Anyone checked on Tadhg Hickey lately? Hope he's doing ok 💔

"No new wars" really just meant "f*ck Ukraine" and everyone knew it.

Also Trump can bomb Ukraine to get Donbas for Russia, I don't know at this stage

Jesus

We are in the timeline when Rubio is proud that there are no US sanctions against Ukraine 🤝 "Well, the administration has continued to increase pressure on Moscow.... The administration continues to sell weaponry to Ukraine. We don’t sell weapons to Russia and we don’t sanction Ukraine. /1

Remember how Lynn Boylan said Sinn Féin strongly supported Ukrainian sovereignty in the European Parliament? Well, guess what, she and her fellow SF MEP Catherine Funchio abstained on this vote. It's nothing new but some people hold on to their illusions on where SF stand in this war.

The coalition of the willing to drink vodka in Kyiv with the lads when the missus is on a spa weekend 👌

Bhí dhá díospóireachta an-suimiúl againne inniu ar @tusaite.bsky.social Bhí an chéad ceann faoin gcomoradh an lae ionraigh na Rúise i gcoinne na hÚcráine. www.rte.ie/radio/rnag/c...

Ok Slovakia started an energy blockade of Ukraine to help their Russian friends to freeze Ukrainians. Lovely stuff, hope Slovaks are proud of themselves.

I spoke to @irishexaminer.bsky.social about the fourth anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Thank you for having me @deshocks.bsky.social ! I think it's my gravest assessment of the situation in all four years of the current war. www.irishexaminer.com/news/spotlig...

Szijjarto just said that ah well we care about the Hungarians of Transcarpatia, so no energy blockade for Ukraine. The callousness of these people truly has no limits. Russia bombed the critical to them oil pipe and instead of diversifying away from Russia they rush to freeze Ukrainians.

Hungary and Slovakia are also threatening to cut off electricity imports to Ukraine because Russia bombed an oil terminal. What's next, gonna bomb Ukraine together with their Russian friends? Why not if they are so happy to act as belligerents by electric blockade?

“The only way that one can make the argument about NATO’s strength with a straight face is when focusing purely on the alliance’s military capabilities. … Crucially, though, none of this matters if NATO is politically weak.” My latest for @wpr.bsky.social

It's not that the US wants to leave NATO, they just want to change it into the Warsaw Pact

It speaks volume for Sinn Féin's policy on Ukraine when Stalinists, in this case Geoffrey Roberts, come in its defence. And everyone else responds that it's bonkers Putin appeasement.

Any American business that invests in Russia deserves whatever Russia will do to it afterwards lol

Historian of medicine here. Yes. Yes, they did.

Should be published next to the Atlantic's recent article on how a child dies of measles. The times we live in are truly horrendous.

Ukraine is reaping the benefits of the rift between Elon Musk and Donald Trump, for a change. Until last year, Musk has been pandering to the Russians and I was convinced that they were using smuggled Starlinks with his full operational approval. But now he's against that, miraculously.

In terms of what cures are being lost: - Epstein-Barr virus is perhaps the major trigger for multiple sclerosis - herpes simplex virus causes cold sores, genital herpes, infections in babies, deadly meningitis - shingles virus causes an intensely painful disease

This is like Cultural Revolution but people will suffer and die across the globe, not just Trumpists.

It is a little known fact that if one throws humanitarian aid at Russian missiles and tanks, Russians retreat.

Manufacturing the age of consent www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

I'm seriously concerned that at this pace a year or two in this is going to go mainstream.

This is all I think about when people post about Obama these days. He started the neo-apeasement of Russia by the US that got us here where we are now.

Tá comhluadar is fearr sa domhan agam agus mé ag scríobh an tráchtais.

My new favourite genre of youtube is summaries of Russian small businesses crying because the increased wartime taxes make them go bust. Pro-war businesswomen in faraway Irkutsk. Non-political owners of fancy boutiques in Moscow. Gives me hope that maybe time is not on Russia's side after all.

Macron is back to his old self. I still remember his Putin-defending nonsense in 2022. It wasn't missed. www.bbc.com/news/world-e...

Writing is better when done beside a snoring cat.

He makes it sound like the Russians are merely trying to buy land off Ukraine, not leveling Ukrainian cities and freezing people to death.

Editing is easier than writing, I am finally happy to confirm from my PhD'ing towards submission.

Bhíos ar @tusaite.bsky.social anocht i stúideó RTÉ Corcaigh. Bhíomar ag plé Minneapolis, agóid Bánú agus comhoibriú fiunnimh is slándála sa Mhuir Thuaigh. Éist siar anseo: www.rte.ie/radio/rnag/c...

But why can't Trump bribe the Russians to leave all Ukrainian territory? Like if that's as simple as that. If everyone is supposedly so greedy and braindead as him?

'You cannot deescalate with a tiger when your head is in its mouth'. Said Churchill. Or maybe Tommy Shelby. Someone should!

I'm happy to see the end of the lie that the US is capable of upholding international commitments, not sure if the UA govt feels the same. Any US-UA deals at this point are an empty letter, but UA doesn't have the luxury to walk away. It would only justify Trump embracing Russia openly.

There's Northern lights over Ukraine and Ireland *envy in my corner of Cork city intensifies*

If this was an advertisement in early 20th century Ireland, it would read like this: Nukes! Nukes! Nukes!

Some responses to the fallout from Trump's Greenland campaign remind me of January 2022 when I began to realise that my little world was about to go out of the window forever. When the changed reality hits you in the head, it helps to both face fears but also to see the new reality for what it is.

It's crazy how it only took a year for the US to ally with the Russians without it becoming an official doctrine (yet?). How long before the US starts helping Russians attack Ukraine, if they aren't yet.

I have roughtly one chapter worth to (re)write for introduction, prologue and conclusion. It's nothing compared to ca. 80k words that I had pushed out of me in the past year, God help me.

Ok all draft chapters are on paper now. Here's to rewriting intro etc and to lots of editing. Le cúnamh Dé I will finish this thesis before it finishes me.

Have you ever had a feeling that a certain monograph should exist in a particular field, but you can't find anything like it, and then thd happiness when you finally do? Carole Fink's Defending the Rights of Others on history of intl minority protection 1877-1938 is that book for me.

It reminds me a bit of the story in Feb 2024 when a few Palestinians were kicked out of a Sinn Féin pro-Palestinian rally in Belfast because they heckled the invited speaker - Palestinian Ambassador.

The famous 'militarisation' of Europe that is suddenly happening, as we were told during the last year's presidential campaign in Ireland. I can blame Europe for complacency towards Russia all I want, but the increase in defence spending has been dramatic since 2014.

After recent failures with sourdough I gave up and baked with fresh yeast 🤝

There's something darkly ironic in the fact that Belfast refugees of 1922 are a homeless theme in my dissertation. I keep cutting them out of chapters and moving them to others only to be unhappy with their new position. One day I will settle on a definitive chapter for them but it won't be today.

Nukes are the only protection left in this lawless international order. Twas a nice residually rules-based international order we used to have.

Спонсор сьогоднішнього різдвяного столу, а точніше його відсутності 😂 👏

Same old tune the before Russians concocted new theories why they want Donbas or any other parts of Ukraine in particular. Crimea was different, a Russian apocryphal story that drunk Khruschov unfairly gave it to Ukrainian SSR already existed.

Jens Stoltenberg memoir has a curious point on that. He and others in Labour Youth League in Norway, protested against American nukes in Europe during the Cold War. He wonders why that was that nobody protested against Russian nukes, not even mid-range ones that literally threatened Europe.