Irish America magazine, our sister publication, celebrated 25 years in style last week. We started all those years ago with a cover story that featured five leading Irish Americans - Tip O’Neill, Ronald Reagan, John McEnroe, Maureen O’Hara and Ted Kennedy.

"Finian’s Rainbow" is back for another run on Broadway. You are probably familiar with the songs – “How Are Things in Glocca Morra?,” “Look to the Rainbow” – but there is more to the show than meets the ear.

As my sophomore year of high school began in 1960, the country was buzzing with the coming election. An Irish American was running for president! My Irish relatives rallied to the call and even my Italian family members supported the candidate. He might be Irish but he was Catholic

Caroline Kennedy will headline an Irish rally for New Jersey governor Jon Corzine, who is facing a tough battle in his re-election race. The rally will take place on October 21st in Belmar, New Jersey. The town is in the center of the Spring Lake area, which is a large center of Irish American population.

It seems appropriate that Ted Kennedy and Frank McCourt share the cover with “Finian’s Rainbow,” which is back for another run on Broadway. Its combination of immigrants’ quest for the American dream, political satire, beautiful lyrics, and social message is one that Ted and Frank would have identified with.

It is fitting that the 1969 Nobel Prize for literature went to the Irish playwright and novelist Samuel Beckett. After all, in works such as "Waiting for Godot" and "Endgame," Beckett alternated between tragedy and comedy, drama and farce. The same could be said about 1969.

Chief Family Historian for Ancestry.com Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak got the assignment of a lifetime when it was discovered in 2007 that future President of the U.S. Barack Obama had Irish roots. Smolenyak’s job? To find out where in Ireland Obama’s family came from.

News from the 32: Antrim, Armagh, Carlow, Cavan, Clare, Cork, Derry, Donegal, Down, Dublin, Fermanagh, Galway, Kerry, Kildare, Kilkenny, Laois, Leitrim, Limerick, Longford, Louth, Mayo, Meath, Monaghan, Offaly, Roscommon, Sligo, Tipperary, Tyrone, Waterford, Westmeath, Wexford, Wicklow

Once there were nine siblings, and now just Jean Kennedy Smith is left from the children of Joe and Rose FitzGerald Kennedy, who went on to become the most powerful political family in America. We forgot what the Kennedys accomplished for Irish Americans. They grew up in an era when “No Irish Need Apply” signs were still up in some New England neighborhoods.

The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr. Micheál Martin, T.D., today announced further details of the Global Irish Economic Forum, which is to be held in Farmleigh on the weekend of 18th-20th September, 2009.

Senator Edward Kennedy - who freely acknowledged that his own family would not be allowed to immigrate to the U.S. now - was a real champion for the undocumented Irish.

No family has dominated American politics more in this century than the Kennedys, a clan which influenced the shaping of a nation to a degree rarely matched.

Sen. Ted Kennedy died shortly before midnight Tuesday at his home in Hyannis Port, Mass., at age 77. Kennedy had fought brain cancer, and according to his son had lived longer with the disease than his doctors expected him to.

IrishCentral has learned that Sen. Edward Kennedy has received the Last Rites from the Catholic Church as he continues to battle a deadly brain cancer.

Tributes have poured in from Ireland after the passing of Eunice Kennedy Shriver, sister of JFK and founder of the Special Olympics movement.

President John F. Kennedy's sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver, who carried on the family's public service tradition by founding the Special Olympics and championing the rights of the mentally disabled, died Tuesday morning, her family said in a statement. She was 88.

In “Bobby and Jackie: A Love Story,” author C. David Heymann reveals what he argues has been an open secret among Kennedy insiders for years: the much hinted at, but never fully disclosed, romantic relationship between Jackie Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy. The New York Times bestselling author talks about the two legendary figures and the tragedy that he says brought them together.

The recession has affected all walks of American life and sport is just one of the many victims. Fewer fans are willing to pay top dollar and sponsors are hard to find. But the global nature of the recession is boosting the fortunes of one particular sport: New York’s Gaelic Athletic Association. The storied 95-year-old amateur football league is experiencing a revival as laid-off footballers have fled Ireland for America.

Legendary TV personality Ed McMahon has died at the age of 86. The Irish American, who defined the role of the television “sidekick” as Johnny Carson’s loyal right-hand-man on the “Tonight Show” for 30 years, died shortly after midnight on Tuesday at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.

Patricia Harty was honored at the St. Patrick’s Day festivities in Holyoke, Massachusetts, and decided that if there is a place called Irish America, this could be it.

Barack Hussein Obama is the descendant of Ohio and Indiana immigrants who came from the borders of Counties

The Irish Kennedys are descended from Dunchaun, the brother of the mighty King Brian Boru. The name comes from his father Ceann Eidig, meaning "helmet head." Appropriately, the arms of the Kennedys have three helmets.

Notre Dame holds some Irish surprises. When I was preparing a lecture on Eamon De Valera’s visit to the university during his 1919 American tour, I discovered that on the stop he viewed the Civil War sword of Thomas Francis Meagher. Known as a leader of the failed Young Irelander rising of 1848, Meagher championed a republican movement that sought to free Ireland by any means necessary. Not only does Notre Dame hold Meagher's sword but it also holds a battle flag of the famed Irish Brigade

Author Marian Keyes, 44, won Ireland’s Popular Fiction Book of the Year award in Dublin at the weekend for her novel “This Charming Man." Happily married to her English husband Tony, 45, she’s come a long way from the depression and alcoholism that marked her 20s and almost ended her life.

The decision by Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter to change parties from the GOP to the Democrats bodes well for immigration reform, especially if the move provides a filibuster proof majority on the Democratic bill in the senate.

As the youngest of those Clancys who lowered the boom on folk music scene, Liam Clancy remains a vital link to those halcyon days when Irish America was feeling its roots.

The Wolfhound eats Krugman alive - and another anti0ti-Ireland gasbag, too... Click to read Even more holes in 'Professor' Krugman's Irish

An amazing country manor in Ireland has just had more than 50 percent slashed from its sale price

The TV drama "Rescue Me" is a groundbreaking - and controversial - depiction of New York City Irish life. But spare me the 911 conspiracy theories.

President Barack Obama's election has reminded many Americans of the same sense of optimism which surrounded the White House when President John F. Kennedy lived there. Tom Deignan explores the legacy of the Kennedy White House.

THE WEST Patricia Harty's tour of the West Landing in the West of Ireland "the cultural heartland" is a wonderful introduction to Ireland. "It is," as Liam Scollan, the CEO of Ireland West Airport, Co. Mayo, said, "a way for Irish-Americans whose ancestors left this part of the world centuries ago to experience Ireland, which has changed little since that time.

KATHLEEN Kennedy Townsend, the eldest daughter of Robert F. Kennedy, has written a passionate new book about how, in her own words, today's churches are mixing God with politics and losing their way.

The book, entitled Failing America's Faithful, is no church bashing screed, but rather a bracing reveille to awaken the reader to dangers of trading the communal good for personal salvation.

In his controversial new book, Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years, David Talbot, the founder of Salon.com, tells the story of the exalted Irish American dynasty from the perspective of their inner circle. It's the story of two brothers, sharing an unprecedented bond, and the never before told tale of Robert Kennedy's secret, heart rending search to track down JFK's killers before his own assassination.

MICHAEL Flatley was presented with one of the highest honors he's ever received last weekend in Cork, when the city officially named him a Freeman. He joins elite company, including President John F. Kennedy and former Irish President Eamon de Valera.

Tommy Makem, 74, songwriter, folksinger and balladeer, died on Wednesday at his home in Dover, New Hampshire, due to complications from lung cancer. To the world he was known as the godfather of Irish folk music but to his son Shane Makem, 39, of the band the Makem and Spain Brothers, he was first and foremost Dad. CAHIR O'DOHERTY talks to the musical legend's son about his father's decades long career, his passion for Irish culture and his far-reaching influence.

JAMES Carroll, 65, noted author, National Book Award winner and columnist for the Boston Globe, has recently completed a powerful new documentary film entitled Constantine's Sword in which he examines the roots of religiously inspired violence in the world.

Working with Oscar nominated director Oren Jacob, Carroll explores the centuries long history of anti-Semitism in the Catholic Church and its corollary in America's evangelical movement.

The new film, which is based on Carroll's 2001 book of the same name, details centuries of ruthless violence committed in Christianity's name.

Marian Keyes has sold over 15 million books worldwide and is one of Ireland's best-known authors. Happily married to her English husband Tony, she's come a long way from the depression and alcoholism that marked her twenties and almost ended her life. She talks to CAHIR O'DOHERTY about her new book and the shocking statistics that inspired it.

In Havana Nocturne Irish American author T.J. English tells the riveting tale of the Mob in Cuba.

What more is there to say about the Kennedys? Since their story is the defining one of the Irish in America, and of all immigrants who have come to these shores before and since, there's still quite a lot. In the documentary The Kennedys: Americas Emerald Kings, director Robert Klein lifts the veil on the famous clan. This week he talks to CAHIR O'DOHERTY about the continuing relevance of Irish America's first family.

It's official - the Irish are magic.

That's the considered opinion of an Irish witch whose family line has produced seers and psychics since the 13th century.

Helen Barrett, also known as the White Witch of the Isles, is the well-known head of over 3,000 Irish witches and wizards, so she's in a position to know.

THE 2008 Democratic presidential contest will surely go down as one of the most exciting and groundbreaking in history.

The Democrats will nominate either an African American or a woman for president, an incredible break with the past and a timely reminder of how far the U.S.

His reference to the strict segregation rules that would have prevented his dad having dinner in any white only restaurant just steps from the Capitol a few decades back, showed the distance America has traveled. The immigrant experience and a new America came together in the most powerful way possible on the steps of Capitol Hill on Tuesday morning around noon. I was delighted to stand among the millions who stood where no one had ever stood before - listening to a black man become president of America.

THE ancestors of Ronald Reagan and John F. Kennedy, Michael Reagan and Patrick Kennedy, came to America around the time of the Famine at a time of rampant anti-Irish discrimination and would probably recognize the America of today.

Once again fear of alien foreigners again stalks the land, aided in large part by demonizing politicians and grandstanding journalists only too anxious to stir the melting pot.

THE bell tolled for John Lennon one awful night outside the Dakota co-op building in New York on December 8, 1980 when Mark Chapman shot him dead. Twenty-eight years later, on a brisk Wednesday morning last week, Senator Hillary Clinton arrived at the Dakota on Central Park West and 72nd Street with her political future on life support.

She had come to New York's fanciest address for two desperately needed fundraisers back to back to keep her campaign breathing through the critical March 4 primaries in Texas, Ohio, Vermont and Rhode Island.

WHEN outgoing Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Bertie Ahern addresses a joint session of Congress this Wednesday, April 30, he is unlikely to match the drama surrounding the joint session address by war hero General Douglas Mac Arthur, after he was relieved of his command by President Harry Truman in 1951.

MacArthur concluded his speech before Congress with the immortal lines, "Old soldiers never die, they just fade away."

Congressman Dewey Short of Missouri was so moved that he cried out, "We heard God speak here today! God in the flesh! The voice of God!"

Despite his own popularity among American politicians, Ahern is unlikely to draw the same response.

THE last time I spoke with Tim Russert, he had called for an update on the Northern Ireland peace process. He was looking for Martin McGuinness' phone number because he heard the Sinn Fein leader was going to be in town around St. Patrick's Day, and he wanted to have him on Meet the Press.

DUBLIN - It's American election all the time here in Ireland where interest is at record levels as we face into the home stretch in the 2008 race.

If I had a dollar last week for the number of times that people have asked me about the election and who I think will win I would be a rich man.

Quite simply, the interest in Ireland is phenomenal.

IT is doubtful The Economist magazine has many subscribers in Harlem, but the black man selling copies on the corner of 125th Street and Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard was doing a roaring trade on Election Night.

The front cover with a striking photograph of Barack Obama and the headline "It's Time" was clearly the draw, and dozens of those present were waving the magazine in joy and jubilation as the results poured in.

On a hastily constructed stage, one two-bit politician after another tried to grab their moment in the limelight.

CONGRESSMAN James Walsh, who has served in Congress for 20 years, announced last Thursday that he would not seek re-election in November.Walsh, 60, spoke to the Irish Voice on Tuesday about his decision, his involvement in the Irish peace process and his future plans. "I have loads of time on my hands now to talk," he laughed during a phone call.

AER Lingus has hailed a new deal with American low-fares flier JetBlue as a major advance for passengers on both sides of the Atlantic.What they called an industry-first "strategic partnership" was announced last week and will begin operating on April 3.The deal will give Aer Lingus passengers 40 new target destinations in addition to the seven U.