The ‘haves’ declare war on the ‘have nots‘

WHEN we look at history and examine the art of warfare we can see one tactic always prevails.

As a central plank of their strategy the princes sacrifice a substantial percentage of the troops as cannon fodder. It is rationalised away as collateral damage.

After the bloody slaughter those who remained impregnable in their ivory towers emerge to reap the spoils of war. These elites thrive as there are now far fewer poor mouths feeding off the state’s resources and consequently they and their offspring grow richer and plumper, hold all power and dispense largesse as they see fit. The princes may suffer a frisson of conscience before dispatching the young and the peasants to the slaughter, but it is only a momentary quiver – the lower rungs on the societal ladder are always expendable.

I see these wartime tactics in operation in our ‘peacetime’ Ireland. Modern Ireland is class-ridden and stratified and has been effectively divided by the princes, our own protected and privileged classes, into the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’. I define the ‘haves’ as the gold-plated pension career politicians, higher civil servants, barristers, judges, hospital consultants, top-level bankers and moneymen, large property developers and the various ‘tax exiles’ who hop in and out of this island unchallenged. Add to this the health service managers, executives in the large semi-state bodies, quango appointees and the plethora of mid-ranking civil and public servants and top union officials who will never go hungry or will never fall in the fray.

Everyone else in Ireland falls into the category of the ‘have-nots’, the cannon fodder, to a greater or lesser degree. This fodder is currently being sacrificed at the economic front in the interests of keeping the ‘haves’ rich and cosseted and the status quo protected. Compassion and equality were early casualties of this war and greed and self-interest led the charge to the death of the republican ideal. Of course the lessons of war should also remind us that sometimes the stupefied fodder wake to reality on their way to the slaughter.

May 1, 1789. Viva La Revolution.

Susan Jordan

Harbour Road

Howth

Co Dublin