The Fianna Fail government in Ireland has released the austerity plan it promised in response for the big bank bailout the rest of Europe forced on it. The most telling aspect of it is that it lowers minimum wage from 8.65 euro to 7.65, a cut of 11.5%. But it retains Ireland’s controversial 12.5% corporate tax.

Poor little Ross Douthat, this analysis gig of his is so hard, especially while the fantasy world of conservatism continues crashing all around him when his primary job is to keep that fantasy alive, at great cost to the real world. Today we find little Ross taking on the crash of the Irish economy. In flailing about for an explanation of what has happened to this former poster-child of Chicago economics run wild, Douthat briefly flirts with an accurate explanation of what went wrong, but then pays proper homage to his overlords by discarding the painfully obvious truth in favor of yet another conservative talking point that is easily demonstrated to be false.

In the midst of tracking news of Gaza this week, I heard the report that the Saville Commission on Bloody Sunday had – after 38 years – found that the actions of the British government on January 30, 1972 were “unjustified” and “indefensible.”

Second wave of Freedom Flotilla to Gaza begins, Israel still blocks full accounting of casualties during attack on Monday.

There are predators, and then there are enablers.

It doesn’t matter if we are talking about child sexual abuse committed by Roman Catholic priests, deceptive Wall Street bankers, or DOJ-sanctioned torture. The game being played right now is the same, in all three venues: avoid accountability.

It’s been almost three weeks now since I wrote about the U.S. decision to revoke the visa of prominent Irish anti-renditions activist Edward Horgan, and not much has changed. The revocation came only a month before Dr. Horgan was slated to visit the United States to attend a major conference at Duke University on the battle against the government’s use of extraordinary rendition. What does the Obama administration fear from the presence of Dr. Horgan? If there is fear, it is on the side of those who politically oppose U.S. policies, and see the revocation of Horgan’s visa as political retribution against policy critics.

In dealing with the current crisis in the Roman Catholic church of child abuse by its priests, the symptom the church is confronting is the abuse, but the underlying disease is a love of power. So long as Benedict addresses only the symptom and not the disease, real healing cannot occur. He called for “decisive action” and “complete honesty and transparency” in his letter to Ireland. A good place to start might be for more bishops to offer their resignations, and for Benedict to start accepting them.

Edward Horgan, a well-known Irish activist and former Irish Defense Force officer, has had his 10-year, multiple-entry U.S. visa revoked without explanation. Horgan and others believe it is because of his principled stand against the U.S. use of renditions, and in particular, the use of Shannon Airport in western Ireland as a stopover for U.S. rendition flights. The Obama administration should be ashamed for its behavior in keeping Mr. Horgan from entering this country.

Where would humor be if you couldn’t tell the one about a priest, a rabbi and a witch walking into bar or watch an episode of South Park about a litigious, celebrity-filled space alien cult or their classic “All About Mormons“?