Richard Sullivan: ‘Arlene Foster bared her crocodile teeth to Joe Biden’

Supporting act Sammy Wilson got in the picture with a baseless attack laying the blame – bizarrely – for the collapse of Stormont at the feet of the Commander In Chief.

Arlene, who betrayed her prejudices with her infamous crocodile comments while in a power sharing Executive with Michelle O’Neill, let the mask slip again with her claims biden ``hates’’ the UK.

In her new career as a presenter on GB News, her remarks are not surprising. She’s playing to her audience, in other words a constituency of English and uber British nationalists in Northern Ireland who will swallow every word of her conspiracy theory.

It’s irresponsible.

Firstly Biden has every right to be wear his Irish heart on his sleeve, he has every right to support the Good Friday Agreement and Windsor Framework, because I believe, he genuinely wants this place to be fixed.

That doesn’t make him anti-British.

America is not the only nation to support the Windsor Framework, it doesn’t make any of them hate the UK.

Arlene and Sammy’s language is age old – the DUP have been talking like this since the day they were formed.

It’s what we know as the politics of fear. The DUP feed on paranoia and have spent decades pointing the finger of blame at other people.

No other country in the world, certainly not one with less than two million citizens, can rely on the patronage of the most powerful nation on the planet. We are the only place where the White House actively encourages US investment.

Yet there are those of us who want to give him the fingers.

It’s bizarre.

It seems to me, given that Biden is at the head of the world’s most powerful economy, to be incredibly short sighted – arguably stupid – to scoff at the arrival of the leader of the free world in this parish.

Peace processes don’t come cheap, the American dollar is the currency of the world and it already directly supports more than 30,000 jobs in the local economy.

We can’t afford to have a dog in the manger. Biden’s smiles, warm words and unashamed Irishness are not a threat to anyone.

A hand extended in friendship should always be grasped.

Compromise and sacrifice are words you won’t find in the DUP dictionary, what you might find is isolated which is what the DUP is becoming increasingly used to.