evidence: Anyone familiar with political negotiations in Northern Ireland will have been surprised by neither the rumors nor the fact that negotiations between the Tories and the DUP eventually dragged on for more than a fortnight. Northern Irish parties of all stripes are expert at stringing out talks, wringing the maximum amount of concessions from them. The agreement, when finally published this week, revealed that the DUP’s demands were focused more on matters such as health care and infrastructure — an extra 1 billion pounds of government money — than contentious issues like parading, although there was a clause in there about the implementation in Northern Ireland of the Armed Forces Covenant (in place elsewhere in the U.K.) aimed at improving the lot of British Army veterans. [...] (In fact, if I were a Labour voter — would that I had the choice — I would say, given the anger elsewhere in the U.K. at that extra 1 billion pounds coming Northern Ireland’s way, that wouldn’t be a bad thing at all.)