EU-US trade deal: Ursula von der Leyen stooped to conquerThe EU is now closer to China than the US on a growing number of policy areas
A father in Gaza: Our children are dying as the world watches. We don’t want your pity – we want action It’s hard to find enough food to give my three children even one meal a day
Every Irish person contributes €53.20 a month to the EU. We should be prepared to pay moreWorldview: Courtesy of our growing relative wealth, we displaced Luxembourg in 2024 in paying the most to the EU budget on a gross per capita basis
Drugs like Ozempic aren’t changing negative narratives around diet and weightGetting thin to succeed in a fat-phobic society is still an understandable individual solution to a structural problem
Stop thinking of taking time ‘off’ this summer. It’s better to take time ‘for’Unthinkable: Three tips to help you try – all of which might feel unnatural, uncomfortable or unintuitive at first
Posting photos of your children online just got a lot riskierMeta is trying to work out how it can use the billions, if not trillions, of photos and posts people have uploaded to Facebook and Instagram going back decades to train its AI
‘I’m angry that my abuse as a child does not count’ – State must pay for school sexual abuseWorryingly, the inter-departmental group seem to be completely unaware of the European Court decision on Louise O’Keeffe’s case
Like Katriona O’Sullivan, my childhood love of sport became a quest for weight-loss pointsAs a teenager, I traded swimming galas and goggles for compulsive sit-ups in my bedroom. Now I’m finding my way back to the water
Parents facilitating a 16-year-old’s ‘prinks’ is a sign of our weird relationship with alcoholWith alcohol labelling, we were on the verge of doing something as revolutionary as the smoking ban. Then we chickened out
If you didn’t have qualms about Spotify before, wait until you hear what its founder has doneOver the past couple of years, tech investors have pivoted toward a collective embrace of the military-industrial complex
The Sacred Heart picture, once ubiquitous in Irish Catholic homes, has a fascinating historyRite & Reason: From the outset, the image had a political edge. During the French Revolution it was adopted as a royalist symbol
Epstein saga has exposed cracks in Maga movement which could fatally undermine Donald TrumpNo one is more aware of this than Trump himself, which explains his bizarre rants about Obama this week
Amazon is not the only multinational losing confidence in Ireland. Will a €102bn plan fix it?And what happens if we struggle to find the cash?
Words like ‘humanitarian’ have lost all meaning. Let the images speak insteadThe photographs coming in on the wires are unfathomable: children with horribly protruding ribs, hollow eyes, scabbed lips and noses, distended bellies
A lesson from The Godfather as Wall Street backs crypto assets it once dismissed as a ‘fraud’Bitcoin is backed by nothing except hype but early adopters made vast wealth. Now they want to protect their own interests
The Ministerial phones are off and the bags are packed. You couldn’t begrudge them the holidayIt has been a peculiar, frazzled political term since the Coalition was formed – and there’s much more to come
A redress scheme for school abuse survivors could become a ‘barrister-fattening exercise’The inquiry already established will cost a considerable amount in legal fees
‘But Ireland loves us,’ the children said. They were not the only ones confusedA group of volunteers flew to Jordan to give Palestinian GAA fans an alternative holiday after their visas to Ireland were refused
How millions of priceless words lost in a fire were painstakingly recoveredThe essential mission of anyone who takes the past seriously is “to make human understanding more profound”
This summer I’m taking a Maga approach to reading: self-serving and isolationistThe art of re-reading - or rewatching - old favourites is a romantic pursuit
The ‘honest belief’ defence in rape cases rewards ignorance and insensitivityThere is no other type of crime in which an accused person can rely on their own interpretation of events - even if there is no reasonable explanation for their belief
Don’t expect votes for 16-year-olds to change the world. It’s the 25-35s who are the rebelsAs the Scottish independence referendum showed, young first-time voters can be surprisingly conservative
The Coldplay couple sit in the virtual dock, victims of online mob justiceByron and Cabot did nothing wrong legally, but their mistake will echo for eternity online
You might think a planning application for a windfarm is good news. You’d be wrongPlanned demolition of the €200 million Derrybrien windfarm will lead to destruction of potential green energy source for 30,000 homes
Some people knew about the Magdalene Laundries, some didn’t - but the silent majority knew not to knowIn a fourth universe, those who knew insist no ordinary people had any agency to take on the Church and the State
Whether the abuse happens in Rathfarnham or west Belfast, the story is the sameMáiría Cahill’s isolation was rooted in terror of the tribe. For the Brennan sisters theirs was about protecting reputations
‘I own and have run a cafe in Dún Laoghaire for 21 years. My business model is nearly broken’Simon Harris says the Government made a ‘solemn’ promise to cut the VAT rate for hospitality in the budget. But is there a better way to support struggling businesses?
Judicial system is on the front line of the fight to avert climate catastropheLooming legal battles over transport and energy projects will determine which direction we take
Magic coins fill the coffers of paranormal IrelandState coffers beefed up by huge corporation tax takes, but Government knows it can’t rely on money tree to live forever
We’re familiar with the evils of fast fashion. But is high fashion so much better?Western culture places a hefty premium on authenticity, and consumers are willing to pay a lot for ‘the real thing’. But what are they really getting?
Why did CMAT have to sell out the 3Arena before she could get exposure on Irish radio?We need to amplify Irish artists on Irish radio – not from a position of territorialism or nationalism, but from one of support and pride
It’s hard to resist the sense that, deep down, I’m a loserUnthinkable: Toxic positivity may be exacerbating a sense that we’re losing in life
Donald Trump could be swallowed up by an Epstein conspiracy he helped createTrump is learning that conspiracy theories are elastic, self-sealing and practically impossible to disprove to a base radicalised over time
We need to face up to the fact that not all middle-earners are squeezedHere’s what to look out for next week as the Government signals its big budget moves
As abortions triple, when will we admit that reluctant repealers were profoundly wrong?We collect statistics on where abortions happen in Ireland and under what part of the legislation, and little else. We have zero interest in knowing why women have them
Let’s inconvenience some oligarchs before we come for exhausted mothersWhat’s sustainable for the planet is unsustainable for individuals trying to survive capitalism, or so it feels
As a teacher in my 20s, I am excited to be part of the revival of Christian faithRite & Reason: Catholic influencers and digital missionaries are bridging faith and tradition with modern culture in dynamic, creative ways
It’s a relief to know young CMAT was taking notes, saving up her rage at BertieConstruction workers who ‘vanished’ from the sector after the Celtic Tiger were humans whose way of life was obliterated
Trump’s threats against Russia are a charade meant to buy Putin timeWorldview: Trump basically gave Putin 50 days’ protection from new sanctions, says Phillips Payson O’Brien, professor of strategic studies at the University of St Andrews in Scotland
DJ Carey belongs to a strange and depressing category To be from Kilkenny was to be proud – automatically, almost congenitally proud – of its supremacy in the sport of hurling. And at the very centre of that was DJ
When I was ambassador, Trump’s advisers still had sway. Now the EU has to be ready to hit back hardThe EU is reluctantly ready to face up to the consequences of its €70 billion tariff package
Why has immigration fizzled out as an issue?Dramatic decline in numbers seeking asylum will be seen by some as evidence that Ireland has become less welcoming. But that’s what the Government wanted
This is what we need to do in Ireland if we want stable, affordable house prices An honest discussion on population, underpinned by data, not emotion, is the only sensible way forward
Politicians come worst out of a row over An Post’s financesRow over An Post’s finances may be a thing of nothing – but a Minister accusing an unidentified Cabinet colleague of leaking confidential information certainly is not
The presidency is not a Rose of Tralee contest for over-35sThe argument that the role of president is devoid of real power is an odd perspective to cling to after 35 consecutive years of radical presidencies
Ireland needs to stop holding out against MercosurTrade deal is a big win for Ireland, but beef farmers feel challenged
A father in Gaza: Our children are dying as the world watches. We don’t want your pity – we want action By Alaa Abu Samara
Letters to the Editor, July 28th: On Gaza and religion, the cost of sexual abuse redress, and Galway traffic
An Irish DiaryDeirdre McQuillan dives into Venice to see how it was built and how the unique city operates