On Friday evening after finishing work I was driving up the road to Donegal, listening to the radio, when I started hearing reports about what was happening in the White House between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Audiences at Roscommon Arts Centre will be treated to the cream of amateur drama

Policing demands continue to rise, yet Garda numbers cannot keep pace with Ireland’s growing and changing population

Part of the services provided by Esker House, which covers parts of South Roscommon, is to help guide and assist victims, and in many cases their children

His wingman, unelected billionaire Elon Musk, is dismantling the federal workforce, the US equivalent of the Irish civil service.

Ireland’s economy is tied to the US, and the decisions made by people like Trump could have a major impact on our future.

"Instead of metaphorically propping the wall however, Trump and his people took the view that they would remove large sections of it altogether and take their chances with the law of gravity."

While plans for a new unit are in train, it now seems that there will be a significant delay before anything concrete is done.

There seemed to be some kind of an expectation out there that Michael Martin should somehow pay people whose electricity was off for a protracted period.

News reports were buzzing about changes to speed limits on rural roads, but I couldn’t quite figure out how it applied to me.

Put simply, Tony was a great person: kind, good-natured and loyal.

Councillor Anthony Waldron was a lifelong community activist, he loved Roscommon to the core and was always keen to promote the county at every opportunity.

You’d have looked a bit foolish in recent weeks as you tried to warm your hands on a dead heat pump, while you considered ‘watching television by candlelight’ as one child was heard to say

The storm primarily affected the West, North West, and Midlands, and it’s hard not to feel that the response would have been quicker and more coordinated if it had hit Dublin or the Pale.

For those still affected, this has become a humanitarian crisis

Some programmes get out and about in all corners of Ireland, and can even provide us with useful information on top of the entertainment value

We’re on the cusp of a functioning government, and a fresh set of ministers is about to grace the corridors of power

All eyes in this constituency will be focused on Dr Martin Daly with genuine hopes that he could become a junior minister

Funerals, one of the things that we Irish do very well

It’s clear what happens in Washington is looming large over Irish politics

If politicians want a future as part of this State in particular, they all need to be on the same page, but that will take a lot of work.

Why do so many people think they are worse off than previous generations?

Are we rearing a generation of absolute wimps, a generation that will never be able to handle any kind of multi-tasking or noisy environment?

Across various media outlets, a consensus emerged: this was a giveaway budget, with something “for everyone in the audience.”

Rarely has a story stopped this county or the wider region in its tracks the way the death of John Naughten has.

President Michael D. Higgins is far from quiet. He is outspoken on numerous issues, especially human rights and global affairs

Last January, Sinn Fein’s Mary Lou McDonald said the days of partition were numbered and a united Ireland was 'in touching distance.

It is often mentioned that Roscommon is one of the safest counties in the country. And, despite the terrible spate of burglaries and thefts across the county, this remains true.

The festival takes place on Saturday

Good things are happening all the time

Small businesses keep the economies alive in local towns and villages, and every euro spent with them tends to be spent locally again and again. But apart from local benefit, these businesses have other things in common.

It will be discombobulating to turn on the television this week, expecting to watch the Olympics and they won’t be there – replaced instead by a slew of silly season programmes or repeats.

For the past two weeks, I’ve focused on the Olympics, and there’s certainly no harm in continuing that conversation, is there? These weeks have brought immense pride in Ireland’s achievements and have shown us just how far we’ve come.

How strange that the most successful week in Ireland’s 100 years of Olympic participation should leave a sour taste in Roscommon.

The increasing number of reports involving threats to politicians has raised the pertinent question about how safe is it being a public figure in today’s climate?The issue about personal safety for politicians has become more heightened, reflected ...

If you’re at a loose end this summer, searching for something to do or a place to take visitors, I highly recommend the National Museum of Ireland at Turlough, just a few miles outside Castlebar.

The memories took me back to my childhood when the silage season arrived for our neighbours in Boho.

I was in Strasbourg last week to witness the opening of the new session of the European Parliament. I had been to the Parliament many times, but never on the opening day, and it was on my wish list.

It has already been a political summer of high drama with the promise of more shenanigans to come. Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw from the US presidential race was inevitable but sensational nonetheless.

A friend sent a text last week telling me John O’Mahony had been in hospital for the previous seven weeks. It was a shock but there was still hope that he could recover.

God, you can’t beat a good election, can you? I was in my element last week watching the election coverage from our near neighbours. Once the polling stations closed, we got the exit poll, and in fairness, it wasn’t that far off.

My generation has a love-hate relationship with Aer Lingus. We’re old enough to remember the time they operated in lock-step with British Airways on the Dublin-London route, code-sharing flights with identical fares.

An Garda Síochána was set up in 1923 and operated under what were known as ‘Peel’s Principles,’ a template for policing first proposed by Sir Robert Peel back in the early 1830s, based on the notion of policing by consent.

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, few people in modern Irish history have been as lauded by others as Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh, who died last Tuesday. His instantly recognisable, lilting voice was distinctive but not inimitable.

The start of July and the inter-county season for Roscommon has ended. It was great while it lasted: the sense of expectation, the hope, the dream, and of course, the entertainment. What next? Football or politics? My two great interests.

With the summer holidays looming for primary school children ALAN BEIRNE takes a trip down memory lane

They say a week is a long time in politics, but I’ll tell you, a week without Wi-Fi feels even longer. Here in Loughglynn we have fibre broadband with promised download speeds of up to 100 Mbps.

I want to preface what I am about to say by making clear my position on Israel’s response to the invasion of their country by Hamas in October last, when 1,139 citizens were slaughtered and 252 hostages were taken back across the border to Gaza.

"As part of the new regime, I’m getting a bit more exercise. I’ll soon be back up on the bike like the good old Covid times."

People are people, we’re all human and we can all get along, if we try.

A major health scare saw Hugh Lynn spend a number of days in ICU

I watched the Spanish TV news on May 1st. I’m interested in developments in the Coalition there, where a government wobble parallels our own situation. However, that story didn’t feature, it was all about Mayday, the workers holiday.

Beneath the surface, something joyful has been stirring

In 1981, in what now seems a lifetime ago, I clocked in for a night shift in a Dublin power station. It was Valentine’s night, a Saturday, and we looked forward to a quiet night.

The Better Half and I were flicking channels on Sunday lunchtime in the lull before the GAA extravaganza began.

All those who get involved in politics know how bruising a game it is. Those of us on the outside looking on can only marvel at the ruthlessness of its practitioners.

By Noel Fallon

There is an inevitability in politics that where a mistake is made, somebody’s head must roll. A politician or a public servant, it doesn’t matter as long as it satisfies the mob. Politics can be unforgiving at times.

Harris faces the challenge of returning the party to its traditional values

My first pair of football boots were acquired from my next-door neighbour.

“March brings breezes loud and shrill/stirs the dancing daffodil. " The lines from the poem ‘The Months’ by Sara Coleridge will resonate this week.

Message warned of the car overheating

Margaret Creaton of Creaton’s Bar and Shop in Loughglynn passed away early on St Stephen’s Day in her 94th year.

This may seem strange to anyone born in Ireland in the last couple of decades, but older people will remember the restrictions imposed during the Second World War, when many goods were rationed.

The quip that no good deed goes unpunished came to mind in the wake of JP McManus’s remarkable gesture to donate €1 million to each of the GAA’s 32 county boards.

This day next week it’ll all be over, Christmas will have come and gone and we’ll all be talking about the season that was. Hopefully it’ll have been “a nice and peaceful” Christmas and we’ll be looking forward to the new year.

A couple of weeks after the Dublin riots and the discussions continue. Yes, we’re listening to talk about immigration and the demands it puts on the country. Many of us are afraid to speak out in case we’re accused of being racist or anti-foreigner.

Light displays and bustling markets are just two of the community initiatives available 

On a particularly foggy day last Saturday, I travelled to Castlebar for the Connacht Junior Football Final. Lahardane, my late father's hometown, were competing, and I had a cousin on the team.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) states that every person has the right to live in society, and that nobody will be prevented from doing so by reason of having a disability.

Last Thursday night marked an unsettling episode in Ireland's history, with masses of right-wing, anti-foreigner protestors taking to the streets and causing widespread destruction in our capital city.

The turning on of the Christmas Lights is one of the highlights of the year in Roscommon Town.

I once knew a lovely lady who came into a few pounds after a lifetime of struggling. She bought a nice car and a fur coat, despite her not being able to drive.

Ryan Tubridy recently made headlines with his announced return to the airwaves, signing a broadcasting deal in the UK. His new show on Virgin Radio UK, airing from 10 a. m. to 1 p. m.

As my nephew and I sat into the car to begin our journey home from the All-Ireland football final, we turned on the radio to listen to the tail-end of RTÉ 1’s post-match coverage.

A two-and-a-half-acre site identified for an apprenticeship centre in the middle of Roscommon Town is a prime location for such a facility with numerous transport links available locally.

Back in biblical times, we are told that God gave King Solomon wisdom and great insight, a level of understanding ‘as measureless as the sand on the seashore.

Halloween wasn’t over before Christmas merchandise was on the shelves of shops throughout the land. We’ve become used to that over the last decade.

On Saturday morning, like everyone else in Roscommon, I awoke to a landscape blanketed in a thick white frost – the unmistakable sign that winter has arrived.

A post on X (what used to be called a tweet) last week summed up the feelings of many people around the world.

It seems nearly everyone is taking drugs now, if you judge by the number of cases in the courts.

Today as I write this column the two Beech trees in the garden have at last started to look at least a bit autumnal.

I knew an elderly Jewish man one time, a wise old fellow who taught me a lot of things about business and life in general. He had a lot of sayings, stuff I wish now that I’d written down.

Roscommon Gardaí are warning the public of the dangers of online fraud as they currently investigate a series of incidents across the county where people have been scammed out of thousands of euro.

Matthew Perry’s candid and often harrowing autobiography opens with the following lines: “Hi, my name is Matthew, although you may know me by another name. My friends call me Matty. And I should be dead.

On Friday I felt I had too much to do and not enough time to do it in. I considered not doing a column this week such was the shortage of time available to me.

At the beginning of September, I took to my usual spot at the green in our estate where our kids play their daily hotly contested football games against their neighbours and friends.

The news last week highlighted the widespread destruction in Palestine and Israel as the people there face the terrifying reality of all-out war and invasion. Air raid sirens wail in both countries as bombs fall on the people.

Recently I spent a night in a Muslim country, and it brought back memories of my once paying a visit to a small Turkish town, several decades ago. On that occasion I had found myself a very cheap hotel as darkness fell.

Had we been in any doubt that the climate crisis has arrived on our shores than the devastation caused in the south of the county last week by Storm Babet should have given us a wake up call.

For the Irish rugby team, the dream is over. A team that has captured the imagination of the country over the last two years failed to smash through the glass ceiling and reach a World Cup semi-final. This time, it felt like it would be different.

All eyes were on the Budget last week with Finance Minister Michael McGrath signing off on Budget 2024’s extra €14bn in spending. With election talk in the air, the government had an opportunity to show it was on the side of the people.

Empires and administrations come and go. The Roman Empire ended for many reasons, but the arrogance of the ruling elite was a major factor. The great and the good of Rome had, in a word, lost the run of themselves.

"Community”, a shared tapestry that we are all intricately woven into, plays a vital role in our lives, often drawing us in with its vibrant threads. This week, like many others, was a profound testament to the power of community for me.

As the horrors unfolded in Israel and Gaza last weekend, it prompted comparisons with our own peace process and how visionaries and risk-takers dictate the paths nations take for generations.