How can we integrate Unionism into a possible United Ireland?

That made me laugh out loud to be honest.

'You are entitled to your belief'....BUT.

Repudiate what the poster says with your own facts blanch.

This mightn't be too good for your blood pressure. https://www.economist.com/europe/2020/07/18/how-ireland-gets-its-way

On a per-head basis, Ireland has a good claim to be the world’s most diplomatically powerful country. Its finance minister, Paschal Donohoe, last week won the race to become president of the Eurogroup, the influential club of euro-zone finance ministers, despite the French and German governments backing another candidate.

In June Ireland won a seat on the un Security Council, fending off Canada, another country often flattered by comparison with a bigger, sometimes boorish, neighbour. Barely a decade after a financial crisis saw Ireland bailed out, Philip Lane, the former head of Ireland’s central bank, is the main thinker at the European Central Bank.

In Brussels, Ireland’s commissioner Philip Hogan is in charge of trade, one of the few briefs where the European Commission, rather than eu governments, is supreme. And the eu’s position on Brexit was shaped by Irish diplomats.

I am trying really hard not to get sucked into a tit-for-tat what’s bad about each others country.

you are also being ridiculous and every poster on here can see your position is far from reality and therefore impossible to debate with. eg I mentioned roads and phones and you suggest that I needed to be in Donegal in the 1930s to experience that disparity.

I travelled to Donegal quite often both for water sports and hillwalking in the early 80s, let’s examine what I experienced on my visit re roads and phones.

we always allowed 3 hours for our journey. 1.5 hours for the 100 miles in ni and 1.5 hours for the 35 miles in roi. A significant amount of our ni journey was on a 20+years old motorway while there still wasn’t a single mile of motorway anywhere in roi.

when I got there I would try to phone home. Bear in mind we had nice shiny red phone boxes in ni that simply always worked on the drop of a 2p down the slot . It was quite something to experience the roi phones and the dual button pushes which rarely succeeded in a connection.

so you are talking nonsense about 1930s - and posters will know this in their heart

roi has come on in leaps and bounds and it is difficult to see much difference in infrastructure in the two countries now

for you to suggest that roi is a success story and ni is a failure story is incredible. you have some of the most awful vile stuff has taken place in roi in that 100 years. ni has not been immune to it but it is not the British community that were up to their necks in it either as victim or perpetrator.

I would also hate my country to have taken a neutral position in the fight against Hitler. Again there are improvements in roi and they are helping in humanitarian ways with Ukraine but still uk is doing the heavy lifting. That’s important to me, that our country will put its head above the water for other peoples quality of life and not just our own.

I do be amazed in my chats with southern colleagues that you have to pay to visit your doc, I find this a disgrace. Also that you pay for medicines etc.

I could go on, but could you tell me something that you think people in ni might envy of roi? Just one or two clear examples will do

That a disgraceful last paragraph.

why do you fear people commenting on ni. Do you ever do it about other countries?

One or two examples, Downcow? You maybe could've tried reading the very post you replied to.

The NHS would've been the absolute top of my list of things I would've envied about the UK, however with a much better income and private health insurance down here, I see a doctor and receive treatment much faster than anyone I know living in the North, and at the end of the year, after paying for prescriptions, I still have a whole heap more money in my pocket than if I lived in the North. My own personal circumstances aside, the NHS is still in my eyes probably the single greatest achievement the UK has put together, so I won't be too critical there.

If you're telling me you travelled from Co. Down to Donegal and stayed on a Motorway for even half of your NI journey, I'm going to outright call you a liar. You absolutely didn't make it from Co. Down to the Donegal border in 90 minutes. I'm also happy to call you an outright liar that you averaged just over 20mph when you got to the Donegal border.

I'll also point out that what you ACTUALLY said was that it was single lane tracks (though we could both point out a few of those either side of the border even now I'm sure) and donkeys. Believe it or not, even Donegal had cars and two laned roads in the 80s. I can assure you I spent a damn sight more time in Donegal in the 80s than you did, Downcow. The roads were certainly worse, I pointed that out myself, but you're talking absolute hyperbolic nonsense......and the square root of f*ck all of that is relevant to our RIGHT NOW comparison, even if you weren't lying through your teeth or misremembering your magical ability to conjure motorways west of Dungannon and your jet car that suddenly turned into a pedal bike when it touched Irish soil.

People can comment all they want, Downcow, but not all opinions are equal.

I'll certainly have an opinion about other countries, but I'm not stupid enough to think that my opinion carries the same weight as that of someone who has actually lived there.

I'd love if you could tell me what exactly was disgraceful though? Was calling him an eejit too harsh, or was pointing out that he doesn't have an iota of lived experience with NI the unpleasant fact that crossed the line for you?

I note you've remained entirely silent on that poster's blatantly trolling comments towards me. I'll remind you when others were trying to make issue of your own identity and lack of Irishness, I stood in your defense despite our lack of agreement on most things, but I'll note your own lack of gumption to stand up when the shoe is on the other foot.

You'll excuse me if I'm not terribly upset that you think the eejit who just happens to agree with you, 'won' the debate even though he didn't actually address a single point that was being debated. Maybe aul Freddie is one of your Republican work colleagues that you so regularly survey.

Belfast to Castlederg is 84 miles, not 100, Downcow. Never mind the fact that the roads have been improved since the 1980s, that Castlederg is still 3 miles from the border and even THAT shortest of journeys is from Antrim, not Down (so we really couldn't be more generous in our interpretation of your claim) is already over the 90 minutes you stated.....and you still haven't told me where in Donegal you were averaging circa 20mph. As I said, you were talking sh*te with your hundred miles in an hour and a half, 35 miles in an hour and a half.

I wouldn't know about the price of Buckfast myself, buddy. I'll leave the Lurgan Champagne to your crowd. I prefer a rioja if I'm drinking at home, or a pint of solidly Protestant Guinness if I pop out for one.....and the last time I made it up North, a pint was up at £5 in Belfast. I pay €4.60 in my local. Your snide b*llocksology is noted and ignored though.

I note you rapidly skipped by the, 'points of envy'.....Most of those were statements of fact. Was that too difficult to address when you realised what a fool you'd made of yourself asking for one or two examples in reply to a post that gave significantly more? Given your reading comprehension, perhaps you should look a little closer to home when wondering who might have enjoyed a tipple or two this evening.

I'm glad you were able to get a quick GP visit, though given the waiting lists I hope the issue remains minor and you don't end up on a waiting list that will take a few years before you can see a specialist like my father would've. In the end, I had to book him in for a private appointment in The Beacon in Dublin. Fortunately you often get what you pay for and he's doing much better now.

your post in summary (and I am getting tired of this as 95% is subjective)

yes my travel times were estimates from the 1980s. They were pretty close. I was travelling with a club from Belfast. We regarded the Donegal border as little more than halfway timewise.

your salary and access to healthcare. Yes I got your ‘I’m alright jack’ approach , but I let it slide

political stability. I really don’t see how it has any significant impact on my quality of life.

education system. I’d like to see a massive overhaul of the selection process and yes there is a problem of certain groups being disadvantaged by our system. I can’t believe roi does not suffer from the same (remember the most discriminated group in Europe lives in your country, for example - maybe, I’m alright jack, again)

you say “private healthcare at ~£110 for the year to match your ten times the price claim. That would certainly be evidence that your company thinks healthcare in NI is CHEAPER (a point I'd agree)” - here you go then https://www.benenden.co.uk/alternative-private-healthcare/

Alcohol prices. Here’s the full list from where I found the Bucky. But I think I’ll change to your tiple of choice, when I see you up posting again this morning after the tirade you subjected a few of us to last night. (In fact the fact you are still here is Evidence, if it were needed, of that other little sensitive matter we were discussing yesterday)

Now, there is an entire thread for this rangers/Celtic type competition of whose got the best country. I respectfully suggest you take it there.

There are not two countries on the island, there is one country that has had the northeast section cleaved off to thwart the democratic wish of the Irish people, thus Ireland is described as partitioned, thus the contested nature of the northeast, thus people living as if there is no border, thus national and international pushback at the threat of rehardening the division of our country.