Talking and Walking
The vast majority of yesterday's Orange Order parades may have been completed in a peaceful, almost carnival atmosphere (even though some senior Orangemen, like the Grand Chaplain Reverend Stephen Dickinson appear hostile to the whole notion of a soft edged, shopping friendly "Orangefest").
But the TV images of the trouble at the Ardoyne shops will be what sticks in the mind for the wider world.
Sinn Fein blamed the riots firmly on republican dissidents, naming Eirigi and the 32 County Sovereignty Movement as the people with questions to answer. Eirigi, in the shape of its General Secretary Breandán McCionnaith, has denied instigating the trouble. Mr McCionnaith claims PSNI officers "violently attacked" peaceful protestors and accuses Sinn Fein of "acting as apologists for state violence against the nationalist community".
This morning both Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness challenged the Orange Order leadership to sit down face to face with Sinn Fein. The DUP's Nelson McCausland argues that's a red herring as talks did take place in North Belfast between marchers and Ardoyne residents.
However there are clearly anomalies in the current situation which has seen the Portadown Orange talking to Gerry Adams and on the brink of meeting Breandán McCionnaith (wearing his Garvaghy residents' hat), but the Order's central leadership continuing to stand on ceremony (despite a recent interview in which the Grandmaster Bobby Saulters acknowledged that you should "never say never").
After Peter Robinson's recent Garvaghy road diplomacy, a Sinn Fein Orange meeting could be seen as a symbolic step forward for dialogue. That said, given the alleged role of dissidents in yesterday's trouble, there has to be a question mark over Sinn Fein's ability to deliver calm on the streets. It would be ironic if, having held out so long against talking to republicans, the Orange leadership do so at a time when the people on the other side of the table are no longer able to guarantee a peaceful outcome.
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