Should Teflon Bertie go or cling on to power .

Mr.Micro

I think Bertie should go ,resign as Taoiseach forthwith .His credibility has gone in view of his payrise ,leaks from the Mahon tribunal and other suspected murky dealings that have been alluded to in the papers .He is now going to suppress the cancer diagnosis report indefinitely.He is just not able to cut it anymore . The country needs a strong leader and not someone who many people perceive as a liar and shady ,more interested in money ,yachts and the like .A new leader of the FF party is needed and a new Taoiseach . We deserve better.

Jimbo

I think the papers try to blow things out of proportion and rile people up. I dont think he's been a bad taoiseach and hes been a great leader of FF. BTW, are you a FF follower?

Mr.Micro

jimbo78 wrote: »

I think the papers try to blow things out of proportion and rile people up. I dont think he's been a bad taoiseach and hes been a great leader of FF. BTW, are you a FF follower?

No not FF but I think that for the good of the country he should go ,before there are even more revelations about his past dealings .His mind is not on the job and time he went.

Tipsy Mac

Why should he go, he's in an unsackable job and 41.6% of people thought they were doing a good job, the rest of us didn't.

Mr.Micro

Tipsy Mac wrote: »

Why should he go, he's in an unsackable job and 41.6% of people thought they were doing a good job, the rest of us didn't.

He evaded the Mahon tribunal before the election promising he would tell all after ,then did everything to avoid going .If the electorate had known more at the time of the election would Bertie still be Taoiseach?Only last week many people in a red C poll said they were misled by FF and Ahern on the economy.So why should we have someone in charge who has no credibility and out of touch .FF can do better.

Akrasia

Mr.Micro wrote: »

.He is now going to suppress the cancer diagnosis report indefinitely.

What? is there a link to that?

galwayrush

Way past time for him to go, he's so out of touch .
Now that he's being caught out in so many lies a quote from CJH springs to mind
" the most devious of them all "

Mr.Micro

Akrasia wrote: »

What? is there a link to that?

no ,but it was mentioned in one of the papers yesterday The Irish Mail that any report will have to have legal clearance( whatever that means ) so it could be long time before we see a report and then how edited will it be following this legal clearance( does that really mean damage limitation) for the HSE and the Government .A disgrace .

Rock Climber

Mr micro.
I'm not convinced that you are unaware of this forum's policy on liar accusations.
I'm giving you a 1 week ban to familiarise yourself with it.

The next poster that comes anywhere near flirting with breaking our policy on this will be getting a 1 month ban.

Final warning.

OPENROAD

Might be wrong, please correct me if I am, but Irish TDs do not resign.

pjproby

as p j mara mara once said

uno Duce, una Voce


or translated

its time to abandon the politics thread

i have

or as Ronan Keating once sang


you say it best
when you say nothing at all

Jay D

Mr.Micro wrote: »

I think Bertie should go ,resign as Taoiseach forthwith .His credibility has gone in view of his payrise ,leaks from the Mahon tribunal and other suspected murky dealings that have been alluded to in the papers .He is now going to suppress the cancer diagnosis report indefinitely.He is just not able to cut it anymore . The country needs a strong leader and not someone who many people perceive as a liar and shady ,more interested in money ,yachts and the like .A new leader of the FF party is needed and a new Taoiseach . We deserve better.

A completely new sysytem needs to be put in place. That payrise is the most blatant shambles.

Then he has the cheek to warn others on being content about their wages in order for the economy etc etc......

It's a complete disregard for people, when those that are dying on trolleys are left while Mr Pig stuffs his pockets.

Colonel Sanders

Obviously nothing has been proved categorically about his finances etc but there is enough muck flying around to ensure that, surely, a lot of the voters now mistrust him and as a result he should resign, however no chance of that.

It shows the level of FF arrogance that a man with so many questions unanswered was allowed lead his party in a general election and it also shows the stupidity and priorities of the Irish electorate that his party was re-elected and FF ratings rose every time another allegation hit the press.

mike65

The main player in this is Brian Cowen, he might be getting a little worried about the legacy Ahern will be handing on. I imagine he might fancy a word in Berties 'shell-like'.

Mike.

murphaph

Why should he go? I voted for a change of government last time as I was and am sick to death of FF's arrogance in power but Ahern & Co. persuaded enough (not most) of us to give them power for another term. We have nobody to blame for being ruled by Bertie Ahern & Co. but ourselves. We now have to wait for another election because FF/Green/PD do not have the collective decency to vote against Ahern in a motion of confidence. So long as FF&Co. support him he stays until he decides or the next election. If the minority parties withdrew support we could have another election but would the outcome be any different?

Of course, in 5 years time our short memoried electorate will have forgotten all about this and whatever SSIA type scheme to buy the election will be coming to fruition and most people won't have time to vote as they'll be buying their latest plasma, lcd, holographic television.

Nobody to blame but ourselves.

Dirk Gently

murphaph wrote: »

Why should he go? I voted for a change of government last time as I was and am sick to death of FF's arrogance in power but Ahern & Co. persuaded enough (not most) of us to give them power for another term. We have nobody to blame for being ruled by Bertie Ahern & Co. but ourselves. We now have to wait for another election because FF/Green/PD do not have the collective decency to vote against Ahern in a motion of confidence. So long as FF&Co. support him he stays until he decides or the next election. If the minority parties withdrew support we could have another election but would the outcome be any different?

Of course, in 5 years time our short memoried electorate will have forgotten all about this and whatever SSIA type scheme to buy the election will be coming to fruition and most people won't have time to vote as they'll be buying their latest plasma, lcd, holographic television.

Nobody to blame but ourselves.

I with this guy ^^^^^
Anyone who only now is outraged and demanding his resignation needs to take a look at themselves. Our glorious leader has been <insert forum rules compliant word here> for nearly as long as he has been in office, going back to his CJH days. Our government has a record of not being accountable and we know that the only way to get rid of Bertie / FF is to actually vote them out of power.

I put the blame squarely on the people. The people of this country obviously want unaccountable leaders, a bluffed false economy which puts us all in debt and lines the pockets of those big players in construction and property related fields on the back of every one else’s debt. Having said that no one put a gun to peoples head and forced them to queue up in their thousands to buy massively over priced shoe boxes off the plans so again a sheep like and uninterested public has to take much of the blame.

At this stage I have gone far beyond anger and out rage, I am now at the surreal and amused stage, both at Bertie and at those who elected him. I said it before and I'll say it again, I hope Bertie rules us for another 20 years and he gets massive pay raises every one of those 20 years. I hope FF privatises everything from hospitals to footpaths. When our blinding Celtic tiger is exposed as nothing more than personal debt without genuine economic sustainability and the dole queues start multiplying I won’t be blaming bertie, I'll be blaming the people who accepted it by accepting and promoting through the ballot box and through apathy.

Our political system and our leaders read like a comedy sketch and we the people are its main script writers.

we have the government we deserve.

/ hail emperor Bertie.

Rock Climber

Right.
I've deleted 3 off topic posts on moderation.

Any further discussion of moderation in this thread or elsewhere on the forum will get the poster banned.

Final warning on that score.

A Dub in Glasgo

Should Teflon Bertie go or cling on to power?

The people should have kicked him in the goolies a long time ago but failing that, he should do the honourable thing and......
































.... embezzle some money

gbh

murphaph wrote: »

Why should he go? I voted for a change of government last time as I was and am sick to death of FF's arrogance in power but Ahern & Co. persuaded enough (not most) of us to give them power for another term. We have nobody to blame for being ruled by Bertie Ahern & Co. but ourselves. We now have to wait for another election because FF/Green/PD do not have the collective decency to vote against Ahern in a motion of confidence. So long as FF&Co. support him he stays until he decides or the next election. If the minority parties withdrew support we could have another election but would the outcome be any different?

Of course, in 5 years time our short memoried electorate will have forgotten all about this and whatever SSIA type scheme to buy the election will be coming to fruition and most people won't have time to vote as they'll be buying their latest plasma, lcd, holographic television.

Nobody to blame but ourselves.

Nobody but ourselves...and Eoin Harris...who still thinks the sun shines out of Berties behind....and lead many astray with his last minute interventions, but got nothing in return, well not if you don't count the cushy number in the Seanad.

He should go but he will cling onto power...

LostinBlanch

Blame ourselves???

Only if "we" voted FF in. Given the mind boggling amounts of money wasted on everything from make up for our dear leader, to electronic voting, to PPARS, to huge overruns on projects like The Luas and Port Tunnel in Dublin, to the fact that there is no 2nd terminal at Dublin airport. The Eircom selloff fiasco (remember that? It's the reason you don't have proper broadband and at a decent price compared to other EU countries); and I'm not even going anywhere near the shambles that masquerades as a health service. The fact is that over the last 10 years a great opportunity, the greatest we have had since the foundation of the state, has been wasted.

You vote FF in, you have no right to complain, if you get more of the same.

Back to the original question, it depends on whether you take the view of party 1st and country 2nd as I suspect a lot of FFrs do; or country 1st, party 2nd.

IMO Bertie will only go when FFrs feel that he is damaging the party too much. Whether he is pushed or jumps a microsecond before he is pushed is a moot point.

ballooba

The 40% or so of the population who voted for Fianna Fail do not care about this country. They only care about Fianna Fail. What I find strange is that they don't mind that Bertie and Albert are accused of stealing money from the party. This (perhaps indirectly) is money that these people have raised through their various collections and draws. Why do they see Bertie as more important than the party?

LostinBlanch

ballooba wrote: »

The 40% or so of the population who voted for Fianna Fail do not care about this country. They only care about Fianna Fail.

Ballooba, it's a bit harsh labelling all the people who voted FF as not caring about the country over the party. It’s the core vote that I think tend to do this more. I’m not sure why, perhaps it is because they tend to conflate FF with the country and genuinely believe that what’s good for the party is good for the country. Or perhaps they are following on from Dev and looking into their own hearts to determine what’s good for all of us. I’m sure there’s a whole other thread in this. Either way I'd be genuinely interested in hearing the FF supporters view on this.

ballooba wrote: »

What I find strange is that they don't mind that Bertie and Albert are accused of stealing money from the party.

Could be a hangover from CJH years. Mind you hasn’t Eoin Ryan come out in the mail this morning asking for an investigation into this?

ballooba wrote: »

Why do they see Bertie as more important than the party?

I’m not sure they do. He has been their most marketable asset to date, but when the cost to the party of keeping him in power becomes too much, he’ll be out on his ear.

Rock Climber

Look at it this way.
Theres a core FG vote too.
If it's only 10% (and anecdotly I suspect it's closer to 20%)then without it,FG's chances of changing this government are poor.

Dont, try to tell me there isn't.
I know people who vote FG just like their grand parents.
They still vote for them even when they don't like labour.
They are old style FG conservatives.

pot calling the kettle black ass to be honest.

ballooba

LostinBlanch wrote: »

Ballooba, it's a bit harsh labelling all the people who voted FF as not caring about the country over the party. It’s the core vote that I think tend to do this more. I’m not sure why, perhaps it is because they tend to conflate FF with the country and genuinely believe that what’s good for the party is good for the country. Or perhaps they are following on from Dev and looking into their own hearts to determine what’s good for all of us. I’m sure there’s a whole other thread in this. Either way I'd be genuinely interested in hearing the FF supporters view on this.

The people who voted for Fianna Fail knew the score before the election.

LostinBlanch wrote: »

Could be a hangover from CJH years. Mind you hasn’t Eoin Ryan come out in the mail this morning asking for an investigation into this?

I don't get the mail until lunchtime. I look forward to reading Ryan's comments. The core Fianna Fail support believe that CJHs crimes were outweighed by any good he achieved.

LostinBlanch wrote: »

I’m not sure they do. He has been their most marketable asset to date, but when the cost to the party of keeping him in power becomes too much, he’ll be out on his ear.

Bertie's position has become increasingly untenable over the last number of months. He looked like damaged goods before the election. Now only 32% of the population believe him according to Red C. The Fianna Fail TDs who are continuing to support him in the face of increasingly implaussible explanations for his affairs are complicit in any crimes he has committed, if any, in my view.

Rock Climber wrote: »

pot calling the kettle black ass to be honest.

I'm not Fine Gael core support. Even if I was, Fine Gael would not put people like Michael Lowry ahead of the interests of the party or country.

Rock Climber

ballooba wrote: »

I'm not Fine Gael core support. Even if I was, Fine Gael would not put people like Michael Lowry ahead of the interests of the party or country.

I'm not saying you are.
How could I possibly know that anyway.

I'm saying 10-20% of FG vote is as core as the FF core vote.
They'd vote FG if the party had an alliance with the moonies probably.

LoL..you think FG wouldn't do a deal with independents regardless of the impact nationally state finances wise?

Think back on how long it took Kenny to stop expecting to be Taoiseach last june after the results were known.
He lingered the possibility for ages and he would have needed all the independents , lowry and even the pd's...

So think again because what you said seems like it's a rose tinted glasses view point that doesn't stand up to the facts,

ballooba

Your pot kettle black comment would suggest otherwise.

I wouldn't have a problem accepting Lowry's (or Bevs) support to form a government. A minority of corrupt members is unfortunately better than a majority who support corruption. I would not support Fine Gael if there were any suggestion of people pocketing party funds or accepting bribes.

Rock Climber

The pot kettle remark was pointing out that your party suffers the same problems voter constituent wise as FF ie sheep that vote like their family before did..(of course you knew this didn't you)

I would not support Fine Gael if there was any suggestion of people pocketing party funds or accepting bribes..

laudable.
As you know theres an ongoing process examining allegations like these.
Lets have a little modicum of respect for that process,fair trial and all that and keep the discussion of that here within said respect and within the mahon sticky thread.I couldn't care less what you say off the site on these matters

ballooba

What's the basis of the thread if not that investigation which dare not mention it's name? And actually the J2 list is not being investigated by that body. It seems items on the J2 list currently being discussed in the papers and elsewhere will never be investigated.

gbh

Rock Climber wrote: »

The pot kettle remark was pointing out that your party suffers the same problems voter constituent wise as FF ie sheep that vote like their family before did..(of course you knew this didn't you)

At the risk of going off topic...
What elected Fianna Fail was not their core vote and I agree that all parties have a core vote who will vote for their party come what may, although the Fianna Fail core vote is probably more intransigent than any other party, and the other parties need to learn also to develop a similar core vote. FF appease their core vote, sometimes in less than subtle ways, very well though.

But you can't get into government in most countries without winning the floating vote or getting enough of the floating vote. The floating vote went with FF this time because these people were persuaded by the media but also by FF bluff that FF were better than the opposition. That and having done a secret deal with the Sindo helped them get back in. It wasn't because of competance.

Secret deals ,the Sindo?
Lol to be honest-if some of the headlines and rubbish read in that paper constitutes stuff helpfull to FF,then I don't know the definition of harmfull.
If the media includes the Irish Times and the Daily mail then I don't think it was persuading people to Vote FF that they were up to...

I think the point is...lose the core vote and the floating vote isn't much use to you.
It's all about the numbers.

oscarBravo

gbh wrote: »

...the Fianna Fail core vote is probably more intransigent than any other party, and the other parties need to learn also to develop a similar core vote.

Something about this idea grates nastily with me. Basically, it seems to come down to a perceived need to fight gobshitery with gobshitery.

I've made it clear that I wanted to see FF ousted at the last election, for no more profound reason than that they've become too comfortable and arrogant in power, and need a (preferably extended) spell in opposition to learn a little humility. Part of the arrogance problem stems from the very "core vote" concept - the people who would vote for a donkey if it ran under an FF banner.

Do we really want an alternative government with an equal sense of arrogance and entitlement?