Catherine Connolly

The combined forces of the political and media establishment threw everything they could at Connolly to try to stop the momentum behind her campaign. “Smear the bejaysus out of her”, as Ivan Yates [1] suggested, was the strategy deployed. Her trip to Syria, her employment of a Republican convicted of a gun crime, her comments in opposition to US, French and British imperialism, as well as her previous work as a barrister, were all endlessly scrutinised and picked over. The red thread running through the majority of the smears was the fact that she is out of touch with the political and media establishment in her defence of neutrality and opposition to aligning more and more openly with NATO.