PLEASE jog my memory. What exactly did Martin Cullen not do wrong? Was it his suggestion to the Office of Public Works that they hire one of his political supporters, Monica Leech?

“I WAS only ever wrong once,” goes the favourite joke of a friend of mine. “It happened once when I thought I was wrong, but I was actually right!”

I HAVE been thinking lately about a tragedy that occurred a few months ago where I come from.

WORDS are left impotent by a tragedy such as has unfolded in southern Asia over the past week. The sheer scale of the devastation wrought and the number of people killed cripples the imagination.

ANOTHER year, another European treaty. But the people of Europe, to judge by last June’s Euro elections, have never been so disillusioned with the European project. Eurosceptic parties made gains in Britain and Belgium.

HERE’S a question to ponder as December 25 approaches: for how long more will Christmas be celebrated in Europe? In the short term, these are exciting times to be European.

SAY what you like about the US, but its approach to internal dissent is in a different league to that of countries like Saudi Arabia and Cuba.

GIVE a Frenchman the chance to mock America and he will take it. It has ever been so - but especially in these days when American restaurants have been pouring French wine down their sinks and renaming ‘French fries’ as freedom fries.

IT never rains but it pours. First we have a same-sex couple seeking parity of esteem with married couples and similar tax breaks. Now advocates for cohabiting heterosexual couples are demanding more rights, too.

ALTHOUGH he has just been denied the justice portfolio in the European Commission, Rocco Buttiglione shows no rancour.