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There are people that will tell you there is a difference between Sinn Fein, the IRA, and the "Real IRA". They are all different manistifications of the same multi-headed monster, basically anarchist and nihilist terrorists, with even less ideology than the Muslim terrorists. Their original purpose was to rag on the British Crown, and English Parliament, then later on the US, whom they thought to be far too chummy with the British. All anti-Americanism is at its base, nothing more than an extension of anti-British sentiment.

But at heart, these Irish terrorists are only an extension of the basic Irish character, a people who would go out of their way to invent adversity if there was not enough of it already in their lives.

To add something here. Maybe it's related. Maybe it's not.

In the 1840's, over in the Northeast US, there was a political party known as the "Know-Nothing" party. It was a strong anti-Irish and anti-Immigration party.

It disbanded, and parts of that party became the Republican Party. The Irish in the US voted solid democrat until starting with Nixon in 68(because of LBJ), and many finally broke with the dems fully in 1980 with Reagan(Irish name, and he was also pro-life)

There still is, especially in the northeast a long running relationship between Irish and democrats, despite the fact that most Irish in the US are very if nothing else, socially conservative.

This may be relevant it may not be. When I lived in N. Ireland I took a job as a welder in a community not far from the border. There was one Protestant lad there and in the end he and I did not get on well with one another. It came down to a physical face off and the owner sacked him.

After he was gone the other guys were a bit more open with their sentiments. I welcomed this because it was "first hand experience". It was at least a biased way to "crack the code" in Northern Ireland. The people don't run around talking about it you see. But they're all one color and look the same to an outsider so it leads one to wonder, 'how do they sort each other out as Catholics or Prods?'. They do it by name or neighborhood if names fail. My accent always told them right away what to divulge to me before we ever got out of the starting block.

It turned out their opinion of the Prod not liking me (and it had been a remarked on phenomenom at this small place) was- He hadn't liked me because I was an American and we (Americans) more or less support "the cause" with our money. The Prod was a wanker though, not a victim and he was well known to have his ties to the UDF so before anyone gets the idea that he got fired unfairly, he wasn't a nice guy.

One day the foremen and I were having a conversation and he said in effect that he approved of what Mugabe was doing in Zimbabwe. "Those Whites have no business there", he said. It made me realize... He had never been there and I had. But he drew his conclusions from his Republican ideology. The Brits invaded his land and it was ok to resort to ugliness to oppose them- therefore, given a similar situation in Africa he must align himself with Mugabe and his minions.

I posted on some thread long ago just after 9/11 that many leftist ideologues have woken up and realized that they are aligned with bin Laden and the terrorists. We saw on television Arafat slapping a vein to donate blood- he was terrified- perhaps he of all people realized the "game is up". Gerry Adams is second in this line. Just as this article says- we may be forgiven for waking up to a new circumstance and realizing "things have changed". But there will be no historical mercy for those that watched events unfold but did not change their ways.