Irish Examiner View: Five families bereaved in an instant

Tue, 18 Nov, 2025 - 01:00

The deaths of five young people — all in their early 20s — in Saturday night’s horror crash in Dundalk illustrated just how thin the margin is between life and death on our roads. Tributes are paid in these pages today to those who died.

The heartbreaking loss of their lives brought to 157 the number of people killed on Irish roads so far in 2025 — 10 more than at the same point last year — and highlighted once more how circumstances can change in a split second from joyous anticipation to pure horror.

Epstein files: Mystery over Trump’s U-turn

US president Donald Trump speaks to reporters on Air Force One on Friday, November 14. Picture: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP

In fairness to Donald Trump, one accusation that could never be levelled at him is that he’s predictable.

Just when White House observers the world over had reached the conclusion that the US president would do just about anything to prevent the publication of the so-called Epstein files, he pulls a volte-face and tells his Republican colleagues in Congress to vote for a measure compelling the Department of Justice to release them.

After a lengthy campaign aimed at damping down growing calls from within the GOP to release the investigators’ files on convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, Trump changed tack on Sunday night and encouraged them to vote to have the material made public.

After years of trying to obfuscate and muddy the picture with regard to his personal relationship with the sex offender, Trump’s switcheroo bamboozled critics and supporters alike — especially after he spent days personally trying to sway Republican lawmakers from forcing a vote.

A document dump last week fuelled the political firestorm facing the US president because of his associations with Epstein.

We must wait and see whether the vote in Congress that takes place this week will clarify the rationale behind his apparent U-turn.

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