Blarney: The faux outrage over Obama's comments about religious schools in Ireland

The sectarian nature of education—and public funding of religiously segregated schools—has long been a sore point in Ulster and the president simplified a hugely complex situation by suggesting that more community integration would erase tensions between the two communities. This is “We Are the World” nonsense. As one local Catholic bishop told the Catholic Register, “We all welcome the president’s presence, but would encourage his speechwriters to support a less hackneyed analysis of our situation and prospects.”

But such calls for an end to everyday sectarianism are so common in North Ireland that the Belfast Telegraph mentioned the school line only in passing; its editorialists ignored it entirely. The churn of news, though, demands fresh outrages—a simple accomplishment when you either have no knowledge of history or have decided that context rudely intrudes upon your predetermined narrative. (That Breitbart post, for instance, makes no mention of the Troubles.)

After Obama’s speech, a columnist for the Belfast Telegraph happily observed that, with the Troubles effectively over, “we really don’t feature much at all in the American news coverage.” It’s a point perfectly underscored by the sputtering outrage hunters, who seem to have already forgotten about a little religious war between Catholics and Protestants that took 3,600 lives.