Echo to Be Sold

The Sunday Independent in Ireland reported last weekend that the Irish Echo newspaper is likely to be sold.

The buyer, according to the newspaper, is Mairtin O Muilleoir, owner of the Andersonstown News, the Belfast-based newspaper chain. The Independent stated the pricetag for the Echo is in the $5 million range.

O Muilleoir is best known in New York for his Daily Ireland newspaper, a competitor to the venerable Irish News in Belfast which had several American investors, including big names in the Irish American community.

Daily Ireland recently was forced to close down. O Muilleoir argued strongly that the British and Irish governments did not sufficiently support the newspaper with advertising.

O Muilleoir is a former Sinn Fein councilor on Belfast City Council who wrote a tell all book which was well received about his time on the council there. His publishing company has printed the Irish edition of the Irish Echo for some time.

One of his partners in the past has been Peter Quinn, former head of the GAA who is also brother of Ireland's richest businessman Sean Quinn.

The current owner of the Irish Echo, Sean Finlay, did not comment to the Independent on whether the newspaper was for sale. Finlay, who made his fortune from the mobile phone company Meteor, was rumored to be thinking of selling the Echo for some time.

The Independent also noted that Finlay had paid $2.2 million for the Echo, so if he has received the $5 million number it is quite a nice coup for him.

Finlay bought the newspaper a few years back from Claire Grimes, who had inherited it from her husband John Grimes. The newspaper was started in 1928 by Charlie Connolly, an outspoken Irish Nationalist known as "Smash the Border" Connolly.

Cutting Turf in Clare

QUICK, which current member of congress cut turf in Co. Clare for six months and also tended bar there?

If you looked through the list of the Friends of Ireland and did not guess the name don't be surprised. He's not on there.

Last week the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform (ILIR) leadership met a dozen or so members of Congress in pursuit of the new immigration reform bill.

One of the key meetings was with Congressman Mike Pence, who represents a large congressional district outside Indianapolis in Indiana.

Pence is a rock ribbed right wing Republican associated much more with tax cutting and a rigorous right wing agenda. He is also a key player on immigration reform, and a clear voice of conscience on the issue within the Republican Party because of his own grandparents who emigrated to America form Clare (Doonbeg) and Sligo (Tubbercurry.)

Pence, who was born and raised Catholic in Chicago, returned frequently to the ancestral home, he told ILIR. He spent six months in Doonbeg at one time, tending bar and cutting turf on the side. He has a wide and deep knowledge of Ireland which could come in very handy in the immigration debate.

Last year Senator Edward Kennedy met several times with Pence, who became born again after college and drifted to the right wing of his party. Pence remarked ruefully that one of the few things in common they had was talking about Ireland.

Pence is the originator of the touchback provision, which means that any undocumented regularizing their status in a new immigration bill would first have to return home to their country of origin. Last year he and Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson introduced their own immigration provisions which included touchback.

Pence will be a key figure in the House again this year. It is good to know that he has Irish interests. Indeed, the former radio talk show host made clear he was very interested in the ILIR position on the issue.

Too Many Americans

WORD has it that neither Senator Edward Kennedy or former Senator George Mitchell were exactly welcome in Northern Ireland this week for the unveiling of the new power-sharing government.

It seems Sinn Fein among others had pleaded with authorities to allow far more people from America and elsewhere to come to the historic occasion and lobbied hard for a bigger venue for the unveiling than the Assembly room in Stormont, which holds very few spectaros.

However, the Northern Ireland Office held firm that the event was not going to be expanded. The clear subtext was that the Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionist Party might be embarrassed if too many Americans had made their way over.

Unfortunately one of those who considered going and then didn't after bureaucratic problems arose was Senator Mitchell, who more than almost anyone surely deserved his day in the limelight,

Senator Kennedy, however, was determined to make his way to the history-making event. There is no question that he richly deserved to take his share of the credit, and it is amazing that despite the incredibly busy schedule he has, he decided to make the trip as part of the official American delegation.

AIF Success

IF you weren't at the American Ireland Fund dinner in New York last week you missed the best Irish event in years.

Held at the Park Avenue Armory, some 1,500 guests packed the spectacular venue to hear from guests such as Irish President Mary McAleese and actor Paul Newman, who was mobbed by the crowds.

The dinner raised a whopping $4.1 million, a record for any Irish dinner in the U.S.

More impressive was the fact that the organization, which has often been accused of having an "old fogies" setup, has addressed that issue in extraordinary fashion.

The dinner chairmen were nearly all in their late thirties-early forties, and the entire make-up of the room was of a markedly younger vintage than in times past.

The dinner is just the latest successful chapter for the AIF, which has become deeply energized by the success of the peace process and the part they played in it.

Suffice it to say that the AIF gives every indication that they are adjusting to the changed political situation in Northern Ireland and that they are intent on not just remaining the largest Irish fundraising group, but also surpassing their past achievements. Well done to them.