I’m going to break with a very long retirement to laugh out loud at Iris Robinson. Actually, I’m not really laughing out loud at her, it’s a pretty horrible situation to be stuck in the middle of… The silly old girl went and had an ‘innappropriate relationship‘ with a much younger man (read: ~40 years her junior), and cleverly managed to wrap up a whole lot of financial irregularity into the whole affair. More on the whole sordid scandal at Slugger O’Toole.
In the first instance – congratulations to Iris on having a rather sexually liberating affair, after living what must have been an awful sham of a repressed conservative Christian lifestyle. Sometimes a woman just needs to loosen up a little. And bravo on the efficiency of hitting the ’sex scandal’ and ‘financial scandal’ targets with just one stone. That’s the kind of councillor you want in your area – someone who can pull strings and get our young folk set up in business. Even if it is just young folk we happen to be straddling 
Note: If you’re not familiar with Iris Robinson, she’s the wife of Northern Ireland’s First Minister, Peter Robinson. Together, they form the ultimate Unionist power couple. Or did. They espoused a conservative Christian/hardline Unionist outlook that certain cliched corners of Northern Irish culture love (partly because they have no imagination, partly because most of ‘em are over 60). Until recently, she was most famous for telling the world that “gays are an abomination” and recommending a psychiatrist who”d talk them out of their filthy ways.
Wait 'til I get my hands on that b*****d...
Part of me feels a little sorry for her. She did try to kill herself. Her husband did just go on out to work as usual that day.
But then part of me thinks – why not? Let’s not try and wrap this up in outdated Christian blech about forgiveness and human frailty. This is a woman who publicly denounced gays as abominations. I don’t even wnat to know what her position on evolution is, or whether she’s a fully subscribed fan of Leviticus.
Or maybe the mental illness made her come out and make her anti-homosexual proclaimation? Maybe we should just ignore everything she’s ever said publically?
For me, this should be the final nail in the coffin of the DUP and those stupid, traditionalist Unionist movements. They’re corrupt to the core. This just proves it. How many scandals has Ian “walking liability” Paisley Jr been involved in? What about Sammy Wilson? Now Iris and Peter are up to their immaculately exfoliated necks in shit. It’s either endearingly human of them to err in this way, or it’s out-and-out corrupt. You decide.
The only thing to worry about is what effect destroying Peter Robinson’s political career will have on Northern Ireland. For all the Assembly’s ineffectiveness, handing it over to someone else within the DUP or the dusty old Ulster Unionists might be as big a mistake as sticking with Peter.
But at the end of the day, this is what you get when you elect a bunch of dusty, bible-bashing pricks into government: they feel they can lecture you ad-nauseum without having to adhere to their own chosen rule book. And don’t give me a lot of faff about forgiveness when your ‘party’ is a pseudo-religious movement well-known for holding everybody else’s sins to account.
This is why I’ve always had a problem with the established political order in Northern Ireland – they think they can get away with murder.
