A moot point but I believe that your are paraphrasing Comical Ali; Chemical Ali was another card in the deck.
Z
Z100
Guest
Spot on.
Loved this line from Wikipedia:
When asked where he had got his information he replied, "authentic sources - many authentic sources".
So it's Comical, not Chemical, Ali who's working for the Indo.
Z
Z100
Guest
The Indo today, paragraph nine:
"Senior garda officers emphasised last night that Mr O'Toole was not, as had been reported, known to the force and he had no criminal record or history."
As reported by who?
The Indo.
"Senior garda officers emphasised last night that Mr O'Toole was not, as had been reported, known to the force and he had no criminal record or history."
As reported by who?
The Indo.
What I don't get is why they thought the fact (or lie) that he was known to Gardai was even worth reporting. Even if he was Dublins biggest gangster, he was still killed in a traffic accident so who cares if he was a politician or a drug dealer. He was just a 24 year old man. I guess the indo are trying to say that some lives are worth less than others. I felt so sorry for the guys family. I hope they got a sincere public apology from the paper but have my doubts. Such sloppy lazy journalism in the Liam Lawlor mould. You would have thought they would have learnt their lesson.
Z
Z100
Guest
I think the real question is who told the Indo the man was known to the Gardai, and why? Who wanted to blacken his name, and why?
I agree. Think they heard Clondalkin and Youth and jumped to conclusions. Even if the guards did try and blacken his name, there is still no reason for the paper to print it. Had nothing whatsoever to do with the story.
I only heard about this last night when speaking with my Mam, who works in Lucan and one of her colleagues is a cousin of the lads Mam. Has nobody drawn a line between the obvious:
4 Gardai, coming home from Westmanstown late at night, hit a pedestrian
Immediately he's a scumbag "allegedly" and the public say (when stirred by the gutter press - ie Indo) serves him right, maybe the poor Gardai were chasing him, he got what was coming to him
But of course it turns out to be a total lie, the car being driven disappears, the Park says "our lads were all stone cold sober" and the country turns on the Indo for bad reporting.
Who fed the story to the Indo?
Why were the details so false? (We can't solely blame lazy journalism)
4 Gardai, coming home from Westmanstown late at night, hit a pedestrian
Immediately he's a scumbag "allegedly" and the public say (when stirred by the gutter press - ie Indo) serves him right, maybe the poor Gardai were chasing him, he got what was coming to him
But of course it turns out to be a total lie, the car being driven disappears, the Park says "our lads were all stone cold sober" and the country turns on the Indo for bad reporting.
Who fed the story to the Indo?
Why were the details so false? (We can't solely blame lazy journalism)
Z
Z100
Guest
Have never agreed more with a post, my thoughts exactly.
Not defending the Indo, but if they are the "gutter press" what are the tabloids??
They're not even Press. Joe, in the weeks before Ollie Byrne got sick the Indo were hounding him and aching to slam him as much as possible, suddenly he becomes a hero of the nation when he gets ill and he's a great man. Sinn Fein/IRA (their moniker - Indo's) are at fault for everything from global warming, to Steve Staunton, to Croke Park not being handed over to the FAI - it's a scum mentality and it's ruining the paper.
So those charming people at the Indo excelled themselves today. On the day that a man is burying his wife and infant child, they seem to think that it is OK to drag up past professional controversies and plaster these with his picture on the front page.
This is surely a new low, even for the SIndo - Do the journalists and editors who come up with this pile of stinking faeces have any conscience or bare trace of humanity left? Given that I swore never to pay over cash to the Indo years ago, I guess all I can do now is avoid their website too, to ensure they aren't earning any advertising income from me.
This is surely a new low, even for the SIndo - Do the journalists and editors who come up with this pile of stinking faeces have any conscience or bare trace of humanity left? Given that I swore never to pay over cash to the Indo years ago, I guess all I can do now is avoid their website too, to ensure they aren't earning any advertising income from me.
Z
Z100
Guest
Yeah, I was fairly speechless when I saw that today. Even if the man had committed crimes against humanity I think he had the right to bury his wife and child in peace (with one small child to look after and the other twin critical in hospital). Incredible.
There are certainly questions to be answered regarding this accident. The police station in Lucan is not far from where the accident happened so why was the driver of the car taken to a station elsewhere to be breathalised?
There is some thing wrong there.
Z
Z100
Guest
According to the Gardai he was to taken to Harcourt St to be tested on an intoxyliser machine because the Lucan station doesn't have one (which is amazing for such a big and busy station). I presume this is standard procedure (is it?), ie that you're first breathalysed at the scene of an accident and then taken to a station to be tested on an intoxyliser?