Every March around St Patrick's Day, we dutifully dispatch the Taoiseach to Washington with a bowl of shamrock and a practised smile. This year, however, he brought six billion dollars and the knowledge of an outrageous war.

Any thinking man would have to wonder why a smart thinking man like Paschal Donohoe would want to give up a nice cushy job in the Dáil to take up a role in the World Bank Group in Washington DC.

This is the week when we talk and think about national identity.

At this time of year, there is a last-minute rush to crop roadside hedges.

Eighty years ago, de Valera beheld a burning Europe and called it a weather event. We're still doing it. We Irish have a distinctive talent for extended euphemism.

First things first. Our President Catherine Connolly put it very well when she joined those who expressed sadness at the death of Ronnie Delany.

There was a collective sigh of relief throughout Mayo early last week when it was revealed that Saturday’s league clash with Kerry in Tralee would, after all, be ‘on the telly’.

In 2013, the then US President Barack Obama warned us: “We like to think of ourselves as a meritocracy - a place where anyone who works hard can make it, no matter what they look like or where they come from or what their last name is.

There has been some media reaction to a recent comment made by Bishop Niall Coll of Raphoe diocese (that’s Donegal, mainly).

The gullible English have always had a weakness for the sort of Irishman who makes them feel both robbed and appreciative of the experience.