A few things seem pretty certain about the Boston bombings.

The rejection of Croke Park II by Siptu’s 66,000 public employees — 53.7% against, 46.3% for — means the deal cannot be ratified.

After the weekend constitutional convention voted in favour — a 79% endorsement — of extending civil marriage rights to same-sex couples, conservative senator Rónán Mullen suggested that the integrity of the convention had been compromised because the debate was a “flawed process”.

The Law Reform Commission proposals to remake how juries are selected and serve in our courts are very welcome and probably overdue.

As the Dáil returns from its two-week Easter break this week, there is a feeling that this administration is entering its defining period.

There’s hardly a family in the country that has not been touched by emigration.

Good news is rare these days — so rare that when it comes around, it deserves to be celebrated.

The “commodification” of children in an emerging made-to-order commercial embryo industry marks a disturbing twist in the heated debate surrounding the use of embryos in the making of babies. Not surprisingly, this recent development at a clinic in California has sparked calls for more effective legislation to control over-the-counter embryo sales in America.

The scathing comments of IMF troika team member Professor Ashoka Mody, on the negative impact of austerity underlying Ireland’s bailout package, have long been foreshadowed in these columns.

Any lingering doubts about the appalling scale of debt now crippling families in this benighted country are utterly dispelled by today’s terrifying report on their plight.