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Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E25 – Taxation

Paul May 11, 2021

Today it’s all about taxes throughout history and the poor fools who beggared themselves in order to pay them. Taxation has a long history, and from biblical tales to popular culture, tax collectors have never ranked highly on the list of revered…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E24 – Jumping the gun

Paul May 6, 2021

I suppose that most of us are familiar with the phrase Jumping the Gun. We have all probably jumped the gun on a few occasions in our lives. While jumping the gun may be a fairly benign oversight in the humdrum of…

Revisiting the Fourth Estate: does the media still serve democracy?

Paul May 4, 2021

Revisiting the Fourth Estate: does the media still serve democracy? – A Radio Panel Discussion This panel discussion explores whether, in a changing media landscape and deepening global democratic recession, the ideal of the fourth estate is still desirable and attainable. Long-term challenges around objectivity,…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E23 – Gallileo, green eggs and ‘German’ science

Paul April 27, 2021

Have you heard the one about the bad scientists who called the good scientists’ science bad science? No? Well, I would like to tell you about them. Like so many historical goings-on, this episode is just one more preposterous example of an…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E22 – Don’t Mess with the Bourgeoisie

Paul April 27, 2021

A country operating at a feudal level in the late eighteenth century may, in the words of Lady Bracknell in Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Ernest, “be regarded as a misfortune.” A country operating at a feudal level in the early…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E21 – Agincourt to Passchendaele – a very muddy business

Paul April 22, 2021

Oddly enough, it was at a similar time of year, autumn, when that English army led by King Henry V faced French soldiers on a battlefield in Agincourt in 1415, and Lieutenant-General Sir Alexander Godley’s Anzac corps prepared to capture Passchendaele Ridge…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E20 – The Questionable Majesty of Queenship

Paul April 15, 2021

The funny thing about queenship throughout history is that it was normally seen as a perversion of the perceived order, an unjust inheritance as it were, by most men you’d care to ask, especially those in power. Primogeniture was the main vehicle…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E19 – Medieval mindset is the mother of all misogyny

Paul April 14, 2021

Misogyny is one of the most constantly repeated mistakes in history, a mistake made by generations of men who abused their positions of power. Even to this day in countries across the globe, many conveniently employ the lame excuses of ‘culture’ and…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E18 – Language & Literature

Paul April 14, 2021

As the mechanics of writing, papermaking, and printing made the written word in the shape of ideas, stories, doctrines, beliefs and theories more widely available, that method of providing information to the growing masses of the literate was harnessed by those religious…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E17 – Can you separate a work of literature from the political beliefs of the author?

Paul March 10, 2021

Can you separate a work of literature from the political beliefs of the author? The question relates to three of our most notable Irish authors – Flann O’Brien, William Butler Yeats and George Bernard Shaw. You know what I mean; you love…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E16 – The unsustainability of unaccountability

Paul March 3, 2021

The first verse of September 1913 by William Butler Yeats, accurately paints a picture of a country where greed and double standards could co-exist quite comfortably with mindless adherence to religious rules. For over two hundred years, one pervasive organization in Ireland was…

Oldfilibuster’s Rhyme & Reason – E15 -The Karenina Principle in Ireland’s Insurrections

Paul February 23, 2021

According to Tolstoy’s Karenina principle, the failure of one component results in the failure of the entire exercise. The failure to coordinate overseas military aid and nationwide support for the 1798 and 1916 rebellions is possibly a working example. An earlier discussion…