Ad watchdog: Ryanair's new best friend?

Ryanair's head of communications, Peter Sherrard, was on the warpath earlier this week, describing the Advertising Standards Authority as the "Awfully Stupid Authority" after the airline had a series of run-ins with the watchdog. "Absurd Silly Asinine decisions [are] being made by this out of touch, clueless and irrelevant quango," Sherrard fumed. So how will Ryanair react to another ad ruling out today, Monkey wonders. The ASA received four complaints about an ad in the Belfast Telegraph that used a photograph of Sinn Fein politicians Martin McGuinness and Gerry Adams, with a speech bubble from McGuinness's mouth stating: "Ryanair fares are so low even the British army flew home." Unionist assembly member Michael Copeland objected that the ad "trivialised Northern Ireland's recent past". However, the ASA rejected the complaint, arguing the ad was clearly light-hearted. "We concluded that it was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence, or cause distress to most readers of the Belfast Telegraph," the watchdog ruled today. A conciliatory triumph for the Actually Sensible Authority? Over to you, Ryanair.