UCC Honour for Austerity King

4th Mar 2014

The EU is doing its level best to back up the prime ministers of Britain and Spain of late. Both Taoisigh have large regions with much more than just separatist ideals – Scotland and Catalonia are both holding referendums on independence later this year much to the worry of their current masters David Cameron and Mariano Rajoy. We, in the People’s Republic of Cork, are watching with great interest with notepads at the ready.
 

Cameron face palms while Scotish separtist Alex Salmond wets himself

The best both leaders can come up with is to put the frighteners on the breakaway boys. The Bank of England says Scotland will most likely not be able to use sterling if it leaves the United Kingdom despite the assurances of the Scottish National Party leader Alex Salmond while Madrid is making loud noises about threatening to prevent the Catalan poll from taking place altogether.

The EU is squarely behind the two beleaguered Prime Ministers and seem to have agreed to do some of the dirtier PR work for them – acting, so to speak, as the overweight junior B substitute with a string of GBH convictions who comes on to “mark” a plucky corner forward who needs to be taken out of the game. Literally.  
 

We might beat them to it.

Seen by an unbiased referee however the EU is clearly not playing fair. Brussels has a book shelf full of rules for countries entering the EU but very few, if any at all, for regions that breakaway - it seems they’re just making it up as they go along.

José Manuel Barroso, the President of the European Commission has been wagging fingers at Scotland saying their assumption that their EU membership can continue as normal if they vote themselves out of the UK is unfounded. He says they will have to re-apply for membership which could take more than five years with no guarantees.  
 

Borroso listens to Paudie Palmer's commentry on Cork's epic win over Dublin last Saturday night in Croke Park.

Add all these referendums to the Russian annexing of Ukraine last week and you can understand why the suits in Brussels are getting sweaty palms and nervous twitches. They haven’t seen this much border-related uproar since Blarney was moved into the same local electoral district as Macroom.

With all this separatist talk it isn’t surprising that the President of the European Commission jets into Cork this week. UCC are bestowing an honorary degree on him (doctorates are reserved for the likes of you-know-who).
 

José has a bit to go before Cork considers him worthy of a doctorate. A tirade against the FAI would help.

We know what most of you will be thinking:  c’mere there’s one law for ‘dem’ and one everyone else – how come the rest of us have to do years of exams and irresponsible drinking to get our day in a black cape yet this fella swans in for one day and collects a degree without doing as much as a week of emergency all-night cramming? Oh, and did he pay his outrageous “registration fee”?

The conferring of honours on Mr. Barroso is certainly an odd one that won’t sit easy with many locals. Most Irish people, not to mention Corkonians, will remember “JMB” (definitely no relation to JBM) as one of the leading promoters of the harsh austerity still being imposed on Ireland and as someone with little sympathy for the regime in Dublin.
 

Up for the craic: Barroso will be in the fountain by 11pm

On Leeside, the timing of his arrival in the People’s Republic, especially in the run up to Paddy’s weekend, might be seen as a long overdue favour to the regime in Dublin who are nervous of Cork’s willingness to go it alone. First Catalonia, then Scotland, now Cork.

However, we think it may be that our revolutionary brothers and sisters at UCC are actually trying to plamás Barroso and his EU colleagues instead:  Catalonia and Scotland haven’t given him any drive-thro degrees or nice days out so let him be wined and dined in Cork a few times and then make our move for independence with Barroso already hooked on Tanora, Barry’s tea, tripe and drisheen.

After having such a positive uplifting experience in Cork, Barroso will be far more open to keeping us in the EU when we finally break away from Dublin’s oppressive grip.
 

An aye for independence: we're taking notes in Cork

And of course if he thinks about turning against us and refusing the People’s Republic of Cork membership of the EU we’ll have the deadly threat of invalidating his degree (by scrawling ‘expelled for cogging’ next to his name on the list of graduates in UCC) – sure, he’d never live with the shame.  

Like Scotland, we now have oiland hurling so the criteria for independence are being slowly fulfilled but instead of getting in the faces of the EU heads, like the presumptuous  Scots and the waspy Catalans, let’s just dish out a good old fashion dose of plamás to help us get what we want - the easy way.

‘So José boy, are you a Murphy’s or a Beamish man?’