Lucky General Kenny may find himself out of step with G8 chiefs on key issue of tax 

We all know that First Lady Michelle is the real boss – and an icon of cool 

Michelle Obama brightened up an otherwise dull, Irish summer's morning yesterday when she began a whirlwind two-day tour of Ireland accompanied by her young daughters Sasha and Malia.

Irish women entitled to celebrate after a 40-year struggle for gender equality 

When it comes to the role of women in society, the last 40 years have been transformative, particularly when it comes to the workforce.

Maybe they're missing the point? 

As is perhaps screamingly obvious from the picture that appears beside this column every day, I'm not one for designer labels.

Despite its flaws the G8 summit is a chance for welcome debate 

ORDINARY decent people within a 50-mile radius of the Lough Erne Resort will have asked the question many times already as the security net is drawn tighter and tighter, impacting on daily life.

Forget the Guinness publicity shots, drinks giant Diageo doesn't need us 

OTHER countries do state dinners and 21-gun salutes but it often seems that no visit to Ireland by a foreign leader is complete without a visit to a pub and a pint of Guinness.

Efficient Meath mix bit of 'nice' with bit of know-how 

'Meath have a lot of nice footballers on that team," said a man on his way out of Aughrim on Saturday evening as if that was the final seal of approval for the new-look side that had just weathered a very stormy 75 minutes against Wicklow.

A literary giant, a creative genius – but Joyce was no great Irish icon 

So, did you have a jolly Bloomsday yesterday? Did you celebrate it by having offal for breakfast, attending a horsedrawn funeral, getting stocious at Davy Byrne's, or just reading aloud some of the more sexually explicit passages from 'Ulysses'?

Well, have you got a better idea? Well done, that man 

I don't believe in UFOs, partly because I have never seen one.

Zebo knows personality is paramount in sport 

Madonna's single 'Express Yourself' became a hit nine months before Simon Zebo was born. Not that he would have needed the advice. He has taken the riff of that maxim and mixed it to a whole new level.

Unemployable at 55, he has 30 years to drive his wife nuts 

HE was a proud man who worked all his life. A couple of years ago, he was on €600 a week, but then he was let go. Now he is down to a third of that. The redundancy was all right enough, but not enough to last forever. Most of the money was spent on doing up the house. Herself wanted a new kitchen. Then there was this "see-through room at the side of the house", as he calls it. Known to you and I as a conservatory.

Watchdog wounded by political flak 

THE Dail's Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is a pretty sniffy body. It looks down its nose at other Oireachtas committees. Uniquely, its members are deemed so distinguished that no substitutes are ever allowed.

Kenny plays Kennedy card as Labour left looking foolish 

The Taoiseach has shown a sure touch from start to finish in promoting the Protection of Life during Pregnancy Bill. I say finish because Kenny's playing of the JFK card has secured him massive public backing. Hence he can take a hard line with hand-wringers.

Forget sex and spooks, virtual spies are bigger threat 

THE media loves spies, but even more, it loves spies to have interesting sex lives. The allegation by Edward Snowden that intelligence agencies have access to our private data has caused much angst, but that he has abandoned a hot girlfriend has added spice to the story.

Senate row throws yin-yang off balance 

TODAY I will save you a lot of time and a lot of energy. You know that debate they're having about the Seanad? You know the way they're asking you to think about the advantages and the disadvantages of having a second chamber? And then to vote for or against?

Let's wipe smile off comic Kenny's face 

We could do with some light relief. There's a lot of serious stuff happening right now – the abortion debate, unemployment stagnant at horrendous heights, the Government's hounding of the sick and the handicapped, the continued looting of citizens' pockets for the benefit of the elite. We need a comic distraction. And, with the superb timing of a veteran performer, our Taoiseach has arranged a referendum on the abolition of the Seanad.

It's pointless keeping Irish on this sentimental life support 

ANDREA finished her honours Irish Leaving Cert paper in central Dublin this week – and last night the latest offering in an endless library on what life was like on the Blasket Islands was launched in the depths of Dunquin, Co Kerry.

June 12: the day we chose democracy over theocracy 

IT felt as if there should have been a thunderclap. But yesterday, when separation of church and State finally happened in Ireland, it was heralded neither with a bang nor a whimper.

Keep on mocking in the free world. . . 

There was a rather jolting moment the other day when the 24-hour news channels just seemed to effortlessly slip from street violence in London to street violence in Turkey.

McGuinness isn't alone in failures of judgment 

THEY still don't get it in Leinster House. It is five years since the economy fell off a cliff. Yet the public would be forgiven for thinking little has changed in the political bubble on Kildare Street.

Ditch discredited policies of austerity and save economy 

THERE are around 180,000 small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Ireland, employing more than 900,000 people. That's 69pc of the workforce, worth more than €40bn to the Irish economy every year. SMEs are the drivers of Irish economic growth over the short and medium term.

Mad dogs and Irish men (and woman) have a burning issue with the sun 

AS I walked along the beach yesterday, I overheard two teenagers talking. One asked: "Did you bring any sun cream?" Her friend turned to her, looking shocked and said: "Sure, the Irish sun doesn't burn you."

Washington better get ready for a radical at the top table 

HUMAN rights defenders will rejoice at US President Barack Obama's nomination of Irish-born Samantha Power to the post of US Ambassador to the United Nations.

Really? That's the best you got? 

Where do you stand on Simon Cowell? Well, unless you're a hormonal teenage girl or want to be on one of his talent contests, then the chances are you wouldn't mind standing on his head. Repeatedly.

Kenny's credibility rests on Seanad vote – he needs a win 

IF YOU like the occasional political conspiracy theory, try this one: Enda Kenny was barely holding on to his job as Fine Gael leader in autumn 2009. So, all of a sudden, he hopped out a 'big idea', to abolish the Seanad, promising the necessary referendum once he became Taoiseach. It worked as he fought off his doubters, became Taoiseach and now has delivered on the referendum.

Under Seanad apartheid, my parents were second class 

THERE were plenty of cushy numbers in the old days. A friend who worked for the State in an office told me of a fiercely competitive game they played every morning. The throw-in was at 10 and the final whistle was blown at 11.

Well, let's not get carried away . . . 

The news that there was a spike in racist graffiti in some Dublin areas over the bank holiday weekend is, it should go without saying, disgraceful.

We're Irish, please feel free to loot us 

THE looting continues. Last week, the banks got their way again. Savings schemes run by An Post for the National Treasury Management Agency are being deliberately handicapped at the insistence of bankers. An Post, it seems, was too successful at running such schemes. Which annoyed the bankers. So something had to be done about that.

Samantha may have to step in to sort out Seapoint 

LAST week, Eamon Gilmore's spin doctors sold a feel-good story to the media about the Department of Foreign Affairs selling off expensive wines – as if this would make a dent in the national debt. An alert media would have rejected that story and laid into the lack of a firm Irish foreign policy on dealing with brutal dictators like Assad of Syria.

We're not speaking the same language 

THERE is a conversation going on, about the banning of alcohol sponsorship of sports. There is even talk that something will be done.

Scandal of vulnerable children who have fallen through cracks 

AFTER so much controversy about the rights of the unborn, it was timely to see the body politic turn its attention to born children this week. Not for the first time, the plight of children in trouble with the law and in need of detention or protection rose to the top of the agenda. This time it was Ms Justice Ann Ryan who made it her business and ours to point out that she had nowhere to place juveniles in need of detention and rehabilitation following sentence.

Our €20bn social welfare black hole is a mystery beyond comprehension 

THE space elevator is a science-fiction standard. Like teleporters, laser guns and green-skinned ladies with a twinkle in their eyes, space elevators are part of the sci-fi cannon.

Sports science obsession widening competitive gap 

Eugene McGee

Some months ago I wrote a small piece about an advertisement in national papers for a course called 'Adult Coach Membership', which the blurb stated would 'focus on theoretical and practical aspects of coaching and sports science intervention of Gaelic Games'.

People – know your place! 

Only a few years ago, we were seeing wistful, ruminative articles in the papers – mainly by stupid people with too much money – telling us that we had all lost the run of ourselves and it was time for a reality check.

Billy Keane: Communion Day – when grown-ups can reclaim lost or forgotten values 

The children are bouncing up from the church now. There's timelessness in the pageant. The big, bad world has pruned childhood years, yet the innocence of the little girls in their white dresses, white shoes and white lace veils is a constant. The boys look as boys should, in their school uniforms with ties slung to one side, shirts stuck out in little triangles and buttons tied out of sequence, pushing one collar above the other. Every day should be Communion Day.