A few decades back there was an Irish politician who implored the warring factions in the Middle East to give up violence because although they were separately Jews and Arabs, he said, at the end of the day they were ultimately all Christians. And even in more modern times, Enda Kenny, our new Taoiseach but back in 2002 just the newly elected leader of his battered political party, caused a bit of an uproar when he delivered a speech in which he related an anecdote about how a Moroccan barman in Portugal had once told him that a cocktail on offer in the bar, the Lumumba, was named after “some nigger that died in la guerre”. “Nigger” is what the barman had said and Enda was merely retelling the story but it caused a storm here at the time. The world has become more sophisticated since and last Thursday at the White House, Enda delivered a speech marking the now traditional St Patrick’s Day visit to Washington by senior Irish politicians. We’re unlikely to ever find out what the host, Barack Obama thought of Enda’s speech and it is not likely to have been a significant part of that day’s presidential work. But I think it worth examining the speech because it is pretty typical of the standard of our new leader’s speeches. Enda Kenny has never been the world’s greatest orator and his skills probably lie elsewhere. That said, the speech from last Thursday was so bad that it might have been diplomatically insulting, it was certainly inarticulate. Here it is, in full, together with comments in bold.
“Mr President, thank you for your warm invitation to join you here tonight.
Fionnuala [Enda Kenny’s wife, but you all knew that right?] and I are honoured and delighted to be here on behalf of the people of Ireland.
On St Patrick’s Day, we remember our proud leaders.
Michael Davitt from my own province of Connaught.
The O’Neills and the O’Donnells of Ulster.
O’Connell of Munster.
O’Bama…of Leinster.
I can tell you, that in the history of the English language, never has a single apostrophe meant so much to so many. [Hmmm, a Churchillian reference which originally applied to the RAF during World War II “never was so much owed by so many to so few” A bit grovelling and not very Irish particularly with our doggedly neutral position in the war, but we’re only starting and it’s good to open with a joke]
Yes – there’s no one as Irish as Barack Obama. [Now this is where Enda really starts making people uneasy. For a start there are some 4m Irish natives in Ireland that would probably claim to be more Irish than Barack. And let’s call a spade a spade here – I’m no expert on Barack’s genealogy but apparently his father’s family is from Kenya whereas his mother was American-born, of mostly English descent with German and Irish figuring someplace in distant history. Indeed you really need go back to the 1850s to a man named Fulmouth Kearney to find Irish ancestry. Fulmouth was from Moneygall in County Offaly in the Irish midlands and is one of the great-great-great-grandfathers of Barack, so you could probably say that Barack is 1/32nd Irish. Of course we are very proud indeed of that 1/32nd being Irish but c’mon “there’s no one as Irish as Barack”? Perhaps we should lighten up and accept that this is meant in a humorous way but it just seems to strike the wrong note]
And Sir, they’re [they will be] queuing in their thousands to tell you [what?], in Moneygall [Barack might just about recognize that placename as the small village in Ireland from where his great-great-great-grandfather hailed, but I’m willing to bet that many in the room were scratching their heads – Money? Gaul? France? Is he asking for a loan?] when you visit us in May.
Let me assure you Mr President that the news of your decision [“decision”? The US made a “decision” to invade Iraq and Afghanistan, surely a softer form of words around the idea of “invitation” could have been framed] to come to Ireland has already caused quite a stir and you can count on a huge Cead Mile Failte [I would have said that half the audience would understand “Cead Mile Failte” – which means “A hundred thousand welcomes” in Gaelic and is a traditional form of welcome address to visitors] from the Irish people.
Tonight, as we gather here in the White House…
We remember the people who began the journey for us….[when you use the word “begin” in the context of Irish emigration to the US, you should be going back to the 16th century, at least – indeed contrary to what you might think of Christopher Columbus, we Irish hold that an Irish monk, St Brendan made it to America in the 6th century]
Driven out by An Gorta Mór – the Great Hunger – when the potato….from the New World failed…..[this was hardly the beginning of Irish emigration to the US. The potato famine in the 1840s certainly directly led to 1-2m emigrants from Ireland arriving in other countries including the US, but Irish emigration, particularly to the US had been a feature of life in Ireland for centuries. Also this is where the speech starts to really descend into schmaltz – “the potato from the New World”]
In scattered lines they make for the quayside.[here Enda is talking in the present tense so obviously he is aiming for some dramatic effect]
Their only sound, the slow slap of their soles on the emigrant flagstones. [and now, he’s definitely starting to take flight into the heavens of literary language]
Herded like cattle onto ships…they know that now is not the time to cry for the typhus, or the cholera. [what does this mean? “cry for typhus, or the cholera”? Does he mean that emigrants had cholera and typhus before leaving Ireland? Do you actually cry from cholera which tends to kill you through dehydration? Is the reason they are not crying that they don’t want to be turned away from the ships at Irish quays because of a fear by the ship’s crew they have cholera? If so are they being selfish in boarding a confined space where they will infect others?]
Or for the gut-busting American corn and the savage segregation of the Workhouse. [what is this about? Why is American corn “gut-busting”? Surely you mill corn to get flour and make bread, why would the end-product be “gut-busting”? And what was the “Workhouse” with a capital “W”? In Ireland we most definitely had workhouses in many towns during the famine where those who hadn’t food or money went and, if admitted, they were given accommodation and food in return for their work. But again what does this reference mean here?]
But ours was not a self-contained adventure. [“adventure”? Does he mean ordeal? ]
On another Atlantic coast, another people were waiting...[And here Enda manages to insult some 1bn people by describing Africans as “a people”. The Irish (all four million of us) are one people and one billion Africans from 50 countries and God knows how many cultures are “another people”]
Waiting to be herded onto ships.
They wait in dungeons. Blind-prison. Chained, fettered.
Husbands calling out for wives. Wives for husbands. [I’m no historical African anthropologist but is the term “husband and wife” appropriate to the very many cultures subjected to slavery in the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries?]
Mothers soothing children, perhaps, not even their own. [at this point I imagine Enda was pinching himself with tweezers in his pants pocket to portray some emotion. This is probably the depth of the schmaltz in his speech]
Singing in notes so small, they can hide among the hymns sung by their captors in the chapel overhead. [What chapel? So the slave-masters were good Christians attending chapel and signing hymns? And the slaves weren’t (see below for more religious controversy)? And what is a small note anyway?]
Two peoples. [Yes the 4m Irish people and the 1bn African people]
On the far coasts of one ocean where, in the words of our Nobel Laureate…Seamus Heaney.
“Tireless waves, came glinting, sifting from the Americas.”
Africa’s Cape Coast.
The shores around Ireland’s Cape Clear .
Two peoples who will cross that dividing ocean.
The Irish to freedom...[The Irish weren’t slaves in their own country. Sure the British ruled the country and demanded allegiance. But Ireland had its own parliament. And whilst there was certainly nothing that resembled a modern day democracy, it was hardly slavery that described conditions generally in Ireland. And just for the record, many Irish were deported to America and Australia to work as slaves eg during the Oliver Cromwell campaign in the 1640s]
The Africans to…slavery [Actually history tells us that slavery was endemic in Africa long before Europeans developed the transatlantic slave trade and in some African territories, over one half of the population was regarded as being slaves. Of course that really doesn’t take away from the point Enda is making]
Though they don’t yet know it, in time, theirs are the genes that will [“help”, presumably, unless Enda wants to insult the remaining peoples of the world beyond Africa and Ireland by claiming the two peoples of Ireland and Africa are exclusively to be credited] build America.
The genes that unite us here at this White House designed by an Irish architect.
To claim [what this does mean “to claim”] and to celebrate St Patrick who came to redeem the soul of a people...[now this is getting quite religious which is generally fair enough in the US, but see below]
And he was a slave [well that’s not really true. Although Patrick was kidnapped from his home in Wales by Irish marauders and was held as a slave for six years in Ireland when he was a teenager, he eventually escaped and fled the country. He then became a priest in Wales/France and it was some years later when he returned to Ireland – as a free man, not a slave – to spread Christianity].
Mr President at Cape Coast Castle, you said it seemed as if the walls were talking.
They might have said,
Respect,
Mercy,
Obligation,
Never…again [and here Enda has a go at the Jews who tend to own that expression “never again” after the Nazi holocaust].
Because I believe the intense, unyielding but compassionate Patrick, unites us here today, not alone in our Irish ancestry, but in our common heredity [what does that mean? It is just about understandable that Enda obviously has Irish ancestry and Barack is 1/32bnd Irish, but what is meant by “but in our common heredity”?]
President Kennedy’s ‘Family of Man’.
Just two weeks before he died he said,
“If our society is to promote the family of man, then let us realise the magnitude of our task.”
Today, I believe we are, indeed, united in this task.
Aware of its magnitude.
Whether the family of man must be promoted across the valleys of Kenya [hat tip to Barack’s Dad’s home], or the mountains of Ireland [fine but he might have promoted the Emerald Isle a little more, perhaps “green fields of the Irish midlands”], or the scattered islands of Indonesia [hat tip to where Barack spent some part of his youth], or today, in the wreckage of Japan [And here Enda insults 130m Japanese people because Japan isn’t wrecked, a large part of the country is suffering from the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami and the nuclear plant situation remains a deep concern, but the country is not “wrecked”]
Or whether we must take it, Mr President, to all those still “huddled around radios”. [thus starts a pretty confused and meaningless passage in this speech. The “huddled around the radios” term is taken from Barack’s speech upon winning the presidential election in November, 2008 “And to all those watching tonight from beyond our shores, from parliaments and palaces, to those who are huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of the world: Our stories are singular, but our destiny is shared, and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand”]
Only this time, the corners are no longer “forgotten”...[What on earth is Enda talking about here?]
They have barged onto our tv screens, ransacked our consciousness, stormed our world. [Again, what is Enda talking about? The Middle East? North Africa? Japan again? The Mayo county gaelic football team?]
This is our task, not alone because we are leaders of our countries. [What is our task? To promote the family of man -well that’s fairly nebulous; shouldn’t a “task” be more specific?]
But because we are fathers…and parents
Teaching our children, our countries’ children about, duty, and about obligation…
The need to fight cruelty, injustice and inhumanity wherever it happens. [I may be wrong here but wasn’t that Captain America’s motto?]
Our stories, might indeed, be singular.
But we know that our destiny, our children’s destiny, is a shared prospect. [Again Enda is invoking Barack’s “Our stories are singular, but our destiny is shared” phrase from his election victory speech]
“Do as I do”. Lead, teach by example. Create a future from the unknown.
You will visit us, Mr President, in a short time.
I hope when you do your stay will symbolise the life-giving bond between Ireland and America.
We are your gateway to Europe. And I can say right here, right now, that gateway is wide open and ready for business. [Possibly the strongest two sentences in the entire speech]
And with our new government, our new mandate from the people, it’s in good, safe hands.
Mr President we meet, almost at the Spring Equinox, when new light returns to our lives. [That’s very weak indeed. The “new light” surely begins at the winter solstice in December?]
But you will come to us in May…
The start of the Celtic [true, but it’s also pagan] Summer…or as we call it…
Bealtaine…the Feast of the Bright Fires [Bealtaine of course is an old pagan festival. So although St Patrick might have come “to redeem our souls”, we’ll still mark Barack’s visit by reference to paganism. And although Bealtaine was indeed celebrated by the lighting of fires, it was also marked by bouts of partner-swapping as the villagers would go and rut like animals in orgies amongst the newly-planted crops in the fields so as to encourage a good harvest later on. Perhaps better not to mention that one here though]
And when you do you will return to your own people, your own place.
Mr President you will come…home…to Ireland. [Or more accurately, you will visit a small village in the Irish midlands where you will indeed get a warm welcome though there will be small protests against Guantanamo, Iraq and extraordinary rendition flights which may have passed through Ireland’s Shannon airport. In the main though the people will be delighted to see a visit by a symbol of change and hope (still in Ireland, even if the US has become a little unenamoured with you). You are still regarded here as cool. More importantly you represent the massive cultural, commercial and technological produce of the US that is welcomed and devoured here. Mind you, it’s not a one-way trade and the US has benefited from Irish emigration, investment, culture and indeed technology. And even though you’re only 1/32nd Irish, you represent the pinnacle of achievement in a democracy that provides opportunity to even the progeny of a shoemaker from a tiny Irish village]
So, tonight let, let the word go forth from this time and place [from John Kennedy’s Inaugural Speech in 1961, “Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans”], high and clear into the eaves of this city…[this is not John Kennedy and what does it mean anyway – “high and clear into the eaves of this city” – literally it means nothing in the sense that it is not important for “the word” to end up in the roof gutters of Washington buildings – figuratively I’d guess that he means that the word will be heard in the heavens or will be heard loudly by policy makers in Washington but if he does, it’s a clunky way of expressing it]
That the bonds between Ireland and America are as warm [are bonds warm?] and strong as they have ever been, in the history of our two great countries.
Warm and strong and vigorous
Because we are united…inspired…sustained…by our faith [our religious faith? If so better back-pedal on the Bealtaine reference above] …
Our faith…in the Audacity…of Hope…[at least Barack had a plug for his book entitled “The Audacity of Hope” still available on Amazon.com for only USD $16.50]”
So I have no idea what Barack Obama thought of Enda’s speech but apart from the plug for the book at the end, he might have thought that it was quite clunking, hitting the wrong notes and in places, insensitive. And would you ever quit with the slavery leitmotif already. Personally I think Barack would have been left wondering if he had just heard a prime ministerial speech from the leader of the same English-speaking country that gave the world Swift, Yeats and Joyce. Who knows, maybe he thought that Enda had drink taken and was more worried that he might start a fight afterwards. Hopefully he will have taken the speech as an overture of friendship and of a continuing commitment to engage constructively with the US, with whom we have significant relationships. Enda though, needs to up his game as far as giving these keynote speeches is concerned.
UPDATE: 26th March, 2011. A report in this week’s Irish Examiner demonstrates the thinking behind creating this post. In Thursday’s edition the newspaper reported “An EU diplomat said: “Mr Kenny thought the offer was a trap. But his campaign-like speech irked Merkel and Sarkozy and now France and Germany have dug in.”” The paper was reporting on Ireland’s recent attempts to secure a reduction in the interest rate charged on the EU element of the bailout. We have no real information to conclude what Enda said and we can’t easily establish if it was Enda’s speech which apparently “irked” our French and German friends. What we do know is that the interest rate on our EU bailout has not been reduced and that Enda’s speech in Washington was atrocious. So the claim reported in the Examiner is credible.
UPDATE: 31st March, 2011. It’s not clear if it’s describing the same event but Channel 4 journalist and presenter, Faisal Islam today tweets that “So I just got quite an interesting internal account of what happened between new Irish leader Kenny and Sarko/Merkel at the Euro Council” and “”Kenny was v cocky: “we are new Gov, bailout has to change”. Content/ attitude stark comparison to humble Papandreou. Merk/ Sarko v upset”” and “EU source: “Kenny had a terrible impact”. But, also said, that EU more sympathetic because Irish exports are growing vs no growth Portugal”. This is probably referring to the EU summit on 24th/25th March, 2011. It’s completely unverified of course. But I think that it will be worthwhile tracking Enda Kenny’s engagements and communication faux pas (alleged or actual)
UPDATE: 24th May, 2011. The speech in Washington on St Patrick’s Day is now available at youtube here from about 9 minutes in..
NAMA Wine Lake 
Shame, what used to be an excellent site and information resource on NAMA has turned into an Enda bashing site.
Shame what used to be a fantastic resource on NAMA is turning into a Enda bashing site
@ Darragh/Frank, we don’t do people- or organisation-bashing on here, though past criticism of Housing Minister Michael Finneran dragging his feet with producing a house price register and of the National Consumer Agency, probably comes close. What the entry above does do, is bash a dreadful speech delivered in an important setting by our head of state. It sets out in some detail the reasons for the opinion the speech is considered abysmal and implores Enda to up his game in this regard. From recollection there have been two other entries on here about Enda Kenny – although one entry also criticises his oratorical skills, it pays tribute to what he has done for the FG party and for delivering a strong government and the other one draws attention to his salary (along with the salary of his Tanaiste and the President) whilst giving him some credit for unilaterally reducing it.
If you think the above entry is unfair, maybe you could suggest why. Meantime I hope Enda dispenses with the slave narrative, there’s a lot more to Barack Obama and Ireland’s relationship with the US which we should be able to celebrate. And in matters of international relations we could perhaps be a bit more sensitive and diplomatic. And in general Enda might ditch the overwrought but meaningless rhetoric – there’s a job to do here and he might do better in future to deliver more workaday speeches.
I am with Darragh/Frank. Namawinelake used to be a very good source of original analysis, and often was in ahead of the mainstream media on Nama/property related topics – uncoverng new info etc…. Now, the site has degenerated into just another silly commentator on all things current affairs. And a bad one, at that. Stick to what you know. Only there can you add value. This post is symptomatic of the recent slide in standards on Namawinelake.
ps – I am not an Enda lover. But this humourless analysis of his speech is way, way over the top. And it is badly written, to boot. Stop trying to entertain everybody, and go back to keeping them informed on property issues, where you kow what you are talking about. You had a good niche. Don’t mess it up by becoming just another online motor mouth.
Frank, Darragh, mp fire… I smell blueshirt trolls…
Just cos Enda Kenny lucked into the job of Taoiseach doesn’t give him immunity from criticism.
That speech is awful. A national embarrassment.
Namawinelake’s dissection of it is a public service rendered no where else.
Look, the purpose of the criticism is not meant to be backward-looking. Let’s face it – Enda in the White House on St Patrick’s Day in 2011 is an easy gig. As international relations go, the bond that unites Ireland and the US is mighty, so all Enda had to do was to turn up and “say what he saw” – there was no delicate diplomatic choreography required to avoid difficult topics. An Irish leader today would need do far more than deliver an atrocious speech, however well-meaning, to damage Irish/US relations.
The concern is, that in future, Enda will be representing our country in discussions with those whose position towards Ireland is less benign than the US’s and the sort of mis-judged raimeis that was delivered last Thursday won’t just be diplomatically embarrassing but may cost us dearly in terms of our prospects and reputation.
@mpfire, sorry you didn’t find the entry well-written. I’d like to say I wrote it in a style which was meant to be an homage to the standard of the speech itself, but sadly that is not so. You say you are not an Enda lover but that implies you are missing the point. The above entry was not about Enda Kenny, it was about his atrocious speech which to summarise was
(1) diplomatically insensitive by lumping all Africans together as “one people”, describing Japan as a “wreckage” , claiming it was African and Irish genes that built America and claiming Barack as our own when plainly we share his heredity with others.
(2) incomprehensible in parts with phrases which meant nothing
(3) unsympathetic to an audience that mightn’t know villages in Offaly, Enda’s wife’s name (we barely know Michelle and Carla, Fionnuala might have benefited from an introduction) or Gaelic
(4) cloying to the point of schmaltz
(5) ignorant in terms of our history
(6) clunking, didn’t flow well, invoked inappropriate British/Jewish semiotics
And which dwelt on slavery and black slavery in particular to the point it was just ground-openingly embarrassing. Seriously I thought that, Father Ted-style, Enda was going to whip out a slide-projector and show a still of Kunta Kinte and nod “a fine lad”.
To let you in on a little secret, I hope Enda does succeed because God knows we need a leader to deliver us from the hole we’re in. This entry has not been about Enda the man, indeed it is probably the folks on Massachusetts Avenue in Washington that have more questions to answer with respect to this God-awful speech. But for the future, certain speeches and interactions with our international friends will be crucial to our country’s success and I hope we will see changes in this regard.
Well, I can’t disagree with you NWL, Enda definitely ned to sack Jackie Healy-Rae and Cecelia Ahern as his speech writers. However, he was with someone who occasionally drops his own bloomers when out without his tele-prompter so I’m sure that he will be forgiven.
”No, no. I have been practicing…I bowled a 129. It’s like — it was like Special Olympics, or something.”
—Barack Obama, making an off-hand joke during an appearance on ”The Tonight Show,” March 19, 2009
And with tongue firmly in cheek, what about your own
– “And let’s call a spade a spade here – I’m no expert on Barack’s genealogy but….. “
Hah WSTT, yes even a US president makes gaffes, though they are mostly of the unscripted kind. My teenaged niece has told me in no uncertain terms that Cecelia Ahern’s books are not cloying and the plots/narratives make sense, so there! You’ve got the advantage on me with Jackie Healey-Rae – I think I’ve only heard him deliver a couple of sentences at most at any one time. As for colourful language on here….
The only partial excuse I can think of for the quality of Enda’s speech last Thursday was that Barack’s people had just dropped the bombshell (no pun intended) about the visit in May and there was some hasty re-writing of the speech to acknowledge the visit. That said, most of the speech was probably written months ago and to the extent that this was prepared for Enda by others, I think he should be challenging those who drafted it and if no-one in Enda’s circle is telling him the speech was dreadful then he has a problem. Because in Washington, the speech was accepted as being well-meaning, however awful it was and Enda was speaking to a friendly audience. If Enda delivers a speech of the same standard in France or Germany or elsewhere the repercussions might be more that mild discomfort.
All the comments attached to Endas speech are way too critical. This is a time when Ireland and The United States remember their links with each other going back many generations.
It is very difficult for a Taoiseach who has just taken over a huge burden from a failed and embarrasing previous administration. He is trying very hard and has made many positive impacts since taking office.
@ Jon “He is trying very hard and has made many positive impacts since taking office.”
Name them?
“What the entry above does do, is bash a dreadful speech delivered in an important setting by our head of state.”
@NWL Enda Kenny is not our Head of State, he is our Head of Government, i.e. Taoiseach.
Kenny is a horrendous public orator, but his public oration skills are not the reason why he was put into the Office he now holds.
@Merv, he is our head of state (small “h” and small “s”) in the practical sense though I take your point about the ceremonial sense. As readily conceded above and elsewhere, there is more to leadership than delivering good speeches. But do you think Enda Kenny wrote the speech above himself?
Creating a nice bouquet in Washington on St Patrick’s Day with a good speech would have been nice, but the speech probably did impart the feeling that it was well-meaning and that Ireland values our friendship with the US and sees much commonality of experience. However, the entry above was intended to draw attention to a dreadful speech in a safe environment because in a more challenging environment a bad speech will cost us. This is from the Irish Examiner yesterday
“An EU diplomat said: “Mr Kenny thought the offer was a trap. But his campaign-like speech irked Merkel and Sarkozy and now France and Germany have dug in.””
http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/kenny-forced-to-take-rate-cut-off-table-149204.html
Being diplomatically insensitive, inappropriate and clunking in Washington on St Patrick’s Day is embarrassing but will probably not cause lasting damage. Delivering the same standards elsewhere will cost us dearly as suggested above. And I would suggest that Enda’s friends and colleagues need dispense with some misplaced sense of loyalty and honestly explain the effect of these shortcomings to our head of state.
Article 12.1 There shall be a President of Ireland (Uachtarán na hÉireann), hereinafter called the President, who shall take precedence over all other persons in the State and who shall exercise and perform the powers and functions conferred on the President by this Constitution and by law.
Wikipedia put it more simply: The President of Ireland is the head of state of Ireland.
Article 13.1.1 The President shall, on the nomination of Dáil Éireann, appoint the Taoiseach, that is, the head of the Government or Prime Minister.
Mixing up the terms is not a licensed free-form art and it annoys me when people use them in very loose manners. There is no “I take your point about the ceremonial role” about it.
Notwithstanding your loose uses of the above terms, I do take your points about his abilities to ‘represent’ us properly on the world stage.
However, I would put Enda anywhere ahead of Bertie; it was always cringeworthy having to listen to someone like that who had barely two words of English and made you want to curl up foetal.
Did we really need an article which was basically just a list of every tiny little thing that could be nit-picked about the speech? I mean, saying that the word “invitation” should have been used instead of “decision?” You might as well just re-write his speech for him, no offence to you and I’m not trying to be cheeky but this just sounds like someone who was bored and wanted to rant about something. And no, I’m not an Enda supporter, just giving my opinion.
@Bobby, funny you should comment on this entry from March today. I closely studied Enda’s speech yesterday evening on College Green and it was difficult to believe it was the same Enda who had embarrassed himself and us at the White House in March 2011. Yesterday he delivered a simple, impassioned, true-sounding, well-themed speech before a crowd that wasn’t backward in interrupting him. Gone was the hi falutin’ language that meant nothing, gone was the forced imagery of slavery, gone was sentiment that just hit the wrong note.
And if you studied Barack; in March Barack was smiling with his mouth, yesterday he was smiling with his eyes. A great speech, the word “improvement” wouldn’t begin to do it justice.
As for the entry above, it was drawing attention to what many have seen as a fault in our new Taoiseach and which several days after that speech in March was reported to have offended our partners in Europe during attempts at renegotiating the bailout. So sorry you don’t see the relevance of the entry, which has today been updated to link to the actual speech in March so you can see and hear how toe-curlingly bad it actually was. As I say, interesting you would draw attention to it now.
And lastly on yesterday’s speech, it was interesting to pick out the influences of the “Braveheart” speech before the Battle of Falkirk. Not too intrusive or noticeable, but they were there.
UPDATE: The Taoiseach’s speech is now available online here
http://www.taoiseach.ie/eng/Government_Press_Office/Taoiseach%27s_Speeches_20111/Taoiseachs_speech_at_President_Obama_celebration_event.html
[…] […]
Enda’s speech in College Green was mortifying. Why does he think that shouting makes him sound passionate? And who wrote that horrible nonsense about “the Irish harp glittering over the heart of the English Queen”??? Did Kenny swallow a book of sonnets as a child? Sure, not nearly as bad as his White House embarassment, but seriously this man is a clown.
Enda Kenny is not an orator – his speeches IMHO are directed at his ‘Paddy’ person – a man who has never existed outside of strange, time long gone, Hollywood films about Ireland, which had white cottages, leprechauns, women in shawls et al.
He needs to sharpen up, he needs helps.
If he is writing this stuff, someone needs to take over.
If someone else is writing it – they need replacing.
What is more of a worry is that a Head of State cannot discern this and speaks this stuff.
@TalentCoop, before someone else leaps in, Enda is probably our de facto head of state though Mary McAleese still holds the formal title. The speech in March at the White House was abysmal, not because it was insensitive or ignorant, but it had the potential to do damage. If Enda can be insensitive to the many peoples of Africa or the people of Japan, then he represents a risk when dealing with France, Germany and the rest. I think the speech yesterday was fine, regardless of the source and he borrowed heavily from Barack Obama on St Patrick’s Day also (though given the audience was mostly American back then, they probably understood the friendly intentions). The funny thing is that Enda has so much more obvious resources than his predecessor, his appearance, his range of facial expressions and his accent. If only he had consistently decent speeches. I think the plagiarism is a storm in a teacup, it’s the themes that he needs watch and yesterday’s theme was fine, and for me at least his delivery was very good.
@Michelle.
did you not see the jewel encrusted harp brooch that HRH wore (on her left hand side just above her heart) during her visit – divine!
Your criticism of Enda’s speech at the White House on Paddy’s Day may not be too much off the mark when linked to his “high-volume” introduction to President Obama and his more recent speech to the diplomatic corps (“cry me a riverdance”).
namawalake
You are way over he top in your criticism of this speech.
The content was fine imo but the reason most americans will like this speech is because, at last ,they can hear a real irish accent from an Irish leader.
And not some west british dublin accent like the wolfhound sounding mary robinson.
[…] to Channel 4 reporter Faisal Islam which might have cost us millions; he disgraced us with a woeful speech at the White House on St Patrick’s Day, he failed to establish any traction with the main players […]