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Enter to win a copy of 'The Paper Wall: Newspapers and Propaganda in Ireland 1919-1921,' by Ian Kenneally.

New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn seals the deal of transatlantic friendship with First Minister Peter Robinson and deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness after their meeting this morning, at Stormont. Quinn is in Belfast to speak this evening at the Aisling Awards, the city?s biggest awards gala which is hosted by our sister media organization, The Belfast Media Group.

There was liberty, equality, fraternity and football in Paris Wednesday night. But no justice. In a moment that will be long remembered, and derided, in Irish sports, the French soccer team advanced to the World Cup finals in South Africa next year with an extra time goal that followed not just one hand ball, but seemingly two.

New York-based Irish writer Colum McCann has won the prestigious National Book Award, coming out ahead of four other authors with his novel "Let the Great World Spin." McCann's tale of 1970s New York set against the backdrop of the momentous wire walking between the World Trade Center towers by Frenchman Philippe Petit was described by the judges as an "indelibly hallucinatory portrait of a decaying city."

November 18, 2009 John Murphy arrived at the Irish Rogue early Saturday afternoon after a 0-5 defeat at the hands of the French. "We'll give them that one," said the Manhattan-based lawyer, hoping that the result would go the other way on the screens upstairs at the West 44th Street bar.

November 18, 2009 NYPD Assistant Chief George W. Anderson didn't have childhood dreams of becoming a cop.

November 18, 2009 An elderly Irish priest kidnapped and held captive in the Philippines was released last week after a month in captivity.

November 18, 2009 New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn is in Ireland this week for a series of high-level political, business and community engagements culminating in an address at Belfast's sell-out Aisling Awards gala.

November 18, 2009 He was caught in a Miami political vice. And now Dublin native John Timoney has resigned as chief of the Florida city's police department.

November 19, 2009 Most of those who showed up at the Irish Rogue for leg two of the World Cup playoff tie against France did so out of loyalty and also, it seems, because they had the time.

November 18, 2009 Irish-American actor John Cusack says he signed on to star in the new high-octane, global disaster flick "2012" because, along with the spectacular special effects, it featured a moving story line about family members trying to reconnect.

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