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When something... anything, goes wrong in Northern Ireland the politicians know who to blame - the media.
Talk about shirking responsibility! Our politicians are becoming less and less accountable as each week goes by, to the extent the only thing we're not responsible for is the weather!
I don't just say this because I work for a newspaper, no, the general public is being shortchanged by the political machine that controls the flow of information to you, the general public. Our job is to inform and it has become increasingly difficult to do that with our political leaders shielded by an army of civil service press officers, and party officers.
In the past politicians were accessible. I could lift the phone to any one of our MPs or decision makers, now I'm directed to a press officer who either refuses to return my call or issues a bland statement which fails to answer the question.
Violence
While the media wasn't actually blamed for orchestrating street violence associated with the flag dispute, we were castigated for reporting it because it portrayed a bad image internationally of Northern Ireland! Journalists weren't the ones out throwing petrol bombs.
First Minister Peter Robinson actually advocated people shouldn't buy the Irish News because they dared ask questions about the cost of his and Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness's trip to the Americas recently. Questions about your money which incidentally, they refused to answer.
And when they were asked about their clearly troubled relationship this week, Robinson insisted all was rosy and that it was a media conspiracy.
Education minister John O'Dowd accused the press of creating a row over this week shared education report when all we did was report misgivings from educationalists and other politicians. There are more than 160 press officers working at Stormont, protecting the interests of 108 MLAs.
News management is a creeping danger, state censorship should be resisted, you deserve to know what's going on. We don't get it right all the time but then neither do politicians, they just don't want you to know about it.
PSSSST...don't tell anyone but we're going to pretend the Troubles never happened.
Yes 40 years of civil war is going to be our dirty secret, and woe betide anyone who speaks of it!
That's the big plan from the nay-sayers in the UUP,TUV and PUP whose opposition to a conflict resolution centre on the site of the Maze prison is one big act of denial. To dismiss it as a shrine to republican terrorism is an insult to the entire population, at least those of us who are intelligent enough to make up our own minds.
There are far too many people busy rewriting history. It's the easiest thing in the world to play on people's fears and insecurities, but manipulating the truth for a slither of political gain is damnable.
So memo to Jim Allister and Mike Nesbitt: "The Troubles were not ALL about Bobby Sands, there were a few others involved. And like it or not, many, many tourists come to Northern Ireland BECAUSE of the Troubles."
