The world (and especially The Guardian) has been consumed of late by the whereabouts, both real and imagined, of Edward Snowden. On Monday there was extended look into planes Snowden wasn't on, before Vladimir "I Must Break You" Putin revealed he was still in Moscow Airport. But Snowden seems to be harbouring hopes of being harboured in Ecuador, the Shangri-La of people dodging US Intelligence.
While the US will throw the kitchen sink and the real life equivalent of Tom Hanks in Catch Me If You Can at Snowden forever more, in Ireland the only small heavily guarded room the pissmasters who caused Ireland's economic cataclysm will ever see is their Scrooge McDuck riches safe. Tapes of the personal of conversations between the top brass of Anglo Irish show them to have an incredible amount of it in their necks, and proved what we've all sort of known all along: that they're dishonest, craven, brazen, juvenile, callous, jibbering idiots who have no idea how to do anything but soak up money and be massive dicks.
That said, the government and financial regulators' spectacular laxity was a contributing factor too, hence why the government will, with its usual Austin Powers-style deftness of manoeuvrability vacillate between inquiry or costly tribunal. In other words, no prison for anybody. If only instead of being in Ireland committing fraud to the tune of billions, they'd played bingo in Portugal.
Elsewhere in Ireland North West Pride (a group that supports gay people and nothing to do with Kanye and Kim's daughter) has officially withdrawn from the Dublin Pride Rally because, as they see it, they've sort of sold out. (This, by the way, was Dublin Pride's response). Happier news for the gay community (well, everyone who's not a homophobe really) came from the US Supreme Court, where the Defence of Marriage Act was deemed unconstitutional by a 5-4 margin. A lot of people celebrated. Justice Scalia and Michelle Bachman went mental. And given how the court voted 5-4, as it usually does due to liberal and conservative phalanxes, it means this moderate is one of the most powerful guys in the universe.
You know who else is pretty powerful? Bono? And you know who thinks he's great? Eh, Bono. Although his reputation among the rest of the world could be better due to his insufferable international smugness and offshore tax affairs, he came out swinging in an interview with Gay Byrne, a man known for getting the best out of Irish popstars. Among the best quotes was that Bono wasn't warm and fluffy when it came to business, and also how he took credit for bringing Google and Facebook to Ireland for its tax competitiveness. And yet, he didn't stay himself.
From one sunglasses-wearing singer to another now and Silvio Berlusconi has, after years of antics shadier than a coconut tree, finally got conked on the head. He's been sentenced to jail for sex with a minor, although in a particularly grimy irony, he's unlikely to serve any actual prison time because of his advanced age.
It's a shame that a mahogany sex pest like Silvio can hang around being Prime Minister on and off for nearly two decades, when a dedicated and effective public servant gets ousted after only three. Julia Gillard, in a weirdly symmetrical situation, has been deposed as leader of the Labor Party, and by extension Prime Minister, just before an election by the very man whom she deposed. And who had tried to depose her before, and who nearly quit altogether due to faceless men. But now he's back after winning 57 Labor caucus' votes, all of whom have faces, and may just keep Labor in power. Julia Gillard meanwhile is quitting politics altogether, to do what next is uncertain. Although, based on other information we found out this week, she is quite good at knitting.
But Julia can be glad her political failure isn't as comprehensive a failure as the EDL (the rip off English Defence League, not the original English Disco Lovers) who decided, in their infinite insanity and inability to spell, to make a video of "Stephen Hawkins" endorsing them that will make you want to shower for watching it. In similarly bad taste, Irish pro-life anaphylactic shockers Youth Defence plonked one of their slogan wagons down in Dublin. Outside the Rape Crisis Centre. They claimed it wasn't deliberately put there, it was just caught in traffic. And by "traffic", they meant "empty road". They then attacked "pro-aborts" for exploiting rape victims. Stay classy, folks.