Lefties who like McDowell

A Dub in Glasgo

Freelancer wrote:

you're making me agree with Adubinglasgo and I hate doing that.

C'mon, it ain't that bad

The_Minister

Freelancer wrote:

Many people have "beef's" with Mc Dowell, he's offended so many aspects and parts of Irish society, announcing that someone who doesn't like Mc Dowell "can't be trusted" would exclude off the top of my head, the Rossport five, the entire Green Party supporter base, Anyone with republican sympathises, most newspaper editors, the RTE news room, human rights activists.

Vincent Brown goes beyond this. Every chance that he gets in the Irish Times, the Village or his radio show he starts into McDowell. He even goes on tangents about him on unrelated topics. Its not a mere grudge its personal. Think of how often he rants about McDowell compared to any other minister.

A Dub in Glasgo

Firespinner wrote:

Vincent Brown goes beyond this. Every chance that he gets in the Irish Times, the Village or his radio show he starts into McDowell. He even goes on tangents about him on unrelated topics. Its not a mere grudge its personal. Think of how often he rants about McDowell compared to any other minister.

Have you seen the article that I was referring to?

Akrasia

Sand wrote:

Because Im not "suggesting", Im noting that a study has determined they are. As to whether I agree or not, I have not carried out my own study, nor have I encountered any material criticism of the study (other than your opinion of course) so Ill accept its findings until given reason otherwise.

Does it hurt sitting on the fense? Basically you believe the survey but you don't want to admit it because it's a ludicrous conclusion (that managers have a worse quality of life than terminally ill people), Or you don't believe the Survey, and you only mentioned it because it supports your position and it distracts people from the main issues.

Well fire away, whose stopping you from pooling your capital with others, forming a co-op or some other form of corporation and working for yourselves? How you handle your profit share internally is your concern. If you want to pay Bob who you hired Monday the same as Ted who mortgaged his house to buy the company factory then fair enough. Im sure Ted will take it philosophically.

Who's stopping me from completely changing the way society works? Well, for one, the wealthy elite, and for another, the ordinary people who still believe that free market capitalism is a good system and won't end up destroying the planet, because my system involves a complete change in the way we deal with private property. Private property now, is the single most powerful control mechanism the rich have over the poor. Anarchism gives property directly to the communities and the people who are directly involved in utilising it as an 'effective' ownership rather than an absolute ownership.

But thats not what its really about - the various shades of communism are all simply about justifying claiming the result of others enterprise and risk taking - sure we deserve it! The various left wing idealogies place no value whatsoever on enterprise or risk taking or vision. Hence they are completely unable to see why Ted should receive any more than Bob. Sure he only mortgaged his house?

I could say the same thing about capitalism. Capitalists cream a little bit off the top (or a lot off the top) from the labour of other workers. You are arguing that CEOs 'deserve' to make hundreds of millions of dollers a year, and calling the ordinary people greedy?

Point in case - someone takes a risk and buys shares in a company, hoping that demand for them will rise. It works out and he sell later at a profit. Communists are simply stumped at why the investor deserves the profit. All he did was provide the company with capital to invest, which the company turned into profit, leading to a higher price for the investor to sell at. The investor took a risk, but communists dont place any value on risk taking.

Stock market and commodities speculation cause more problems than they fix. The Markets are designed to redistribute wealth from the poor to the rich.

Every share gets a vote actually, reflecting that if you invest 20 million in a company you should have more of a say in what happens to that 20 million than the guy who invested 20 quid. Its not a democracy, and corporations arent a replacement for government. They are a tool to efficiently achieve profit for the owners. Each owner will be seeking the maximum return on their investment, and that return will be equal on every share. Please, confirm for me that you think its wrong that voting power should be proportional to investment.

Voting power should not be based on investment for the same reason that voting in national elections should not be based on the wealth of individuals, because the votes affect more than just the investment, they affect the lives of ordinary people.

Of course, but corporations are formed only for the purpose of earning profit and its employees are charged (primarily - there is hands across the world crap too, but thats PR with a profit motivation again) with earning that profit for its owners. Its up to owners to take care of their other interests themselves - again corporations are not a replacement for government. Corporations != Political Parties. If they were political parties, corporations wouldnt need to bribe politicians.

This profit only mechanism is utterly depraved and is the main reason why Free market capitalism is a self destructive system that poses a real and imminent threat to our entire planet.

Until voting time comes around, and then everyone is basing their decisions on how it impacts people living in 3rd world countries? Give me a break. Do you think farmers will ever vote for an end to CAP despite it strangling competition from 3rd world farmers? Or will trade unionists ever vote for an end to trade barriers that keep the competition abroad stifled? Do you think their concern over underpaid foreign workers in Ireland has more to do with their concern over someone elses paypacket or their concern over their own paypacket being undercut by new competition?

people deal with the problems that affect their own lives. I admit, solidarity is on it's knees, but to gloat over the death of human decency, is pretty pathetic in my opinion. People still have good intentions, but we have been trained to be good consumers from a very early age, and it's going to bite us in the ass some day.

But all they have to do to send Nike a message is buy some other brand. Probably for much cheaper than theyd pay for Nike. And they wont do it. This is the voting base for politically driven revolution? Maybe you werent so far wrong with your belief that peoples interests need to be placed before profit - only in Nikes case, peoples interest in having fashionable footwear goes before they save money buying another brand.

I have been involved in boycott campaigns before. I have said that, 'Listen, just buy a different brand to send a message to company x' But the obvious reply is 'Then we'll only be supporting Company Y who are doing the exact same thing as Company X' and that line of reasoning is very hard to argue against. It's really hard to find a friendly face in International Capitalism.
This is not to mention the fact that the workers in Nike Factories do not want Boycotts, they want us to help them defeat the companies through regulation and improving their working conditions. It would be more beneficial to those workers to defeat the IMF and the World Bank, than to start boycotting all the sweatshops. It is more beneficial to those workers if we allow them to elect their own leaders instead of propping up dictators and tyrants because they're good for business.

If you really want to end 3rd world repression then you need to turn the forces that drive it to your advantage. Create the demand for approved goods. Bono and Geldof have demonstrated that people love shallow politics, but their problem is they cant know whats "bad" and whats "good" to buy. Create a brand that identifies "good" products, Bono and Co create the demand for that brand, the consumer demand creates the producers demand to earn the brand by demonstrating their conditions are good.

I am involved in promoting Fair Trade, and what is happening there, is activists and dedicated people spend hours and hours of their own time promoting the idea of fair trade and building this brand, and then when it gets powreful enough that it might start to make a difference, the International corporations simply move in and use it for their own benefit to make themselves look good and dilute all of the work that the activists are doing.

Yes, thats why the USSR had to beg the USA for technology to milk cows, or why any Soviet scientist, sportsman or artist had a KGB detachment ensuring they didnt flee to reap monetary reward for their gifts in the capitalist west.

The soviet union failed because it tried to centralise all the decisions in Moscow and maintain an Iron Grip. Anarchism is the exact opposite in terms of how decisions are made.

Protection of intellectual property rights - to a reasonable degree - allowing profit to be earned on enterepreneurship is vital in encouraging people to spend time and money on R&D. I havent exactly noticed Somalia as leading the world scientifically, but then that would be the story of all nations who do not protect patents, and systems which do not value or reward entrepreneurship, risk taking or vision.

Reasonable protections inevitably lead to unreasonable protections because the wealthy people get to make the laws. People are now claiming Genetic Data as private proprety. That is nothing less than theft on a massive scale.

Freelancer

Firespinner wrote:

Vincent Brown goes beyond this. Every chance that he gets in the Irish Times, the Village or his radio show he starts into McDowell. He even goes on tangents about him on unrelated topics. Its not a mere grudge its personal. Think of how often he rants about McDowell compared to any other minister.

Okay specifics, links and proof, not your strong suit, I know but I'd like some evidence to back up your assertions.

If you're going to claim that these attacks aganist Mc Dowell cannot be credible you need to

A) Point out where Browne is making unfounded and not credible accusations againist McDowell in the article.

Demostrate that this is part of a consistent policy, on Browne's part.


Announcing that the village is **** and Browne has it in for Mc Dowell isn't a credible rebuttal.

The_Minister

Freelancer wrote:

Okay specifics, links and proof, not your strong suit, I know but I'd like some evidence to back up your assertions.

If you're going to claim that these attacks aganist Mc Dowell cannot be credible you need to

A) Point out where Browne is making unfounded and not credible accusations againist McDowell in the article.

Demostrate that this is part of a consistent policy, on Browne's part.


Announcing that the village is **** and Browne has it in for Mc Dowell isn't a credible rebuttal.

Obviously, I can't show every article so I'm just going to give some examples. I'll get more soon but I'm quite busy now so I'll leave you with the fact that the Village, in its less than two years of existance has 81 matches for Michael McDowell. He also has 50 articles written regarding him for the Irish times. If you really want to trawl through all those articles you will see that he never once praises mcdowell

EDIT: Could someone remind me what the name of his radio show is so I can get transcripts.

Akrasia

Firespinner wrote:

Obviously, I can't show every article so I'm just going to give some examples. I'll get more soon but I'm quite busy now so I'll leave you with the fact that the Village, in its less than two years of existance has 81 matches for Michael McDowell. He also has 50 articles written regarding him for the Irish times. If you really want to trawl through all those articles you will see that he never once praises mcdowell

EDIT: Could someone remind me what the name of his radio show is so I can get transcripts.

if you go through any 'left wing' news source i doubt you'll find many positive mentions of McDowell, Similarly, I doubt you'll find any positive mentions of Thatcher or Reagan or Bush. Some people are just hated by the left, and there are usually very good reasons for it.

Freelancer

Firespinner wrote:

Obviously, I can't show every article so I'm just going to give some examples. I'll get more soon but I'm quite busy now so I'll leave you with the fact that the Village, in its less than two years of existance has 81 matches for Michael McDowell.

Thats the village not Vince Browne, other people write for him to. All that proves btw is that a popular contempary Irish Politics magazine, discuss' the actions of a Justice Minister. A Justice Minister who has courted contraversy, introduce disturbing legislation, not to mention had his house shot at.

He also has 50 articles written regarding him for the Irish times. If you really want to trawl through all those articles you will see that he never once praises mcdowell

What has Mc Dowell done thats been worthy of praise?

The_Minister

Freelancer wrote:

Thats the village not Vince Browne, other people write for him to. All that proves btw is that a popular contempary Irish Politics magazine, discuss' the actions of a Justice Minister. A Justice Minister who has courted contraversy, introduce disturbing legislation, not to mention had his house shot at.

Vincent Browne controls the Village so he deems what gets in. Even with McDowell being so high-profile that is alot of articles to write.

dRNk SAnTA

Freelancer wrote:

A Justice Minister who has courted contraversy, introduce disturbing legislation, not to mention had his house shot at.

What has Mc Dowell done thats been worthy of praise?

Disturbing legislation such as....?

Are you saying that a justice minister who has his house shot at must be a bad minister? or are you just saying its an example of why he's in the news a lot. I would expect any justice minister to court controversy and I know that michael mcdowell has a big mouth and he doesnt do himself any favours but I still think he has done nothing to deserve the derision he gets from some in the media. For exmaple I think its fair to say the tribune on sunday crossed the line with regard to attacking him.

Freelancer

Firespinner wrote:

Vincent Browne controls the Village so he deems what gets in. Even with McDowell being so high-profile that is alot of articles to write.

Firespinner thats just a pathetic argument. Mc Dowell has been in the media spotlight for his tenure as Justice Minister, you cannot claim that because Vincent Browne and the Village talk about him that means they're biased against him.

DrinkSanta wrote:

Disturbing legislation such as....?

The wiretapping bill for a start, not to mention his criminal justice Bill.

Are you saying that a justice minister who has his house shot at must be a bad minister? or are you just saying its an example of why he's in the news a lot

The latter, Firespinner offered proof that Browne has a vendetta against him by announcing the number of times he's been mentioned in the media, I offered a far more rational decision.

michael mcdowell has a big mouth and he doesnt do himself any favours but I still think he has done nothing to deserve the derision he gets from some in the media. For exmaple I think its fair to say the tribune on sunday crossed the line with regard to attacking him.

Compared to the number of people McDowell has attacked and hid behind "parliamentary" privileges.

Mailman

I have no time for him.

He claims to be driven by ideologies but he won't defend them.
I have been in correspondance with him regarding some legislation that he introduced and supposedly "championed".
When I pointed out to him that the institutions he created were working against his stated objectives with regard to the legislation and pointed out to him the specific sections in his legislation which allowed him to investigate\intervene he absolutely refused to intervene.
I'm not going in to details here but with regard to my correspondance with him I was explicit as to what the issue was and the remedies that were available to him in the legislation but he refused to involve himself.

I've formed the opinion that he is a hypocrite and he only introduced the legislation because he was obligied to due to our membership of the EU.

If you want a sincere caring public representative look elsewhere. McDowell ain't your man.