An Armed Gardai??

The establishment of these new Garda Armed Support Units has caused some controvosy, with organisations like the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors saying it blurs the traditional ethos of an unarmed force. However, surely it must be accepted in principle that we need some armed members of An Garda Siochana to respond to appropriate situations, the ERU is proof enough of this (not to mention the large number of armed detectives in Ireland). If that premise is accepted, it follows that those Armed Units must be able to respond to situations quickly and effectively. Surely it is more sensible to have numerous small squads of armed police officers in various locations rather than one unit based in Dublin.

Furthermore, having these 'armed officers' unarmed for the majority of their duties (at least until called upon) surely re-inforces the principle of an unarmed force, showing that even our officers trained in the use of firearms will not be carrying their weapons in the normal course of their duties.

Having regional teams capable of responding to situations allows the gardai to respond quickly as situations arise and in fact, gives the gardai the ability to deal with multiple situations at once, should that need arise...I don't see the downside.

Sarah Palin's Acceptance Speech...

Well McCain has his new attack dog...however in achieving that goal she may have undermined the substantially more important role that her acceptance speech should have fulfilled, she missed out on a chance to properly define herself to the American people in a way which will not be overshadowed or in a way that she herself didn't undermine.

In attacking Obama so consistently, so directly and so personally she has left that as the abiding memory of her speech. Tomorrow her attempts to define herself as a small town American who will be the people's voice in Washington and who will be approachable and personable will be left behind, undermined by her condescending tone and the bitchiness of her ad hominem attacks on Senator Obama and drowned out by the memory of the frequency and the nature of those attacks. Ultimitely what will be remembered from this speech is the fact that she went after Obama with the equivalent of a 2x4, and that is probably much more of a problem for the McCain campaign than the Obama one. It will now be hard for her to redefine herself to the American people and move away from being seen as condescending and snide. As the saying goes..."you only get to give a first impression once" and i think Gov. Palin has miscalculated the best way to define herself and also the credibility she has as a relatively unknown politician to agressively attack a person who is well liked by the public and seen as more American than she is. As Nate Silver puts it, there will be a sigificant "who the fuck does she think she is? factor" among many Independent and undecided American voters, who at least know who Barack Obama is

And while the speech was delivered in, while not a charismatic fashion, a solid one, it really missed the point as to how best to define Gov. Palin as someone more than 'that woman running with John McCain' and have that remembered the next day. All she managed to achieve was to cap off a series of depressingly similar speeches made by Romney, Huckabee and Giuliani with more of the same, a speech that the Republican base will lap up, because it pushed all their buttons, however one which singularly failed to stand out from the others or impress in terms of appealing to any person who wasn't already voting for McCain/Palin in November.