Hannibal, Mad Mel, Mosney And Me

"Can you stand to say I'm evil? Am I evil, Officer Starling?"
"I think you've been destructive. For me that's the same thing."
"Evil's just destructive? Then storms are evil, if it's that simple. And we have fire. And then there's hail. Underwriters lump it all under Acts of God."
-Doc Lecter to Clarice in the novel, "The Silence of the Lambs"

By Charley Brady

Why can I never meet your run of the mill psychopath that can give me a good argument like that? Just as well, maybe. I did meet Mad Mel once when he was filming "Braveheart" here but that was long ago when he was playing with a full deck...

Well, the Usual Suspects who find that they hate my column so much that they keep emailing me to tell I'm a nasty piece of business who should not be allowed to write for anyone will be happy this week.

After this column they'll probably think that I'm a cross between Uncle Adolf and Mad Mel Gibson, but that's OK. I know I'm sane. The voices have told me so and you can't argue with the voices.

You know what? I'll bet that they're reading this just the same. Let's be honest, if you have nothing better in your life than to be outraged by a journalist who is trying in his own limited little way to tell the truth then maybe it's time that you stopped trying to lose your virginity through internet dating, following some outdated Marxist rubbish, wipe that little piece of drool off your mouths every time you see a picture of a pretty woman and - how can I put this delicately - get a freaking life.

As I say, they will be happy today because I'm going to go over old ground that will once again have them screaming that laziest of words "RACIST" at me.

So get your little claws sharpened, prepare your outrage and I'll get back to you in a moment.

There is one thing to be thankful for on the night that I'm writing this: the World Cup is over, and that with a damp squib. At least I'll never have to hear one of those bloody vuvuzula horns again.

I'm so glad that I'm not a fan but it's kind of been hard to avoid here in the last month. Why the hell are Irish people so interested in a bunch of overpaid prima donnas who fall over writhing in agony every time they get a tip on the shoulder?

There they are, moaning and groaning on the ground and hoping that the hopeless referee can see the terrible, terrible pain that they are in. Jeez, try watching a hurling match. These guys just pick themselves up after having their heads split open and continue playing

Do you hear them crying? Do you hear them screaming when someone has stepped on their foot? No, because they would be seen as in the same class as the namby pamby soccer players are.

Did you see the two tennis players who played for ten gruelling hours in hellish heat a couple of weeks back?

These were men, not a bunch of old queens like the English team who were booted out of the Cup before they had even gotten started and decided to celebrate by throwing their manicured feet on to the tables of their luxury hotel and were photographed drinking brandy and smoking huge cigars.

A lot to be celebrating, eh, guys?

Wayne Rooney, for crying out loud, being caught by the microphone whining about how his own fans were booing him. If I were an Englishman who had spent a fortune to travel to South Africa in order to see my country get a good bloody kicking from the Germans I'd be more than booing. I wouldn't take out a sniper's rifle, of course, but I would be... upset.

I'd just love to see these guys playing Gaelic football or hurling but that's an empty dream. We've seen the photos now of these tosspots admiring their black toe-nail varnish so it is probably insulting for me to mention them in the same paragraph as real sportsmen.

As for Ireland, it's about bloody time we got over the fact that the French got in there on an illegal handball, but some people still can't let it go. Jeez, get over it. Our French buddies had their own brand of Karma handed out to them. Move on.

And so, admittedly reluctantly, to the continuing stand-off with our asylum- seekers at Mosney in County Meath.

Let me cut through all the Human Rights drivel immediately. ("Yes, Brady, we knew you were a racist!" - I can hear it already.)

The Department of Justice has decided that they can save €1.8 million a year by simply moving 109 asylum seekers to Dublin. They are not talking about moving them into a concentration camp; they are talking about moving them to Dublin. (Mind you, for those of us who had the misfortune to work in Dublin that may not be too much of an improvement, heh-heh.)

They are only asking for single people with no ties to be moved and since I would prefer to see that €1.8 million going to Morticia Harney's Third World hospitals here then I don't see that as a bad thing.

Sounds good to me. After all, they are not being treated badly at Mosney. Quite the opposite and you will not find a single asylum seeker who will disagree with that. They have been there for years now due to the kindness of the Irish taxpayer. We pretend to be tough but we do always try to look out for the underdog.

Except... let's look at the facts, as my friend Frank Carroll would say: out of that 109 single people only three have not had their asylum applications turned down. Indeed, ten of those have already been issued with their deportation orders.

Did you get that? Out of 109 only three should still be here in the first place. And if it comes to that why are they here anyway since international law demands that asylum seekers apply for refuge in the first country they get to? Yet, mysteriously Ireland - a tiny island on the fringes of Europe - always seems to be the first. Could it be because we are known as Ireland of the Soft Touch even as far away as Nigeria?

This accommodation cost just over €70 million last year alone. Now I'm not great at maths but even an idiot like me can see that this would go a hell of a long way towards NOT letting Harney close more wards; NOT letting her close hospitals in areas that desperately need them; NOT let them cut the care for severely disabled children, all of which is happening.

So if I find that I don't have a huge amount of sympathy for asylum seekers who are put out by being moved a few miles away when they have moved heaven and earth to get in here in the first place then I trust that the sane amongst you will not feel I am a racist.

You see, I don't have the luxury of deciding where the government will put me next.

I just struggle, like most people these days, to pay my bills.

I don't have the luxury of being a NAMA recipient who can sun himself in Spain while the government bails him out.

I'm not a non-taxpayer like Bono or an ex-pat like Bob Geldof who has the luxury of telling you what to think and what to do with the few shekels that you have.

I wasn't included in the decision of our government this week to send yet another €66 million to Africa in the same few days that another hospital closes.

One of the most shameful indictments of this corrupt little nation came this week when thousands of parents and their children in wheelchairs descended on the Dail to protest the cutting of yet more funds against them. Many of these people just need one day a week off or in some cases a month in order to refresh themselves for the next gruelling episode in their 24/7 care.

Here in Galway 1,000 went through the streets with their children in wheelchairs. It's not a lot to ask that parents just be given a few hours off by leaving these children in the hands of responsible carers. I wouldn't have thought that was a lot to ask at all.

Yet our government - put there, ostensibly, to serve US - showed their compassion with Brian Cowen, the very next day, announcing that he had decided to give all our overworked politicians 12 weeks' holiday.

Did he see what I saw at all? Man, the tears were blinding me as I watched these extraordinary people having to almost beg - I say almost as they were too dignified for that - for a little bit of leeway on these gruesome cuts which are an affront to human compassion.

And this big clunky thickhead's response: "Ah, Jeez, sure lads, we've had enough of this. Let's take three months' holidays."

I don't know about being ashamed to be Irish but this government makes me ashamed to be human.

Still, back to our immigrant friends: there may not be money for people who live and will probably die here, but because of left wing do- gooders we will always have money to shell out for... Oh, let's see.

There is a perpetually and effortlessly stylish and attractive lady who has been hanging around here for what seems now like decades. Her name is Mrs. Pamela Izevbekhal of Nigeria. You'd know her if you lived here: always has the shades stuck on her head as she gives you the poor mouth.

We have spent so much money on this woman that if it wasn't Ireland then you simply wouldn't believe it.

She's been banging on for years now that she legged it with her children from Lagos because her husband's family wanted to perform genital mutilation on her daughter.

Of course once Amnesty International (don't get me started) and the ever-gullible Irish Refugee Council got wind of this then things began to become a little... how shall I put this... embellished.

Apparently there was another daughter who had died under this horrific and barbaric 'operation' so there was absolutely no way now that that she could return there in safety, despite the size of Nigeria and the pure fact that this is practised in only a few very small areas; and no one there wears the designer gear or the sunglasses on top of their head that Mrs. Izevbekhal does.

Contrary to popular opinion due to the unending efforts of our corrupt political chancers, the Irish are nothing but a compassionate race and very soft touches - myself included, once upon a very long time ago - so off we sent the Gardai to Nigeria in order to investigate her claims.

I could have saved them the trouble, since I'm a nosy bastard and had already been digging into her background myself.

Suffice to say that out of the seven documents that the glamorous Mrs. Pamela had presented here, only one was not a fake. Apart from her other dubious claims, guess what? No dead baby!

Her final appeal - and God knows there have been so many at this stage - was on Friday and was dismissed.

Deported? Are you winding me up? Nothing is that simple any more. The next stop is the European Court of Human Rights. Guess who's paying for it?

If I haven't gone completely mad by next week then, well, I hope to see you all again.

Yes, even the nutters: you have your own peculiar charm.

Same bat-time!

Same bat-channel!

You can reach Charley at chasbrady7@eircom.net