Lunch – Kennedy’s Bar, Merrion Square
After an eventful couple of weeks back in the old country, it’s very good to be back in town.
Regular service on The Overnight Note will resume on Thursday – maybe in a slightly tweaked format, more of which tomorrow – but the fact that we’re back on April 1st is just too good to miss. This one was easily my favorite:
Although it may be a wild guess that enough people will want one to make it a real thing by this time next year. Here’s the day’s best and worst from The Independent; from CNN and the best brand hoaxes from AdWeek. (Just don’t mention “Guinness Time.”)
In the meantime, in the occasionally barely-distinguishable “real” world, here are some of the stories from the past couple of weeks that I wish I’d been able to comment on at the time:
* WORLD * Clearly the tragic Germanwings crash in the Alps is one of those stories that’s almost too sad for words – and becomes even sadder with every successive drip of information about co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, suspected of deliberately causing the crash. Parent company Lufthansa, meanwhile, faces what the FT calls a “grim struggle”, its CEO having previously said that Lubitz was “100% fit to fly.”
It looks like we’re no closer to an Iran nuclear deal. Negotiators in Switzerland extended the talks deadline for another night with a “broad framework of understanding” not apparently yet enough to translate into a concrete deal. Markets think an agreement which would lead to a lifting of sanctions would “send oil prices further south.”
Things are still heading towards the fan at a rate of knots in both Yemen and Syria. In a much-needed explainer, The Economist speaks for most of us, asking “What’s going on in Yemen”?
Jon Stewart, meanwhile, analyzes the Middle East big picture thus:
“Holy shit! It took decades of destablizing conflict, but we finally figured out how to wage a proxy war against ourselves. We cut out the middleman, and now we’re just punching ourselves in the dick.”
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* POLITICS * A feisty Senator Bob Menendez pushed back after being indicted on federal corruption charges.
I’m angry because prosecutors at the Justice Department don’t know the difference between friendship and corruption and have chosen to twist my duties as a senator and my friendship into something that is improper. They are dead wrong and I am confident that they will be proven so.
As if to prove that political Culture Wars know no geographical boundaries, as corporate power mobilizes to oppose so-called “religious freedom” legislation in Arkansas and Indiana (where lawmakers are hoping to “fix” things before the spotlight of the weekend’s Final Four heats up), Belfast had its very own religion-and-cake-related trial, dragging poor Bert and Ernie into a spat between a bakery and one of its customers.
(image: Photopress Belfast/Daily Mail)
Ted Cruz said he was running for President and was wholly in favor of the Indiana legislation. Oh, and he doesn’t care much for the New York Times. The NYT itself meanwhile, reported that Jeb Bush may be moderating his support for the Indiana bill after initially joining Cruz and other GOP hopefuls in praising Indiana’s Governor, Mike Pence.
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* MEDIA * Jeremy Clarkson will be parting company with the BBC after his Top Gear contract was not renewed following a “fracas”. Tickets for his live show spiked as a result and a million people signed a petition calling for his reinstatement. If it wasn’t so serious, though, the most ludicrous part of this whole ludicrous tale is that alleged death threats were apparently made to the BBC’s Director General Tony Hall after the decision.
The Guardian won a legal ruling that Prince Charles’s letters to ministers should be made public.
Ah, Meerkat, we hardly knew ye?
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* CULTURE * Trevor Noah will be the new host of The Daily Show and it seems has already fallen foul of whoever it is out there that makes it their life’s work to trawl back through everything someone has ever written as soon as they become famous.
It was announced that Zayne Malik was leaving boy band One Direction. (Reminds me a little of the time when Robbie Williams left Take That, and the saddest story was about the Take That tribute act who had to fire their Robbie Williams impersonator – “Sorry, mate, it’s not you, it’s him”.)
Surgeons in Cambridge carried out the first transplant of a non-beating heart.
And if all of this doesn’t sufficiently exercise your disbelief, The X- Files is to return for six new episodes.
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* SPORTS * The Premier League’s highest-scoring Englishman Harry Kane cemented his position as the likely winner of the Young Player of the Year award by scoring after 79 seconds on his international debut in a European qualifier victory over Lithuania.
(image via NYSpurs)
Australia won the Cricket World Cup, a victory that retiring one-day captain Michael Clarke emotionally dedicated to Philip Hughes, who died after being hit by a ball last year.
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* IN MEMORIAM * Death never stops, even when the rest of us take a holiday, and we lost a few noteworthy individuals over the past couple of weeks, including Lee Kuan Yew – father of modern Singapore, whose history will likely always include the words “chewing gum” and “flogging”; guitarist John Renbourn of Pentangle; the Pet Rock inventor guy and Cynthia Lennon.
(For a fresh, somewhat askance look at obits, memorials and general stuff and nonsense “about death” check out the potentially brilliant new online mag with an outstanding domain suffix, TheReaper.rip)
Richard III was reburied from his car park resting place to Leicester Cathedral, complete with a state funeral and no shortage (ha!) of controversy. Polly Toynbee in The Guardian writes:
It’s comical, but tragic too, as a reminder of the indignity the British accept in their accustomed role as subjects, not citizens. Here are church, royalty and army revering a child-killing, wife-slaughtering tyrant who would be on trial if he weren’t 500 years dead. This is the madness of monarchy, where these bones are honoured for their divine royalty, whether by accident of birth or by brutal seizure of the crown.
In Dublin, “Flannoraks” – devotees of author Flann O’Brien in all his guises – gathered Wednesday at the Palace Bar for their annual celebration of his life and work. He died on 1 April 1966 and his writing is as funny as ever.
(image: painting by his brother Micheál Ó Nualláin, 1948 The Irish Times)
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* BRITISH POLITICS * In the story that will likely dominate the Note over the coming few weeks, the British General Election campaign formally got under way with the dissolution of the current parliament and its coalition government.
Election day is May 7th, with current projections showing no party likely to wind up with an outright majority and PM David Cameron throwing a bit of a spanner in the works by saying he’ll only serve two terms – assuming he gets re-elected for a second.
The first leaders’ “debate” was held – although it wasn’t really a debate, even if David Cameron and Ed Miliband appeared in the same studio, with the same audience and were interviewed by the same host – a combatively in-form Jeremy Paxman, who inevitably ended up as the star of the show – but not at the same time.
(YouTube/Channel4)
The second televised debate, featuring seven party leaders, is on Thursday evening.
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Finally, very sorry to hear that Joni Mitchell had been hospitalized. A great, great talent, may she have a speedy recovery.
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