The first reaction of people to the bombings in London was one of sympathy for those who suffered.
As always, those who suffer are not those responsible for the disaster. Ken Livingstone, Mayor of London, was accurate when he said that what was done was aimed not at the rich and powerful but at ordinary people, most of whom had neither power nor wealth.
Much of this suffering imposed on people could be prevented. When the British prime minister, Mr Blair, said that the way to prevent such things was to find out the causes and do something about them he was saying something right and true. But then he went on to say that the cause of what happened in London was the extremists of one religious group. That is almost exactly the same message he tried to spread over the whole world in relation to Ireland.
What was wrong in Ireland? The ill-doing of successive governments? No. The greed of people whose souls were in their wallets? No. Racism against Irish people? No. The official British reason for war in Ireland was that religious people could not live together and "extremists on both sides" were the cause of the suffering – almost word for word Blair's message after the London bombings. Religious differences, this time between Muslim and Christian. Religious extremists – that is, Muslim extremists this time.
Any word of what London and Washington and other governnments did in Afghanistan and the Middle East? No. The message is simple. And it is untrue. The message is that the people are to blame, governments are innocent.
Many people knew and forecast that what governments were doing in the Middle East would destabilise and endanger everybody. That has happened.
People even made jokes about Bush declaring war on terrorism and without knowing what he was doing declared war on tourism, about how the last time people listened to voices from a burning Bush they were left wandering in a desert for forty years. People knew. Governments knew. But governments' greed often wins over people's wisdom.
And so we have New York. So we have Madrid. So we have London. And we really believe Ireland will not appear in the awful list of countries where innocent people are killed and hurt unnecessarily? That would be naive indeed.
Shannon should not have been used for the transport of troops and arms. That should be stopped now. Not just because Ireland could well become a target just at a time when we are all hoping Ireland could be on the verge of a new phase of prosperity and peace if we keep our dignity and make governments behave rationally rather than greedily.
One of the extraordinary things about the past decades is how the myth of Irish neutrality persisted. Governments seem to believe they can convince people they are neutral in international disputes when they are nothing of the kind and never have been. In the First World War Ireland was not neutral. In the second world war Ireland was not neutral, north or south.
In the recent armed conflict between British governments and Irish people demanding justice in the northeast, Dublin governments were not neutral – they sided with London even against their own people. During the so-called Cold War Ireland was not neutral, it was wholeheartedly and publicly against any communist regime that happened to be around. And yet the myth of Irish neutrality still remained. People argued about it as if it were even possibly true.
Irish power institutions were never neutral in wartimes, whether the wars were being fought abroad or on Irish territory.
So whatever preparation Irish people can make for our future safety should not be based on the idea that people are deceived by cries of neutrality in any war that is going on now. It will have to be based on a reasonable and logical assessment of what we are really doing, or what we are allowing governments to do, and if necessary what they will be made to stop doing.
In the northeast we have little power over what London does – the biggest reason for getting London out of our affairs once and for all – but people in the other part of Ireland should be able to control their own politicians.
It is all very well having tens of thousands of people marching on the streets but if those same people are going to put the same politicians in power who have made bad decisons and thus made possible targets of them, what answer is there to that?
Ireland should be in a position now to make its own foreign policy, to stop touching forelocks and start forward planning. What a pity so many of us are still embroiled in controversy about little religious men with hard hats marching up and down streets. At a time when we need to force decent policies on indecent governments. London governments nearly always succeed in turning our minds away from hard issues and on to hard hats.
May a multitude of votes go to the parties brave enough to challenge the whole wretched business of our bad politics.
Our sympathy for those poor people must be measured by how determined we are to make sure the real causes of their hurt are found and dealt with.
We are certainly not going to blame the people for their own misery.
