Leading financial expert David Hall, chief executive officer of the Irish Mortgage Holders Association, said the tracker scandal is the “largest scam ever perpetrated on customers in the state.”

Some financial experts reckon customers are owed up to half a billion euro in refunds.

Central Bank Governor Philip Lane, who had a special meeting with Donohoe on Monday morning before the bank chiefs were called in for their dressing down, said banks have already paid out €163 million in redress and compensation and there is no upper limit to the amount of compensation to be paid, hopefully before Christmas.

Meanwhile, pressure continues to mount for criminal prosecution of leading bank personnel.

Irish Times commentator Fintan O’Toole suggested there was an apparently strong prima facie case for criminal investigation of the deception of tens of thousands of customers at a time when banks were under enormous pressure to show that they were returning to profitability.

Donohoe has said he will outline a number of options available when his meetings with the bank executives are concluded.

A commitment by the banks to speed up repayments and compensation to avoid government moves towards sanctions seems the most likely outcome.

There is expectation that demands for criminal prosecutions will be put on the long finger, or even rejected.

What a difference a week makes for Michael Fassbender.  Two weekends ago the Irish-German hunk was celebrating his wedding to Alicia Vikander with family and friends on the sun-soaked island of Ibiza.

But reality hit with a bang last weekend as Fass, star of some new stinker named The Snowman, suffered the worst reviews of his career.  The turkey, allegedly a thriller, only scored a measly 8 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, and critics were not in a good mood.

The Toronto Star howled, "Such abundant talent, yet what we get on the screen is like a snow cone made with horse urine." IndieWire called it an “icy, mostly lifeless waste,” while the opening line of the review in The Los Angeles Times said the film amounts to a “wretched waste of time and talent.”

How the heck did Fassbender, a double Oscar nominee who always turns out good stuff, get involved in such a pile of garbage? Who knows, but it won’t be around for long. The Snowman melted at the box office, earning only $3.4 million last weekend. 

Hopefully MF is incommunicado somewhere, still enjoying his honeymoon!

Por favor, les ruego que no vayan a ver Snowman. La fui a ver sin antes mirar Rotten Tomatoes y me arrepiento de todo. pic.twitter.com/MQhK0GJaBq

— Dada (@dadatina) October 23, 2017

The Irish are renowned storytellers and Halloween is our time to shine!

The storytelling tradition in Ireland goes back to ancient times, when the Seanchaí – Irish storytellers – were the definition of entertainment, holding the key to all of Irish folklore, myth, and legend. 

The tradition survives strong today, from the lore surrounding the Blarney Stone to storytelling festivals, to everyday conversation. 

This Halloween, we want you to unleash your inner storyteller and tell us your scariest stories and spoooookiest encounters.

Is there a chilling tale that's been passed down in your family? 

Have you ever visited a haunted place or had an encounter that terrified or confounded you with its supernatural explanation? 

Or, maybe you have a photo that accidentally captured some paranormal activity or a video with some ghostly going ons. 

Tell us! Leave a note here in the comment section, or email submit@irishcentral.com 

On Halloween, we'll pick the scariest of the stories to spotlight and share so we can all have scares a-plenty. 

There's no better time to get in touch with your spooky side! White witch Helen Barrett provided us with some simple spells you can try out this Halloween.

Simple love spell

To gain the love of someone:

On a night of the full moon, walk to a spot beneath your beloved's bedroom window. Whisper his/her name three times to the night wind (el alder). It is believed that the night breeze has a guardian; this guardian is compassionate to mortal requests between 12.00 midnight and 1am (the witching hour).

Attract good fortune

You will be damn lucky with this one.

You will need a candle, some string, and a trinket. Light the candle and loop the string in through the trinket and tie it. Then start passing the trinket above the candle-flame while chanting: 

A candle flickers, This trinket I pass, Good energy and fortune come to me, Wealth, Knowledge, Influence, Energy, By good means come to me, Wealth, Knowledge, Influence, Energy, This trinket I pass into power, To attract, To me, Wealth, Knowledge, Influence, Energy, Come To Me!

Repeat that three times, then wear the "necklace" around your neck. The more you do this, the more powerful. Enjoy!

Beauty spell

This spell makes you prettier than you think, just follow the instruction below.

On a full moon, take a mirror and go outside. (If you can't then open a window but make sure the moon is reflected off the mirror.) Take a piece of a picture (hair, lips, eyes, whatever you are interested in changing), place it on the mirror, concentrate on it and say:

Moonshine, Starlight, let the wind carry your light, let your glow cover my body, and let your shine cover every eye.

Say it three times and concentrate on the part that you want to change. Then say:

Moonshine, Starlight, shape and mold my body, as a rose is granted beauty, let me blossom in your light, the light that brings me beauty, and grants me beauty three times three.

Say it three times and when you are finished light a candle (pink) or incense.

To get someone to call you

This spell will make the person of your choice call you.

Take a piece of parchment or fine quality writing paper and inscribe the name of the target. Write it in a circle twice, so the ends meet. As you do this, concentrate on the person's face and your desire that they call you. Then, while still concentrating, put a needle through the center of the circle created by the name. Place the charm by the phone.

The call will come within five minutes, five hours or five days, depending on how well the spell was cast and how much will power was used.

Have you tried out these spells? Let us know how they worked out in the comments section, below. 

Helen Barrett, the White Witch of the Isles from Cobh, is the leader of 3,500 Irish witches and wizards. 

* Originally published in 2010. 

Irish Diaspora Minister Ciaran Cannon denied claims that the Irish government will cut its 2018 budget funding for the diaspora.  

“In a press release and in statements to the Seanad there has been an assertion that the 2018 funding for the diaspora has been cut. This is not the case,” Cannon said on Monday.

“It is important that the correct position is highlighted. I am pleased to confirm that the Department’s overall current expenditure… has actually increased by €2.2 million, from €69.6 million in 2017 to €71.8 million in 2018.

“The government remains fully committed to supporting Irish communities abroad. It is important for our communities abroad to know this,” Cannon continued.

“Not only has the government not cut funding for our diaspora this year, but we are finding new ways of funding supports for groups such as returning emigrants. For example, the application process is currently open for a new program called Back for Business, a mentoring program which will assist returning emigrants to set up new businesses.

“There is no truth in any suggestion or perception that the government is cutting funding to the Irish abroad.”

Irishman John Lonergan, hailed as a hero in the American Civil War, is remembered as a hero of Gettysburg. He was also leader of the Vermont branch of the Fenian Brotherhood, a forerunner to the Irish Republican Army.

Lonergan, born in Carrick-on-Suir in Tipperary in 1839, immigrated to the US with his family in 1848. It is said that the Lonergans were on the run from both the Great Famine, as well as British oppression. In Vermont, John Lonergan worked alongside his father as a cooper.

In 1862, Lonergan formed a company of fellow Vermont Irishmen to volunteer to fight the Confederates. Lonergan did so with the mindset to gain more military skill to help the cause of Irish freedom.

Lonergan served for the Union in two stages, 1862-1863 and 1865. His efforts at the Battle of Gettysburg earned him a Medal of Honor, which cited him for “Gallantry in the recapture of 4 guns and the capture of 2 additional guns from the enemy; also the capture of a number of prisoners.”

One hundred and fifty years later, in 2013, a memorial was erected to him in Burlington, Vermont. 

Following his services in the Civil War, Lonergan helped organize a pair of failed raids into Canada from staging areas in St. Albans. The Fenians’ quixotic aim was to pressure Britain, which ruled Canada as a colony, to surrender control of Ireland.

To learn more about John Lonergan, take a look at Irish American William L. McKone’s book ‘Vermont’s Irish Rebel'

A member of the board of directors of the New York City St. Patrick’s Day parade filed a complaint in Westchester County Supreme Court last week alleging that the board as it currently exists is illegal, and that all actions taken by the board and its chairman Dr. John Lahey since a June meeting are also subject to being overturned.

Brendan Lynch, elected to the board in January of 2016, filed the complaint in response to what he believes was a stolen election at a June 7 meeting in which he claims he was elected vice chairman of the board.

Read more: Sean Lane confirmed as Vice Chair of the NYC St. Patrick’s Day parade

At the meeting, Lynch received seven votes from the 12 board members who were present. Sean Lane, also elected to the board last year, received five, but proxies counted after the meeting from members not present rendered Lane as the winner.

Lynch, a parade volunteer for more than 25 years, states in his complaint that Lahey is “unfit to remain as a director of the corporation or as a member of the parade committee, and should be removed from those positions permanently,” a charge he also levels at Lane.

Lynch contests that Lahey validated his election at the June meeting, but took “illegal” actions afterwards that shifted the result in Lane’s favor.

“As the election for the office of chief administrative officer was being held, chairman Lahey called for a ruling on whether Lynch could run for this office because he already held the office of vice chairman, this acknowledging the election result,” the complaint states.

“Well after the close of business, on or about June 11 or 12, Lahey announced that the already closed election of Lynch was done in error and that, owing to proxy votes, the true winner was Lane.”

The complaint asks the court to “name Mr. Lynch to the title of vice chairman for a full term.”  It also says that any business conducted by the board after the June meeting is “voidable … and all votes and decisions must be voided, and the board must revert to its composition as it was before June 7, 2017.”

The complaint does not specifically mention the election of philanthropist Loretta Brennan Glucksman as the 2018 parade grand marshal in a board vote taken at the end of August as being “voidable.”  Glucksman was formally unveiled as the grand marshal of the parade at an event at the Irish Consulate last Tuesday, and Lynch was one of those present on the night.   He gave no indication to members of the board at the party that two days later, he would be filing a formal complaint.

Earlier this year, the board passed a motion that allows the chairman to suspend any board member who files suit against the parade, which means that Lynch is subject to suspension.

Lahey is currently out of the country and was unavailable for comment on the latest legal salvo aimed at the parade.  Previously he has said that 2018 will be the last year he leads the St. Patrick’s Day parade.

With such history behind Irish pubs, is it any wonder that you'll come across loads of haunted pubs in Ireland?

Haunted Irish pubs from Dublin to Kerry, from Donegal to Galway, are sure to be a frightfest this Halloween as the night where the divide between the living and the dead brings ghouls and goblins out to mess with you feet and make you tumble as you step up off your bar stool and are completely responsible for putting a spell on you to make sure you spend a few more bob behind the counter. 

If you want to add a little fright to your Halloween scoops this year, why not visit one of these top Irish haunted pubs. What’s better than a pint on Halloween with some ghosts?

Renvyle House Hotel, Renvyle, County Galway

Despite being burnt down by the IRA and then refurbished, the several ghosts of Renvyle House Hotel refuse to leave their old haunt here in Galway.

Famed poet W.B. Yeats was witness to some strange happenings - doors moving by themselves, groans, and bed sheets and people being thrown out of their beds. And these ghosts have a touch of voyeurism as they’ve been spotted in the mirror by female guests who were undressing!

Kyteler's Inn, Kieran Street, Kilkenny, Co. Kilkenny

This inn was named after Dame Alice Kyteler, known as ‘The Witch of Kilkenny, since this site was where her house once stood. After she outlived several wealthy husbands, accusations of wrongdoing and witchcraft arose.

She beat the charges but Alice’s servant Petronella was burned at the stake. Some believe it is Petronella who now haunts the inn, while others believe it is Dame Alice herself.

The Brazen Head, 20 Lower Bridge Street, Dublin

What would a pint in Dublin’s oldest pub be without a ghost or two for company? The spot, though it is not the original building, was used by “Bold” Robert Emmet for meetings. He was hanged in 1803 but still reportedly visits the Brazen Head in ghost form, resorting to his place in the corner and looking out for enemies.

Read more: Secrets of ancient Irish charms and spells for Halloween

Ballygally Castle Hotel, Larne, Co. Antrim

This 17th-century castle was home to Lady Isabella Shaw and also were she was imprisoned after giving birth to a girl instead of a boy. Brokenhearted, she clutched her baby girl and jumped to her death.

The ghost of Isabella has been known to knock on doors to scare guests. Perhaps more scary is the crying of a baby that has been heard throughout the castle.

Bull and Castle, Lord Edward Street, Dublin

This birthplace of poet James Clarence Mangan (1803), who was best known for his “Róisín Dubh,” is said to still be haunted by Mangan. Mangan died of cholera in 1849. When Mangan’s ghost drops into the Castle Inn the temperature is said to dip and the mood darken.

Kavanagh's ("The Gravediggers"), Glasnevin, Dublin

Surely a pub next to a cemetery won’t be without its own ghosts! Kavanagh’s, also known as ‘The Gravediggers’ due to its location near Prospect Cemetery, originated in 1833 and was named for former landlord John Kavanagh, who fathered 25 children.

An observed tradition at this pub is to order a pint by throwing a shovel of earth from the cemetery against the pub’s wall. The site is said to be frequented by an older man in old-fashioned tweeds who sits and enjoys a pint, until he disappears without a trace.

Ross Castle, Meath

This castle was built in 1533 by the lord of Devon, Richard Nugent, also known as "The Black Baron." Legend has it that in 1536, the Baron’s daughter Sabina snuck out to meet a man named Orwin at a bridge towards the end of her father’s property. Sabina’s father the Baron was English, and Sabina’s suitor was the son of an Irish lord, thus making an improper match. The two eloped by taking a boat out to Lough Sheelin.

The boat tragically capsized, killing Orwin and injuring Sabina so that she would not wake for three days. When she did, she awoke to Orwin’s body laid out in the palace chapel. She died of shock soon after.

The two are buried nearby the Castle, but the story goes that Sabina’s spirit returned to Ross, while Orwin’s returned to his family’s home. Sabina’s screams have reportedly been heard late at night in Ross Castle.

Read more: Halloween Irish whiskey-flavored pumpkin pie recipe

The following three Castles make up what are considered "Offaly’s Haunted Triangle:"

Charleville Castle

This castle was built between 1798 and 1812 by the 1st Earl of Charleville, Charles Bury. It is believed that Bury was a devil-worshipper and his ghost now walks among the dungeons, catacombs, and tower of his castle.

The castle is also haunted by the ghost of a young girl who fell down stairs to her death in the early 1800s, around the time the castle was being built. She still roams the castle and has been heard moving furniture, laughing and talking.

Leap Castle

Leap Castle is inhabited by several ghosts. One, perhaps the most frightening, is that of a foul smelling elemental creature that is half human and half beast. It is said to roam the lower regions of the Castle.

A ghost of a young girl, believed to be the daughter of a one-time owner of the Castle, also haunts the site. The story goes that her father killed the boy she was in love with, so she in turn killed her father one night during his sleep. The following day, the girl was pushed off the castle by an invisible hand, falling to her death from what is believed to be the ghost of her own father’s hand.

Many visitors have reported eerie moaning and weeping sounds at night, as well as lights at the top of the Castle, perhaps the young girl wandering about mourning her lost love.

Kinnitty Castle

The “Phantom Monk of Kinnitty” has been seen gliding along the room of the Banquet Hall in this Castle.The Phantom often stops to look out of a particular window overlooking the courtyard.

Sometimes, he even communicates with staff members or visitors of the Castle, The Geraldine Room and the Elizabeth Room are said to be two haunted bedrooms in the Castle. In other areas of the Castle, eerie presences are often felt.

Where have you visited in Ireland that you found majorly spooky? Was there an Irish pub that felt very haunted to you? Let us know below.

H/T: Irish Independent.

* Originally published in 2011.

The Clooney Foundation for Justice announced that Clooney, who has Irish ancestry, would award the money in a quest to uncover corruption throughout Africa.

American actor George Clooney has gifted $1 million to The Sentry, the investigative initiative he founded to uncover corruption and fight against war crimes in Africa.

The actor, who has Irish ancestry, made the announcement via his charity The Clooney Foundation for Justice, who revealed that the large gift would go toward uncovering the financials networks that are behind conflicts within countries in Africa.

Clooney stated that the donation was being made so as “to make sure war crimes don’t pay.”

“We want to make it more difficult for those willing to kill en masse to secure their political and economic objectives.

Read more: Court records show George Clooney’s Irish family had their land stolen

“When we’re able to go after the warlords’ wallets and bankrupt those who choose the bullet over the ballot, suddenly the incentives are for peace, not war; transparency, not corruption.”

The Sentry has now received donations of around $3.4 million from generous benefactors such as actor Don Cheadle, jazz drummer Carl Allen, and businessman Ruben Vardanyan, as well as its founder Clooney himself.

In a statement about the actor’s gift, The Sentry stated that the money will be used to fund investigations and reports over the next year on “state looting and illicit financial flows out of the war-torn countries of South Sudan, Sudan, Congo, Somalia and the Central African Republic.”

The aim of these reports is to provide information and evidence  to banks and governments so as to allow for the groundwork to be set for possible legal action in the future. The initiative hopes to be able to seize the assets of those who are responsible for financing genocide or other war crimes, or those who benefit from  the war crimes in some way.

Read more: George Clooney: Irish were treated terribly in America and not accepted

Founded by Clooney alongside human rights activist John Prendergast in 2015, The Sentry consists of “a team of policy analysts, regional experts, and financial forensic investigators that follows the money in order to create consequences for those funding and profiting from genocide or other mass atrocities in Africa, and to build leverage for peace.”

“The Sentry is pursuing a new strategy to counter mass atrocities that would utilize the tools of financial pressure normally reserved for countering terrorism, organised crime and nuclear proliferation,” Prendergast said.

“We aim to undermine the pillars of the war economy and disrupt the financial flows that fuel conflict. Unless the links between conflict and corruption are confronted, peace will remain a distant dream.”

Do you think high-paid celebrities such as George Clooney should intervene more in the world’s largest problems and conflicts? Or should that role fall on government or people in general?

H/T: Irish Times

Lee Harvey Oswald should have been under surveillance, John F Kennedy’s assassination could have been stopped

Two days after the assassination of Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director J. Edgar Hoover issued a strong plea to the Justice Department that there be no independent investigation into the death of President John F Kennedy.

Hoover knew that if the FBI and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had done their job Kennedy would never have been shot. Hoover succeeded in claiming national security concerns were at stake and he never told the true story even under oath to the Warren Report.

That story was that due to utter incompetence by the FBI and CIA Kennedy had lost his life in Dallas.

Lee Harvey Oswald under surveillance

The documents show Oswald was immediately portrayed by them as a lone wolf, a loner who could never have been identified.

It was all poppycock. Oswald had been under very direct and aggressive surveillance in the months before the assassination and both the FBI and CIA knew all about his ties to Cuba and Russia. They had been watching him since 1959.

If you were asked to name the top three enemies of JFK, in 1963, they would have been Cuba, where JFK was trying to kill Castro, Russia, who had just climbed down from a nuclear war, and Oswald, filled with hate for Kennedy and recorded on a wiretap by the FBI threatening to kill JFK.

Yet Oswald was able to get a job in the Texas Book Depository on the Kennedy motorcade route two weeks before he killed Kennedy a fact seemingly missed by the intelligence agencies.

Of all the people likely to shoot Kennedy in Dallas that November day Lee Harvey Oswald was definitely the top name.

Into the bargain he was a Marxist, a marine sharpshooter who had purchased a rifle by mail order and even had pictures taken off himself with it and he was considered mentally unstable in intelligence reports.

How he wasn’t under surveillance that day is mind boggling to contemplate.

Yet neither the FBI nor CIA surveillance of him revealed he had got a job in a building in the JFK motorcade route and was in it the day of the president’s visit.

The FBI and CIA apparently never asked the question: Where is Lee Harvey Oswald this day of the president’s visit?

Kennedy was betrayed by desperately poor intelligence work and the FBI and CIA knew it as the new documents make clear.

FBI's quick cover up

As writer Philip Shenon, author of A Cruel and Shocking Act: The Secret History of the Kennedy Assassination, wrote the FBI cover up began right away with the agents ordered to destroy a note that Oswald  himself had delivered to the FBI office in Dallas threatening violence if they did not cease their surveillance of him. He was such an obvious target for surveillance that the cover up goes on today with the Trump administration pulling most of the evidence at the last moment for “national security reasons”.

What national security reasons could there be for a killing now almost 54 years old - other than to keep the lid on how incompetent the agencies responsible for American security acted like the Keystone Cops that time before and during Kennedy’s visit.

One subsequent FBI Director however told the truth. In his memoirs Clarence Kelley stated bluntly Kennedy should not have died that dreadful day.

The evidence gathered by the CIA and FBI should have put his name in “red lights” as the major threat to Kennedy, he argued.  Kelley wrote that if the FBI and CIA had done their job “without doubt JFK would not have died in Dallas and history would have taken a different turn”.

Amen to that.

The Friendly Sons of St Patrick in New York is still cool on women members - but transgender men are ok.

The society is the oldest Irish organization in the United States, founded on St Patrick’s Day in 1771 and even counted George Washington as an honorary member. Dedicated to providing for the welfare of Irish immigrants it has a long history of tending to the Famine stricken and destitute.

“We’re a 234 year old fraternal organization,” the branch’s President Matthew McLaughlin told IrishCentral.

“And by definition of being a fraternal organization our members are all male.”

Personally McLaughlin favors allowing women but remains coy as to whether that will happen anytime soon.

“I think it might happen some day,” he said.

“We do discuss it as an option and I think that someday it will probably happen but at the moment the membership of the Friendly Sons would like to keep it all male.

“As generations move along people reevaluate the rules that they abide by within their society and at some point it wouldn’t surprise me if the membership and the leadership did reevaluate the bylaws and rules of membership but I can’t make a prediction as to when that’ll happen.”

Transgender men, he continues, would not be precluded from membership - although he adds, “I haven’t given it any real consideration."

Two years ago the Philadelphia branch made news both in Ireland and America when it decided to admit female members in time for its 245th anniversary.

The then Irish Ambassador to the United States, Anne Anderson,  as its first ever female honorary member to much fanfare and President Joseph Heenan said the change was “long, long overdue”.

Read more: Female Irish Ambassador calls on Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick to allow women

97 miles to the east however, the New York chapter still caps its membership to 1000 men and change isn’t on the agenda in the immediate future.

Other than that to join you have to be of Irish origin, have an interest in Irish affairs “and you have to be a person of integrity, vouched for by two members.”

The branch organizes events that women are able to attend but still precludes them from membership.

Regardless, he does not believe many women would apply if the ban was lifted.

“I don’t see a tremendous amount of interest in the Irish female community to join the Friendly Sons of St Patrick to tell you the truth.”

Like most societies, the Irish have a long history of gender segregation slowly wilting with the passage of time.

Read more: Things that Irish women could not do in 1970s

Generation of students at Trinity College, Dublin have wandered past a glum statue of Provost George Salmon who once proclaimed that, “Over my dead body will women enter this college”. Fittingly perhaps he died in January 1904 - the same month the college  applied to King Edward VII for permission to admit women.

Other institutes took longer to desegregate: it was not until the 1960’s that the college’s debating societies deigned to admit women.

Portmarnock and Royal Dublin Golf Clubs however still deny women membership - something Rory McIlroy called “outdated” and “unacceptable” earlier this year.

A legal challenge to Ireland’s Supreme Court in 2009 however found that such clubs do not in breach  equality legislation.

Lee Harvey Oswald should have been under surveillance. John F Kennedy’s assassination could have been stopped

Two days after the assassination of Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director J. Edgar Hoover issued a strong plea to the Justice Department that there be no independent investigation into the death of President John F Kennedy.

Hoover knew that if the FBI and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had done their job Kennedy would never have been shot. Hoover succeeded in claiming national security concerns were at stake and he never told the true story, even under oath to the Warren Report.

That story was that due to the utter incompetence of the FBI and CIA Kennedy had lost his life in Dallas.

Lee Harvey Oswald under surveillance

The documents show Oswald was immediately portrayed by them as a lone wolf, a loner who could never have been identified.

It was all poppycock. Oswald had been under very direct and aggressive surveillance in the months before the assassination and both the FBI and CIA knew all about his ties to Cuba and Russia. They had been watching him since 1959.

If you were asked to name the top three enemies of JFK, in 1963, they would have been Cuba, where JFK was trying to kill Castro, Russia, which had just climbed down from a potential nuclear war, and Oswald, filled with hate for Kennedy and recorded on a wiretap by the FBI threatening to kill JFK.

Yet Oswald was able to get a job in the Texas Book Depository on the Kennedy motorcade route two weeks before he killed Kennedy, a fact seemingly missed by the intelligence agencies.

Of all the people likely to shoot Kennedy in Dallas that November day Lee Harvey Oswald was definitely the top name.

Into the bargain he was a Marxist, a marine sharpshooter who had purchased a rifle by mail order and even had pictures of himself taken with it and he was considered mentally unstable in intelligence reports.

How he wasn’t under surveillance that day is mind-boggling to contemplate.

Yet neither the FBI nor CIA surveillance of him revealed he had got a job in a building along the JFK motorcade route and was in that building on the day of the president’s visit.

The FBI and CIA apparently never asked the question: 'Where is Lee Harvey Oswald this day of the president’s visit?'

Kennedy was betrayed by desperately poor intelligence work and the FBI and CIA knew it as the new documents make clear.

FBI's quick cover up

As writer Philip Shenon, author of "A Cruel and Shocking Act: The Secret History of the Kennedy Assassination," wrote the FBI cover-up began right away with the agents ordered to destroy a note that Oswald  himself had delivered to the FBI office in Dallas threatening violence if they did not cease their surveillance of him. He was such an obvious target for surveillance that the cover-up goes on today with the Trump administration pulling most of the evidence at the last moment for “national security reasons.”

What national security reasons could there be for a killing now almost 54 years old – other than to keep the lid on how the agencies responsible for American security acted like the Keystone Cops before and during Kennedy’s visit.

One subsequent FBI Director, however, told the truth. In his memoirs Clarence Kelley stated bluntly Kennedy should not have died that dreadful day.

The evidence gathered by the CIA and FBI should have put his name in “red lights” as the major threat to Kennedy, he argued.  Kelley wrote that if the FBI and CIA had done their job “without doubt JFK would not have died in Dallas and history would have taken a different turn.”

Amen to that.

Ever since checking Facebook first thing in the morning became the norm, we live our lives online - from #bloggers posting about their every move to you and I liking, sharing and commenting on people we barely know. We’re living in a post-privacy world. It’s become widely accepted that anyone and everyone can snoop, “creep” or even indulge in public shaming online. There’s no line, no privacy, and no one to hold us back.

Justine Sacco infamously felt the impact of this modern conundrum when one ill-advised tweet left her without a job. Now, the WP29 want to make us more aware of our social media and enforce legislation which protects our information from potential employers.

In conjunction with recent GDPR talks in Europe and increased privacy legislation, it’s now likely that in the future it will be illegal for employers to snoop on job candidate’s social media profiles. This would mean that your future boss won’t be allowed look through your Instagram, Twitter or Facebook posts – unless they have a direct reason to do so.

The people behind these recommendations are the WP29, a group made up of representatives of each of the EU’s national data watchdogs. The opinions of this group aren’t legally binding, but they are heavily influential so are worth noting.

What the potential ban would mean

The WP29 argue that employers should not search potential employees Facebook or Twitter, unless they have an explicit reason to do so. For example, if an employer heard a potential employee was bad mouthing the company online this would be a valid reason to check a person’s Facebook page. However, if while on the person’s Facebook page they noticed other unnecessary information this must be ignored.

What is defined as necessary and relevant differs from country to country, but this will be unified and made clearer once GDPR is enforced in 2018.

The WP29 adds that before prospective employees submit a job application, the company must tell the applicant if they plan to check their social media platforms, and employers cannot force employees to accept friend or connection requests.

Key points to be aware of

The aim of the ban is to reinforce privacy, decrease discrimination and avoid unconscious bias.

- Just because information is public doesn’t mean it should be reviewed unnecessarily.

- Job applicants must be made aware from the offset that their social media will be viewed.

- Social media profiles should only ever be looked at to review relevant information.

- Profiles used for business aren’t likely to be affected – e.g LinkedIn

- If an employer sends a friend or follower request you are not obliged to accept, and this shouldn’t be held against you.

In the current digital age, where we document our every move it can be easy to accept a personal or business connection scanning through your social media but it’s important to remember that sometimes privacy should come first. The above opinions aren’t currently enforced by law, but are likely to come into play once GDPR legislation is introduced in 2018. In the meantime, be mindful of what you post and always keep your privacy settings up to date.

Thinking of moving to Ireland? Search Irish jobs opportunities