Intelligencer

Getting Their Irish Up 

ONE of the best sideshows in this year’s presidential election is the battle between the two party chairmen, Ed Gillespie and Terry McAuliffe. As the GOP point man Gillespie has an attack dog role, one he fulfills with relish, while McAuliffe does the same for the Democrats.

Watching the two of them on the Today show on NBC on Tuesday morning was political entertainment at its best, as they tore into the other’s candidate and basically blamed them for everything since the fall of the Roman Empire.

Both are well qualified to have the gift of the gab. Gillespie is a frequent visitor to his father’s native Donegal and in fact is considering buying a home there. He is a frequent visitor to the Irish Embassy in Washington and has been a helpful source for the Irish government. 

McAuliffe traces his roots to Co. Kerry and has been a huge supporter of Stella O’Leary’s Washington–based Irish American Democrats organization. He played a large role in creating the Clinton Center in Fermanagh, Northern Ireland, which works for peace and reconciliation there.

Peace and reconciliation are not exactly two words that come to mind watching these two Irish Americans go at it, however. More like slash and burn. As the political year advances their duels may get even more spirited which should be fun to watch.

Tim and Big Russ

TALKING of McAuliffe and Gillespie they are just two of the cast of Irish American characters who are shaping the debate this presidential season. Tim Russert of Meet the Press is probably the leading newsman in the U.S. at present, a stature made evident when President Bush picked his program to go on when wanting to explain his position on Iraq and other issues.

Maureen Dowd, another highly influential Irish media figure in this year’s election, once wrote that Russert is “very Irish in the sense that he has no pretensions.” It is a fair description. 

And why should he? He clearly remains very grounded in the Irish working class neighborhood in South Buffalo, New York that he grew up in. As Russert told our sister publication Irish America in 2000, he knows that the locals are watching every week. 

“Men like Diapers and Bottle Riordan, Shiny Faced Collins and Fuzzy Coughlin” and others make sure that the local lad doesn’t grow too big for his britches, Russert said.

Russert cut his political teeth in the Buffalo political machine, which was run by the legendary George D. O’Connell, the Michael Curley of upstate New York. 

Six of his great grandparents are Irish and he is descended from the Gilhooleys and the Rings. He takes particular pride in the fact that he is related to the legendary Cork Gaelic games star Christy Ring.

A lot of the Irish background will come out in Russert’s new book Big Russ and Me, his biography of his dad, set for a Father’s Day launch. In the meantime just catch him shaping the presidential race every week on his top rated show.

Kelly On a Roll

IT is doubtful if New York has ever had such an impressive police chief as Ray Kelly. A recent article in The New York Times Op-Ed pages made clear that Kelly has done enormous good in the area of community relations since he took office. It was an amazing commentary on a New York police chief from an organ that is critical more often than not of those who hold his particular job.

When we look back to the Rudy Giuliani days when there was a reflexive position to always blame the victim in police shootings, Kelly has changed the dynamic in an extraordinary way.

He is able to fess up to mistakes, such as the recent killing of a young man on a Brooklyn rooftop, and in the course of that is able to defuse tensions in a manner that the Giuliani administration could never have dreamed of.

Kelly was recently on NBC talking about his experience in Haiti where he ran the police force after the American invasion there under President Clinton. Again his frankness was extraordinary, admitting that the job was not done when he left and that many years needed to be put into it.

He could have any job in New York City, including mayor if he wanted it, but the odds are that Kelly will stay just where he is. He is most comfortable as a cop’s cop, but not so much that he can’t see the mote in his own eye on occasions. As recent events have shown it is doubtful if there has ever been a better commissioner.

British Honor For Connorton

WELL-known Irish activist John Connorton has been granted an honorary OBE by the British government in its honors list. Connorton becomes the second Irish American to receive the award in recent years. Loretta Brennan Glucksman, president of the American Ireland Fund, was also awarded the medal a few years back.

Connorton distinguished himself as John Hume’s man in America and was always there for Hume no matter how bleak the days and the outlook was. He is also very active in Democratic Party politics and ran Al Gore’s New York campaign during his first run for president in 1988.

Of course, taking British honors for Irish Americans is a fraught business, but Connorton and Glucksman can legitimately say that they have tried to reach across and work with both sides of the aisle. 

The peace process has brought about so much change in Ireland that we should no longer be surprised that the British too are looking to award accolades to Irish American for their peace work these days.