Lisbon 2 The Return!

Stark

SoupyNorman wrote: »

I'll reiterate, I'm voting NO...purely to take a swipe at the d**ks in Dail Eireann. Cowen and his big fat head have the gall to try scaremonger us into voting YES, makes my blood boil. I find it farcical that we were given a vote at all, there wouldnt of been half this hassle if we were not asked to vote.

Europe thanks you for your parochial mindset. It's good to know that after years of treaty negotiation (which we were all invited to send our suggestions for I might add), the most pressing issue of the treaty is the current Irish Taoiseach's fat head.

It is farcical that we need a referendum for a treaty that merely brings about administrative changes. There are laws of far greater significance enacted on a regular basis through parliament. The only reason for a referendum is that Irish law requires a constitutional amendment in order to ratify EU treaties. There's nothing undemocratic about other countries not having referenda to ratify the treaty, it gets ratified or not ratified by elected members of parliament just like any other law.

SoupyNorman

Sam Vimes wrote: »

When people talk about Ireland's reputation being damaged by a no vote, reasons like that are why. The Lisbon treaty is a European treaty, it is has nothing to do with Brian Cowen. Denying a treaty to the other 26 countries that have either ratified it or will ratify it as soon as we do because you don't like Brian Cowen can do nothing but damage this country. You might as well be voting no because you hate marmalade, it makes Ireland look just as bad

Why then, is Cowen and co. telling us with a finger wagging attitude to vote again on the same bloody thing. It's total tripe to suggest that we were given any special dispensations, it's just the higher echelons of europe spouting rhetoric and speaking of and to us in condescending tones.



I hate plum marmalade, does that count?

Sam Vimes

Stark wrote: »

Europe thanks you for your parochial mindset. It's good to know that after years of treaty negotiation (which we were all invited to send our suggestions for I might add), the most pressing issue of the treaty is the current Irish Taoiseach's fat head.

I now know how to get this treaty passed but we'll have to be quick. I propose an amendment to article 48:


Article 48b:
1. Brian Cowen has a fat head
2. Refer to 1


It'd pass in a landslide

The_Minister

oppenheimer1 wrote: »

I see Cóir already look like being the focal point of the opposition to the treaty with their rather outlandish posters:

http://www.coircampaign.org/images/LeafletsPosters/poster_1.jpg
http://www.coircampaign.org/images/LeafletsPosters/poster_2.jpg
http://www.coircampaign.org/images/LeafletsPosters/poster_3.jpg
http://www.coircampaign.org/images/LeafletsPosters/poster_4.jpg
http://www.coircampaign.org/images/LeafletsPosters/poster_5.jpg

Posters 2 and 3 I'm guessing will be the most controversial. I must say I'm also looking forward to what the PR department in Ryanair is going to come out with!

http://photos-g.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs167.snc1/6251_124884155892_671655892_2451542_5370492_n.jpg

ShooterSF

Sam Vimes wrote: »

Are you questioning Milward Brown's motives and surveying techniques? They are a company whose existence relies on giving accurate results so that's a fairly serious accusation

And the many people who are voting for reasons with fcuk all to do with the treaty wouldn't vote yes if their objections were rectified because they don't have any specific objections to the treaty

Well I will offer this if they were behind that poll they picked a silly angle. Let's look at your previous post that said a voter might as well vote no because they don't like marmalade. It would be akin to saying if I changed everything you don't like about marmalade would you like it?

Sam Vimes

SoupyNorman wrote: »

Why then, is Cowen and co. telling us with a finger wagging attitude to vote again on the same bloody thing. It's total tripe to suggest that we were given any special dispensations, it's just the higher echelons of europe spouting rhetoric and speaking of and to us in condescending tones.

I couldn't give a sh!te what Brian Cowen is saying, the man's a retard. Lisbon is bigger than Irish politics. We're voting again because the survey the last time showed that the biggest reason by far for rejection of the treaty was lack of understanding and not any specific objection to the treaty. Now we've had two years to learn about it so that reason doesn't apply anymore

RandomName2

Stark wrote: »

It is farcical that we need a referendum for a treaty that merely brings about administrative changes. There are laws of far greater significance enacted on a regular basis through parliament. [...]There's nothing undemocratic about other countries not having referenda to ratify the treaty, it gets ratified or not ratified by elected members of parliament just like any other law.

Political parties changing the constitution without recourse to the public? Where have I seen that before...

Oh no! Can't mention anything about communism, fascism, or Cromwell here, it might offend those of a delicate disposition.

SoupyNorman

Stark wrote: »

Europe thanks you for your parochial mindset.

lulz, good one.

The approach from the government in campaigning for the YES side has been substantially more parochial,

"You better vote yes or X, Y and Z will happen to you"

Vote yes or you'll goto hell should be the flagship poster for the yes side.

Sam Vimes

ShooterSF wrote: »

Well I will offer this if they were behind that poll they picked a silly angle. Let's look at your previous post that said a voter might as well vote no because they don't like marmalade. It would be akin to saying if I changed everything you don't like about marmalade would you like it?

The thing is that so much mud has been thrown at this treaty that I would fully expect significant numbers to say that they wouldn't vote yes if their objections were rectified. If someone is voting no to give Brian Cowen a black eye like Norman here, how can changing something in the treaty satisfy him?

Sam Vimes

SoupyNorman wrote: »

lulz, good one.

The approach from the government in campaigning for the YES side has been substantially more parochial,

"You better vote yes or X, Y and Z will happen to you"

Vote yes or you'll goto hell should be the flagship poster for the yes side.

Yes, we have established that Irish politicians are gobsh!tes. But that fact has nothing to do with which way you should vote on the Lisbon treaty

SoupyNorman

Sam Vimes wrote: »

I couldn't give a sh!te what Brian Cowen is saying, the man's a retard. Lisbon is bigger than Irish politics. We're voting again because the survey the last time showed that the biggest reason by far for rejection of the treaty was lack of understanding and not any specific objection to the treaty. Now we've had two years to learn about it so that reason doesn't apply anymore

OK, fair enough. Then you see the problem, as long as you have politicians leading the charge you are already fighting an uphill battle. As long as Cowen and co. continue to tell me to vote yes then it's a no for me.

The whole approach to this was a disaster, and now with the simmering hatred for the current government will more then likely result in a larger defeat of the treaty this time around.

DamoDLK

I'd defo vote. But in Oz so will be unable to unfortunately.. But it would be a Yes. The EU can only go in one way, and i'd rather Ireland be on board!

dub_skav

Sam Vimes wrote: »

Yes, we have established that Irish politicians are gobsh!tes. But that fact has nothing to do with which way you should vote on the Lisbon treaty

Did you not point out earlier that people should vote yes because their elected representatives were telling them to?

Stark

RandomName2 wrote: »

Political parties changing the constitution without recourse to the public? Where have I seen that before...

Oh no! Can't mention anything about communism, fascism, or Cromwell here, it might offend those of a delicate disposition.

Who said we can go about changing the Constitution willy nilly? It's simply farcical that articles relating to banalities such as EU treaties were in there in the first place. We already have articles providing explicit protection on issues such as abortion, neutrality etc. so that despite what people may say, they can't be touched by Lisbon or any other EU treaty.

Stark

SoupyNorman wrote: »

The whole approach to this was a disaster, and now with the simmering hatred for the current government will more then likely result in a larger defeat of the treaty this time around.

A large majority of people will vote on what they perceive to be the pros and cons of the treaty like they did last time. Not everyone is hellbent on punishing a government that won't even be in power by the time the treaty is ratified.

Sam Vimes

SoupyNorman wrote: »

OK, fair enough. Then you see the problem, as long as you have politicians leading the charge you are already fighting an uphill battle. As long as Cowen and co. continue to tell me to vote yes then it's a no for me.

The whole approach to this was a disaster, and now with the simmering hatred for the current government will more then likely result in a larger defeat of the treaty this time around.

That's doing nothing but shooting ourselves in the foot. It's not Europe's fault that our government are gobsh!tes, Brian Cowen is not a European issue. Every other country in Europe has ratified (or will shortly ratify) this treaty and voting it down not because of something you object to in the treaty but because the Irish people don't like the government they keep voting in over and over again makes the whole of Ireland look as much gobsh!tes as the ones in Leinster house.

If you want Fianns Fail out, try to bring the general election forward. The Lisbon treaty is not for voicing your anger at Fianna Fail

RandomName2

Sam Vimes wrote: »

We're voting again because the survey the last time showed that the biggest reason by far for rejection of the treaty was lack of understanding and not any specific objection to the treaty.

Do you really believe that if the surveys came back showing a high level of electorate understanding that the referendum would not be re-run? It is very convenient of groups who ignore the facts of the referendum to quote ignorance as a reason for re-running the thing. Hell, Vimes, you do a better job promoting the Consitutional Ammeding Treaty better than all the political parties combined!

The reason why Lisbon is being rerun is because there was a majority No vote the first time. The fact that a Yes vote is more likely due to external circumstances merely solidified this decision.

Could I quote Dail ignorance for why Lisbon should or shouldn't be re-run?

Oh, and in relation to the issue raised by Soupy (what a name!) - the most immediate means to distabilise the government is by voting down Lisbon (even if this has nothing directly to do with the issues of the treaty).

Be at the heart of Europe, vote yes.
Cowen is a fat head, vote no.
See? The no side can play it the same way...

Sam Vimes

dub_skav wrote: »

Did you not point out earlier that people should vote yes because their elected representatives were telling them to?

I said that trusting your elected representative is not an inherently bad thing and automatically a bad reason to vote yes. Many Irish politicians are gobsh!tes but not all of them are and they're not the only people calling for a yes vote either

RandomName2

Stark wrote: »

Who said we can go about changing the Constitution willy nilly? It's simply farcical that articles relating to banalities such as EU treaties were in there in the first place. We already have articles providing explicit protection on issues such as abortion, neutrality etc. so that despite what people may say, they can't be touched by Lisbon or any other EU treaty.

We can't but other political parties in Europe can. Change the Consitution, sure, why not?

Apparently Hitler's rise to power is quoted as a reason for not allowing referenda in Germany.

Err... what? It wasn't the election of Hitler which crippled Germany, but the Nazi party being able to arbitrarily change the German constitution such that they could do whatever they want. Presumably there is some bar on how many changes the Reichstag can make to the Constitution without it being... well... unconstitutional... but they are still able to make 'em.

dub_skav

Sam Vimes wrote: »

If you want Fianns Fail out, try to bring the general election forward. The Lisbon treaty is not for voicing your anger at Fianna Fail

This is a very good point. If you are so concerned with people voting No as a protest at FF, why don't you do something about bringing forward a general election.
Or indeed if Labour and FG are so concerned about it why don't they insist on a date being set for a general election before we vote on Lisbon (set the date that is, not run the election).

Reason is FG and Labour know that no matter what way the vote goes will be good for them.
Yes => People will feel there protest wasn't registered and will turn out even more anti FF come election time
No => FF as the party in power once more failed to get Lisbon through

Sam Vimes

RandomName2 wrote: »

Do you really believe that if the surveys came back showing a high level of electorate understanding that the referendum would not be re-run? It is very convenient of groups who ignore the facts of the referendum to quote ignorance as a reason for re-running the thing. Hell, Vimes, you do a better job promoting the Consitutional Ammeding Treaty better than all the political parties combined!

The reason why Lisbon is being rerun is because there was a majority No vote the first time. The fact that a Yes vote is more likely due to external circumstances merely solidified this decision.

If there had been a high level of understanding then the survey would have found coherent and valid objections to the treaty, which the government could have brought to the bargaining table to get renegotiated. We would have been asked to vote on a new treaty with our objections rectified.

Unfortunately, the reasons were mostly people didn't understand the treaty and a smattering of stuff that wasn't actually in the treaty so they were put in the embarrassing position of having to get "guarantees" to try to reassure us that all of those fears were unfounded. And even with the guarantees people still won't accept that this sh!t was never going to happen! It's making the Irish people look like idiots tbh

RandomName2

Sam Vimes wrote: »

If there had been a high level of understanding then the survey would have found coherent and valid objections to the treaty, which the government could have brought to the bargaining table to get renegotiated. We would have been asked to vote on a new treaty with our objections rectified.

Unfortunately, the reasons were mostly people didn't understand the treaty and a smattering of stuff that wasn't actually in the treaty so they were put in the embarrassing position of having to get "guarantees" to try to reassure us that all of those fears were unfounded. And even with the guarantees people still won't accept that this sh!t was never going to happen! It's making the Irish people look like idiots tbh

Suppose the survey came back saying that 85% of no voters opposed the Charter of Human Rights. Or any other part of the treaty.

What could Fianna Fail have done about it?

Nothing.

Sam Vimes

dub_skav wrote: »

This is a very good point. If you are so concerned with people voting No as a protest at FF, why don't you do something about bringing forward a general election.
Or indeed if Labour and FG are so concerned about it why don't they insist on a date being set for a general election before we vote on Lisbon (set the date that is, not run the election).

Reason is FG and Labour know that no matter what way the vote goes will be good for them.
Yes => People will feel there protest wasn't registered and will turn out even more anti FF come election time
No => FF as the party in power once more failed to get Lisbon through

Enda Kenny called for a vote of no confidence after FF got 12% in the local elections and it was refused. They are trying to get them out but unfortunately the minority parties cannot force the majority ones to hold an early election. If the people really want an early election they can campaign for it but it's not going to happen before October 2nd so all we can do right now is ask people to separate their hatred of Fianna Fail from the treaty, as labour have done

Sam Vimes

RandomName2 wrote: »

Suppose the survey came back saying that 85% of no voters opposed the Charter of Human Rights. Or any other part of the treaty.

What could Fianna Fail have done about it?

Nothing.

The French and the Dutch got the constitution renegotiated after their people rejected it and gave valid reasons. Why couldn't Cowen have done the same?

ShooterSF

Sam Vimes wrote: »

The thing is that so much mud has been thrown at this treaty that I would fully expect significant numbers to say that they wouldn't vote yes if their objections were rectified. If someone is voting no to give Brian Cowen a black eye like Norman here, how can changing something in the treaty satisfy him?

OK. There will still be those that vote no. What can you do? Protest votes happen. I myself, if I was voting yes, just might have been irate enough at the fact that it's "not financially viable" to run a referendum on the sky fairy issue when we can run another Lisbon one to have given a protest vote (even if it wrong thing to do). I was simply trying to point out that polls like that one do not show that the public is now in favour of a new referendum yet it was used for such arguments. "Oh people have changed their mind (see this poll) we better run another referendum".

RandomName2

dub_skav wrote: »

This is a very good point. If you are so concerned with people voting No as a protest at FF, why don't you do something about bringing forward a general election.
Or indeed if Labour and FG are so concerned about it why don't they insist on a date being set for a general election before we vote on Lisbon (set the date that is, not run the election).

Reason is FG and Labour know that no matter what way the vote goes will be good for them.
Yes => People will feel there protest wasn't registered and will turn out even more anti FF come election time
No => FF as the party in power once more failed to get Lisbon through

It's win-win for Fine Gael and Labour.

If Lisbon passes - Fine gael and Labour can claim victory. If Lisbon doesn't pass they'll blame Fianna Fail!

dub_skav

Sam Vimes wrote: »

If there had been a high level of understanding then the survey would have found coherent and valid objections to the treaty, which the government could have brought to the bargaining table to get renegotiated. We would have been asked to vote on a new treaty with our objections rectified.

Unfortunately, the reasons were mostly people didn't understand the treaty and a smattering of stuff that wasn't actually in the treaty so they were put in the embarrassing position of having to get "guarantees" to try to reassure us that all of those fears were unfounded. And even with the guarantees people still won't accept that this sh!t was never going to happen! It's making the Irish people look like idiots tbh

I think a lot of the anger now is based on the fact that we were told before the referendum that a No vote meant the treaty was dead.
We were not told that if we voted No the government would commission a survey with leading questions which they would then use to staple things to the envelope the treaty is contained in and try again.

Level of understanding was never even mentioned until after the No vote. As has been said before by many people lack of understanding has never reversed a yes vote.
Just because you believe that a survey to change aspects of the treaty and present it again is fair and democratic does not mean that everybody else should.
A Yes / No question has 2 possible answers, not 1 answer plus 1 answer that leads to further discussion so that you get the other answer in the end.

RandomName2

Sam Vimes wrote: »

The French and the Dutch got the constitution renegotiated after their people rejected it and gave valid reasons. Why couldn't Cowen have done the same?

Because then you have to have the whole thing re-run (and presumably, re-named).

Can't just have another referendum.

With Lisbon, even with this being the case, another referendum is the most logical step for them to take. If lisbon is voted down again, THEN something along the French-dutch lines can be taken. Even if it is slightly dubious in the first place whether or not the French and Dutch got what they wanted as there was no direct vote on either what changes should be made to the Constitution Treaty, and then whether or not such changes were approved of by the electorate through referenda.

Sam Vimes

ShooterSF wrote: »

OK. There will still be those that vote no. What can you do? Protest votes happen. I myself, if I was voting yes, just might have been irate enough at the fact that it's "not financially viable" to run a referendum on the sky fairy issue when we can run another Lisbon one to have given a protest vote (even if it wrong thing to do). I was simply trying to point out that polls like that one do not show that the public is now in favour of a new referendum yet it was used for such arguments. "Oh people have changed their mind (see this poll) we better run another referendum".

I don't think it was that people had directly said they changed their minds, it was more that once more education was made available and the unfounded fears had been settled, there was no valid reason not to change your mind. Unfortunately people are still holding onto their old invalid reasons while coming up with some more, such as the incredibly ill informed idea that being asked to vote again is undemocratic

Stark

RandomName2 wrote: »

Because then you have to have the whole thing re-run (and presumably, re-named).

Can't just have another referendum.

We did it with Nice II (Nice+Neutrality). No reason why Lisbon II couldn't have amendments. In fact it has an amendment regarding the Commissioner.
Lisbon I would have had a rotating Commissioner system (equal time given to small and large countries). Lisbon II has a full time Commissioner for every state. Under Nice, we have no guarantee of retaining a Commissioner once they decide to reduce the size of the Commission in a few year's time. In fact, other countries may decide not to give us any representation in this regard.