Claire Byrne and Farage

Well Corbyn got dubbed a traitor and a terrorist for a remark he made about the IRA so why does Farage get off the hook.

If a lad got Starmer to say "Fk the Queen" for a birthday joke the UK media would go into absolute meltdown and he would end up on top a Guy Fawkes bonfire

Farage is best ignored and not given the air time he craves.

How dare you! He has family in Ireland!

But seriously, though, he is the very definition of 'right-wing grifter'. His act is shallower than a garden pond. He was out there last year doing that march for Brexit thing, wearing a flat cap and hunting jacket, and eating a bag of chips, trying to be as stereotypically British as possible. All that was missing was a pint of John Smith's in his hand. I'll give him this, though - it works, but only because British politicians had been so laughably out of touch over the last 15 years, especially since the recession, that desperate ordinary people look to an obvious hack like Farage as some kind of hope. It's only with Brexit passing and the rise of Johnson to PM that Farage's relevance has dwindled. The man is primed to be knocked down by any competent interviewer - but there seem to be too few of them out there and Farage is just a bit too clever to knowingly risk exposure.

Interesting you're only here a couple months and have enough insight to identify the 'usual crowd'.

Other people are criticising Byrne for taking that approach at all, I'm criticising her for not going far enough. See the difference?

Farage is an odious individual and not enough people challenge him on the various angles of hypocrisy he exhibits. A generation of people in the UK are worse off partly as a consequence of this man and his imperialistic fetish.

RTE is a mouthpiece for the Irish government and the EU.

It receives major funding from both.

I always love this one.

Brexiters: " how dare you say people who voted for Brexit are fools and idiots who were duped "

Brexiters: "people who voted for Lisbon II are fools and idiots who were duped"

Leaving aside the cheap shot about his "Up the RA!" howler. (Why should anyone be surprised by a clown being a clown?) Let's look at some of his statements and take them head on.

"Ireland made the historic error of joining the euro. You now do not have control over the levers that directly affect your economy, The European Central Bank now runs your country. Whoever you vote for doesn't really matter."

Well, having control over an independent currency DOES give you some "levers" by which to steer the economy but did Ireland EVER have such levers? Prior to about 1980, the Irish pound was pegged to sterling. Irish base lending rates were effectively set in London. In those days, interest rates were in the control of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, so the people who operated the "levers" in the 1970s were such renowned Irish patriots as Tony Barber, Dennis Healey and Geoffrey Howe. Independent accountable democracy?

For less than 20 years, between Ireland entering the European Monetary System and the introduction of the euro we had some leeway, as I understand it, but we were required to keep our currency within bands set by the EU to attempt "convergence" of all currencies to permit the introduction of the euro.

Small countries are taking a huge risk if they allow their currency to float freely without being pegged to a larger stronger one. If speculators could force a currency backed by an economy as large as Britain's to abandon a determined policy, as they did in September 1992 (Black Wednesday) they could manipulate the Irish economy, or at least take hold of its "levers" effectively with small change.

"I think it's a matter of time before the Irish people say you know what. We are now a net contributor to the EU. We're not getting anything out of it."

There may well be such a point of view expressed. Whether it would win a cogent argument is another matter.

"No! No! No! No! No! Nobody, nobody on this side of the argument ever suggested putting a border back on the island of Ireland. Only UVDL, your boss nearly did that. Nobody in the British government, nobody in the NI Executive is talking about a hard border. "

Let's see how this one plays out. They're not TALKING about it but will they do it? If they tear up the protocol, refuse any animal checks on traffic across the Irish Sea and then, say, enter into a deal with some country that allows say dodgy drug-fed cattle not allowed by the EU, they will effectively be putting up a border and pretending that it was our fault. He's an utter charlatan. I think he knows this is a likely scenario if the Protocol is torn up.

"What was the point of fighting the British for 500 years. what was the point of it? Do you want to be an independent nation or governed by foreign bureaucrats? That is a debate that will happen in your country in the next few years, believe you me. Do you want to be an independent democracy or part of a European superstate?"

Well indeed. But the crucial difference is, we are a member of this "European Superstate" by our own volition and all we have to do to get out of it is write a nice letter to the President of the European Council. (Charles Michel, today; Donald Tusk when Britain left) Contrast that with what countries had to do to get out of the British Empire. The US had to fight a war for 8 years, the Cypriots had to fight. So did the Kenyans, the Malayans, the Yemenis. India and Pakistan went for the non violent route but still endured decades of repression, massacre, famine and eventually a perfunctory skedaddle and partition which caused millions of deaths.

I don't think the EU and the British Empire are comparable in that regard.