Disappointed partisans of the Republican movement focus their attacks on Gerry Adams, alleging deception, connivance and mainpulation. Historical antagonists of Sinn Fein polemicise against him as the emblem of a shift to the right of a party they never supported, but which had gathered a working class constituency around it. When they speak, implicit in their claims is the sense that they sense a misdirected radicalism.
Those whose 'republicanism' nis built around Adams will never be swayed by such ad hominem attacks. Rather their sense of partsianship will be consolidated. Fianna Fail, Fine Gael, the Newspapers, Sticks etc will continue their assault, built on the preservation of the status quo, simultaneously so that any left critique will go unnoticed in the snowstorm of reaction.
The seperatist movement in Ireland has always been the receptacle of a hybrid radicalism, powerful becasue of the primitive nature of its artciulation, continual confrontation with legality, incessant demonisation, persecution and criminalisation by the state. Those who have identified as republicans however, identify with a radical anti-state politics and are somewhat open to alternatives. The fans of the last decades media stars will remain unmoved by the ideological broadsides, but the activists will bhe in a state of continuous assessmet of where they stand, especially as the fruits of cooptation generate internal manipulation and new factions.
Against this background, the only useful approach is to constitute an alternative which delivers, manitains contact with the millenarian tradition in Irish politics, the physionomy of permanent rebellion, but establishes its alternative choice as practice. Libertarians need to think this through, rather than being seduced by the simplistic traditional polemics practiced by leftist elements.
