TNS/MRBI poll, FF at 17%

irish_bob

is_that_so wrote: »

They will need Labour anyway and both parties have been here before and are pragmatic enough to be able to hammer out a deal. The rainbow of 94-97 did a very good job and deserve part of the credit for the progress from 97 that FF took much of the credit for.

As for your post I suggest you look back at previous elections , even to the late sixties. FF ceased to be a real single party of government in that "landslide victory" of 77 which had them on 84 seats. Since then coalition or agreed support is the way things have gone and will probably continue to go.

The last single party Govt. was in the 80s and a minority one at that. Even FF would be hard pushed to do so these days and have only been above 80 on a couple of occasions and have needed extra support.

I can understand someone not voting for their own TD who has done a bad job but I really don't understand this "I hate Kenny so I am not voting for FG" nonsense. People who have the vote are deemed adult enough to be able to make an informed decision and not indulge in juvenile sulks because our political classes are not perceived to have the same level of cool as politicians in other parts of the world.



Labour will do well to get into the high 20s and may sneak to 30 but probably no higher. As others have posted, they are strong in certain areas.



86% of them vote apparently and with numbers growing they are likely to have a more marked influence on results in future.

i said we need single party goverment without FIANNA FAIL , so 1977 doesnt count , i dont believe that coalitions involving labour and fine gael have worked well in the past either , labour are a boulder around fine gael,s neck , at this point , id rather either a true right wing goverment or a true left wing goverment as i think we need idealogy of some kind , that way the people could see what descisions are , it might do away with the half measure please everyone populists that are fianna fail

I take the opposite view.

Why do we need 'right wing' and 'left wing' alternatives? Or what's so wrong with having two populist parties that are ideologically not miles apart? It seems to have served a lot of Western Countries quite well, leave the right wing and left wing battles to the banana republics of the third world. An alternative isn't a bad thing, choice is never a bad thing, but let's not pretend having popular parties that are polar opposites and set in their ideology is something to be welcomed.

nesf

Deleted User wrote: »

I take the opposite view.

Why do we need 'right wing' and 'left wing' alternatives? Or what's so wrong with having two populist parties that are ideologically not miles apart? It seems to have served a lot of Western Countries quite well, leave the right wing and left wing battles to the banana republics of the third world. An alternative isn't a bad thing, choice is never a bad thing, but let's not pretend having popular parties that are polar opposites and set in their ideology is something to be welcomed.

Well one of the biggest issue with two polar opposite parties is that they spend an inordinate amount of time once they get elected undoing what the other party did during their term.

taidghbaby

I was listening to Pat Carey on newstalk thismorning and his theory was that Fianna Fail and in particularly Brian Cowen's poor showing was due to the tough decisions that they now have to make! he said that the leaders of all countries were suffering similarly! He in fact singled out Barack Obama who he said was the worlds most popular leader was also suffering in the polls due to the tough decisions he now had to make - decisions which he said were a result of the poor policies of the Bush administration!

Therefore I assumed that Pat thought the reason FF and Mr. Cowen were down so much was a result of the policies of the previous regime.....eh would that have been Bertie government then???

irish_bob

taidghbaby wrote: »

I was listening to Pat Carey on newstalk thismorning and his theory was that Fianna Fail and in particularly Brian Cowen's poor showing was due to the tough decisions that they now have to make! he said that the leaders of all countries were suffering similarly! He in fact singled out Barack Obama who he said was the worlds most popular leader was also suffering in the polls due to the tough decisions he now had to make - decisions which he said were a result of the poor policies of the Bush administration!

Therefore I assumed that Pat thought the reason FF and Mr. Cowen were down so much was a result of the policies of the previous regime.....eh would that have been Bertie government then???

you could let carey away with what he said if his party actually had made tough descisions , they have not yet they are still unpoular , i dont think most irish people like politicians who make tough descisions ( bertie was popular and never made one ) but irish people dont like wimps who dither either

Stephen

^^ The one in which Biffo himself was minister for finance, architect of much of the disaster. Lovely.

jank

Deleted User wrote: »

Stories of FF being finished are complete and utter nonsense. No poll can change the fact that they are currently the largest party in the country.

I take it you missed the local elections where FG are now the largest party in the country.

jank

jank wrote: »

I take it you missed the local elections where FG are now the largest party in the country.

Oh Jesus, you're right!

And of course the town councils and county buildings are where all the really big decisions affecting our future will be made.

My God, go out and tell everyone to forget about NAMA and the Lisbon Treaty and what FF will do. In fact, why are we even debating FF. There's a public foootpath in Duagh that needs to be fixed...

RealityCheck

Deleted User wrote: »

I take the opposite view.

Why do we need 'right wing' and 'left wing' alternatives? Or what's so wrong with having two populist parties that are ideologically not miles apart? It seems to have served a lot of Western Countries quite well, leave the right wing and left wing battles to the banana republics of the third world. An alternative isn't a bad thing, choice is never a bad thing, but let's not pretend having popular parties that are polar opposites and set in their ideology is something to be welcomed.

That is a good point. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are only a reflection of the people voting for them.
However I suspect having two popular parties has us in the mess we are in, as in general all the parties huddle around the centre trying to out spend each other to the detriment of the country.

There is especially a case for saying the Fianna Fáil are too nice, Bertie Ahern and Jack Lynch populist governments for example, spending tomorrows money today.

Donnaghm

Some people are baffled by the fact that the tired, grotesquely incompetent and useless FF party are at 17% when they should be utterly obliterated in the polls. But what's far more gaulling to me is that British Labour is polling in the late 20s when they've been in power for a similar length of time, they too have an uncharismatic leader, they too presided over a bubble economy for which their leader has been largely responsible being chancellor at the time and above all, they entered their woefully underfunded army into two unjustified simultaneous wars, costing 1000's of British and civilian lives and the pretext for the war in Iraq(Sadam's chemical weaponery) has proved to be spurious to say the least. So what the F are the Brits doing to themselves?

Donnaghm

RealityCheck wrote: »

That is a good point. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are only a reflection of the people voting for them.
However I suspect having two popular parties has us in the mess we are in, as in general all the parties huddle around the centre trying to out spend each other to the detriment of the country.

There is especially a case for saying the Fianna Fáil are too nice, Bertie Ahern and Jack Lynch populist governments for example, spending tomorrows money today.

Nice my hat, it's purely opportunism and cynism in it's purest form.