Things to See..

The Royal Hospital Kilmainham. The Royal Hospital in Kilmainham on the outskirts Dublin City was built in period of 4 years from 1680 to 1684 for a cost of £22,500. The site where the Hospital was built was the location a medieval hospital founded in 1174 by Strongbow. Strongbow had been one of the leaders of the Norman invasion of Ireland and had married Aoife who was the daughter of the then King of Leinster, Diarmait Mac Murchadha (Dermot MacMurrough) and eventually inherited the throne himself.

Royal Hospital Kilmainham.

The hospital was actually a home for retired soldiers over 250 peopled lived in the Hospital at any one time. Queen Victoria of Britain visited the hospital on two different occasions the last being 1900 before her death in January 1901. In 1922 the Hospital was handed over to the Irish Free State and went on to be the Headquarters of the Garda Siochana (Irish Police Force) between 1930 and 1950.
In 1991 the Hospital became home to the Irish Museum of Modern Art and is a wonderful place to visit if you are in Dublin.

While in the Kilmainham area, another site well worth a visit is Kilmainham Gaol or Jail. Built in 1796 the New Gaol or as it was officially known, County of Dublin Gaol was used as a place of incarceration and execution of many Irish leaders during times of rebellion or insurgence over the years. The last prisoner in the jail was Eamon DeVelera who went on to become Taoiseach and President of the country.

New Gaol or County of Dublin Gaol

The jail is one of the largest empty prisons in Europe and is currently the Irish History Museum following a restoration in the 1960's. For years the building was left idol as it possibly had too many ghosts of the past history of the Irish struggle. The jail have been used as a site in many films over the years including The Italian Job in 1969, In The Name Of The Father in 1993 and  Michael Collins in 1996.

Presidential Election: In a RedC poll for the Sunday Business Post on Sunday last , 16/10/2011 we saw swift change in how the country expect to vote on October 27th. The poll topper was Sean Gallagher with 39% of the vote which was up an incredible 18 points from the previous poll 10 days earlier. Michael D Higgins was in 2nd place with 27% of the vote which was up 2 points. Martin McGuinness was at 13% down 3 and Gay Mitchell was down 5 points to 8%. David Norris had half of his previous vote at 7% and Mary Davis had gone from 9% to 4% while Dana Rosemary Scallon  received just 2% of the vote down 3 points.



Caricature of Candidates Tweeted by Niall O'Loughlin

The spending limits for this election is €750,000 per candidate of which €200,000 can be reimbursed by the state, which means the the bottom 4 people in the poll with a collective total of 21%  of the vote are to claim €800,000 from the state for wasting their time.