Free State with Joe Brolly and Dion Fanning

Micheal Martin emerged from his meeting with Donald Trump on St Patrick’s Day with the commentariat purring.He had stood up for Europe, for Keir Starmer and, in part, for Winston Churchill but that didn’t matter. He had survived.On Free State today we ask does any of it matter. As oil and gas fields in Iran, Qatar and Saudi Arabia are attacked, oil prices rise and governments insist they will protect their people. But what can they do?On Free State, we look at how commodity traders control the movement of the world’s resources. We examine the astonishing claims in the book The World for Sale. We ask in this world, what good can politicians do? Let us know what you think - info@freestatepodcast.com

When the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission threatened to revoke broadcasters’ licences because of their coverage of the war, some complained that it violated the First Amendment, guaranteeing freedom of speech.On Free State we look at what those rights mean in a country where Trump must get what he wants.We go back to what happened in Iraq when the country was broken apart, its resources plundered and its people scattered. Is Donald Trump following in that tradition or is what he is doing in Iran potentially worse? Contact us at info@freestatepodcast.com

Riham Jafari has heard the stories of her grandparents. The stories of a time before the Nakba when her family lived a simple existence in a village outside Jerusalem. They enjoyed farming the land and their independence.It was a “beautiful life” her grandparents said before occupation came.After the Nakba, they lived in a camp one square kilometre, crowded with nowhere for children to play.Riham was born in the Dheisheh camp near Bethlehem. Today Riham Jafari works for Action Aid and when she came to Dublin last week she spoke about the suffering of the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank.On Free State today she talks to us about life under occupation, why the Occupied Territories Bill has to pass and why a two-state solution with an independent Palestine could be a reality if the world was determined to see it.

The story of Casement Park is a metaphor for post conflict Northern Ireland.Once there was a dream about a shining stadium on a hill, a stadium which would benefit everyone in the north when it hosted matches at the European Championships in 2028.Two years ago, that dream ended when the British government said they would not fund the cost of the stadium which had ‘risen dramatically’ during years of obstruction and resistance. The benefit to all communities of Euro 2028 was gone but for some it mattered more that a GAA stadium would not be built. On Free State we look at what the ongoing battle to build Casement tells us about Northern Ireland. Gordon Lyons, the minister responsible, says there is a ‘funding gap’. But is the real chasm something more fundamental?

“Based on what I’ve seen, it was done by Iran.” When Donald Trump spoke on Air Force One about the bombing of a school in southern Iran, he was, of course, lying.That is what Trump does but in the attack on Iran he has also tapped into the American fantasy about their righteousness that can only be fully displayed through military force. When Stanley Kubrick made Dr Strangelove, he was fascinated by what he saw as ‘the delicate balance of terror’ that was part of the Cold War. To give his satire power he realised it needed ‘inspired lunacy’. That inspired lunacy now drives Trump’s military strikes where satire is meaningless and death is what happens to other people.On Free State, we look at how far America will go in Iran. What happens when Trump loses interest? What happens when Netanyahu wants something else?Let us know what you think - info@freestatepodcast.com

Professor Charles Knowles is a very smart man. He is a surgeon and clinical researcher. He is able to apply logic and reason to find solutions to most things. But logic and reason made no sense when it came to his own drinking.On Free State today Charles Knowles explains why we drink and why we drink too much.He talks to Dion about his own struggles and why there is a genetic reason for many people drinking.They discuss the line of Kurt Vonnegut that ‘Alcoholics Anonymous is America’s greatest contribution to the 20th century’ and Charles explains why modern science agrees with Vonnegut.

When a US submarine torpedoed an Iranian warship in the Indian Ocean, 150 Iranians were believed to have been killed. ‘It thought it was safe in international waters,” Pete Hegseth the US’s self styled Secretary of War proclaimed. “Instead it was sunk by a torpedo, a quiet death.”More than a thousand civilians have been killed since the US and Israel launched their offensive. This is a campaign they are advancing ‘without mercy’ Hegseth said.On Free State today we look at what the US, Israel and Donald Trump want. Are their aims of total control in the Middle East achievable? Or will the ambitions of the US and their allies spiral out of control as they have before but not before there is endless human misery?

A few minutes before 1pm on the Saturday of the 2026 GAA Congress some protestors forced their way inside.The response to this protest may have far reaching implications for the GAA.On Free State we look at how the GAA has failed to deal with the understandable anger about the Allianz sponsorship deal.Dion and Joe argue about how they should be addressing it and Jarlath Burns’s comments on Saturday. Is this a turning point for how volunteers view the GAA, certainly the GAA as represented by Croke Park?

Labour Together was set up in the summer of 2015 as a way of uniting the UK Labour Party, but with the election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader it soon became something very different. Driven by Morgan McSweeney, it became a means of destroying Jeremy Corbyn‘s leadership ‘by any means necessary. Keir Starmer was the vessel to take Labour away from Corbyn‘s politics.On Free State today, Peter Geoghegan talks to us about the extraordinary and chilling practices of Labour Together. He tells the story about the decision to hire a PR firm to investigate the motivations of journalists who were reporting on their funding. As Keir Starmer faces threats from all sides, will this be the scandal that upend him. Is this the scandal that is grotesque, unbelievable, bizarre and unprecedented?