Irish republicanism is in a profound state of crisis and is rapidly decaying almost by the week. Scandals such as the expulsion of political prisoners from what are supposed to be republican prison wings while heroin dealers and thugs from the Sinn Féin militia are accepted with open arms are only recent examples of this longstanding atrophy. We are all familiar with the catalogue of unexplained “mistakes”, “errors” and – this excuse is my own personal favourite – “strategic decisions” that have transformed Irish republicanism into the risible and badly deformed phenomenon that it has become. Unfortunately, these patterns are now so well established and familiar to us that they could be described as long-term phenomena due to their manifestation over the two decades that have passed since the reimposition of Stormont

The persistent problems that have become so established now that they appear like permanent hindrances to progress include…