This may be the single most controversial interview in the illustrious career of the much-loved current President of Ireland, Michael D Higgins. In it, he proves, conclusively, that he is not a man to be crossed. At the time, seemingly systematically, he was under attack from various columnists in the Irish newspaper, The Sunday Independent. For-the-record, here I must say that I myself worked for the same newspaper years later. However, circa 1993, Michael D had been attacked in print, savagely - in The Sunday Independent and elsewhere, as he explains during the interview - by the likes of Eilish O Hanlon, Eamon Dunphy, and Gerry Adams. Speaking to me ( for a two-part interview which I edited down to a one-hour programme in my radio series,  The Joe Jackson Tapes Revisited, in 2016) he finally retaliated in kind. It is unlikely that we will hear again Michael D unleashed to the same degree. This is an unedited and uncensored podcast of the 2016 radio programme