Starts off with a lie. I grew up an Irish Catholic in a town full of Irish Catholics. Our schooling was all Catholic. I have zero recollection of anyone ever saying one positive word about the IRA. Maybe up in Fordham (the Bronx for you non-NYers) these guys were heroes but not in Middle-America Irish neighborhoods.
Yeah, he was painting with a broad brush there. I think the Irish-Americans in New England - and not everywhere there - would be the most supportive. Then it goes downhill after that.
I never heard the first whisper about IRA.
Many Irish songs praise the "bold IRA", but I suspect that they were written before the Marxists co-opted the organization. A lot of "BICs" (Bronx Irish Catholics) used to visit our part of the Jersey Shore in the 60's and 70's, and Irish rebel songs were very popular.
From "The Patriot's Game":
'Tis nearly two years since
I wandered away,
with a local battalion
of the bold IRA;
I'd heard of our heroes
and wanted the same,
to play my own part in
the Patriot's Game.
This Ireland of ours has
for long been half free;
six counties are under
John Bull's tyranny;
so I gave up my boyhood
to drill and to train
and now I'm a part of
the Patriot's Game.