Sean O'Rourke Today Show

BarryD

PeterTheEighth wrote: »

Pat Cox - Ireland's most arrogant and condescending man.

He is exactly the sort of person that the Brits voted to get away from.

True and you can add Peter Sutherland to that list too - how often have we heard him lecturing us on our responsibilities from his ivory tower.....

Callan57

May you live in interesting times!!!!!

Letree

Hayes is a complete fool he is after saying we need closer integration now in the EU.

tayto lover

Letree wrote: »

Hayes is a complete fool he is after saying we need closer integration now in the EU.

He's thinking of himself here (as usual).
The British MEP's are out of a job.

Cervantes2

BarryD wrote: »

True and you can add Peter Sutherland to that list too - how often have we heard him lecturing us on our responsibilities from his ivory tower.....

And John Bruton too.

PeterTheEighth

Cervantes2 wrote: »

And John Bruton too.

Yeah I dont know what it is about them, particularly of that era, that when they went to Europe they came back like the f**king Pope. Any time you hear Pat Cox talking, it's like he consciously slowing down his words because he believes that he is much more intelligent than the person he is speaking to and they wont understand what he is saying unless he addresses them as one would a child or perhaps a dog.

Brendan Bendar

PeterTheEighth wrote: »

Yeah I dont know what it is about them, particularly of that era, that when they went to Europe they came back like the f**king Pope. Any time you hear Pat Cox talking, it's like he consciously slowing down his words because he believes that he is much more intelligent than the person he is speaking to and they wont understand what he is saying unless he addresses them as one would a child or perhaps a dog.

Good spot there P.

BarryD

PeterTheEighth wrote: »

Yeah I dont know what it is about them, particularly of that era, that when they went to Europe they came back like the f**king Pope. Any time you hear Pat Cox talking, it's like he consciously slowing down his words because he believes that he is much more intelligent than the person he is speaking to and they wont understand what he is saying unless he addresses them as one would a child or perhaps a dog.

Perhaps he should've been sent so, across to the English. To explain to them slowly that Brittania no longer rules the waves.

BarryD

Can't help thinking these sporting commentators are a bit deluded. We looked under the cosh for a lot of the game yesterday and it seemed inevitable that the French would score when they did. When the French got in front, they kept pressing the game up the field. Whereas we were retreating. We had a late win against an Italian team who had little to play for and looked outclassed yesterday against France and Belgium a week ago.

BarryD

Brendan Ogle and his ilk are quite mad - suggesting we should have to vote to leave the EU on the basis of having to pay a piddling amount towards his water & sewage. It's exactly his like who fed distortions & nonsense to the British electorate.

And Brendan - there is no such f******* thing as a 'Right to Water'. Take a trip out of ivory tower sometime and visit ordinary households in rural Ireland where we all pay for our water and if we don't, we don't get any.

ThisRegard

Do you know what the scary thing is, I saw people liking and sharing those pages from the rag tag groups, the likes of Dublin Says No ****e, calling for a referendum of an Irish referendum on exiting.

Over a couple of euro? People are dumb.

PeterTheEighth

BarryD wrote: »

Brendan Ogle and his ilk are quite mad - suggesting we should have to vote to leave the EU on the basis of having to pay a piddling amount towards his water & sewage. It's exactly his like who fed distortions & nonsense to the British electorate.

Why is he even given air time. He's giving out about unelected people with no mandate enforcing rules on us but what mandate does he have. I dont remember voting for him and his unique brand of populism.

Giving out about the high water charges, and the affect on the poor. When he was in the ESB union, he stood over the staff being "spoilt" while the poorest in society were paying some of the high electricity charges in Europe. Where was his social conscience then?

BarryD

PeterTheEighth wrote: »

Why is he even given air time. He's giving out about unelected people with no mandate enforcing rules on us but what mandate does he have. I dont remember voting for him and his unique brand of populism.

Giving out about the high water charges, and the affect on the poor. When he was in the ESB union, he stood over the staff being "spoilt" while the poorest in society were paying some of the high electricity charges in Europe. Where was his social conscience then?

Never mind his role in the train drivers strike, if I recall. Not exactly poorly paid public servants.

PeterTheEighth

He said he'd leave the country if they voted for BREXIT, and now he says it was a joke and he's not emigrating. Remind anybody of any particular RTE presenter and Enda Kenny?

Callan57

Tommy got it right for once. Immigration is an issue for those who are likely to be impacted by it and it's easy for middle class people who hardly know what the housing waiting list is, or who will never be looking for a min wage job, to sneer from the high moral ground.
It is a very real issue for a lot of people and no amount of superior moralising is going to change that and you can't blame people when they want an end to something that they see impacting their lives daily.

constitutionus

i was in shock !

someone who actually got that immigration was about economics and not racism.

beyond the rest of the media unfortunately

BarryD

Callan57 wrote: »

Tommy got it right for once. Immigration is an issue for those who are likely to be impacted by it and it's easy for middle class people who hardly know what the housing waiting list is, or who will never be looking for a min wage job, to sneer from the high moral ground.
It is a very real issue for a lot of people and no amount of superior moralising is going to change that and you can't blame people when they want an end to something that they see impacting their lives daily.

He did and it's why if we had a similar vote and the immigration card was heavily played, that we'd get the same result.

But it's very same people who are most vulnerable to the winds of change. The moralising middle classes will always muddle along.

Brendan Bendar

BarryD wrote: »

He did and it's why if we had a similar vote and the immigration card was heavily played, that we'd get the same result.

But it's very same people who are most vulnerable to the winds of change. The moralising middle classes will always muddle along.

To quote that famous line from Deliverance "You make that sound kinda... sh***y, Lewis.

serfboard

Callan57 wrote: »

Tommy got it right for once. Immigration is an issue for those who are likely to be impacted by it and it's easy for middle class people who hardly know what the housing waiting list is, or who will never be looking for a min wage job, to sneer from the high moral ground.
It is a very real issue for a lot of people and no amount of superior moralising is going to change that and you can't blame people when they want an end to something that they see impacting their lives daily.

The only problem with that though is that a lot of areas that would hardly see an immigrant from one end of the year to the next voted to leave, whereas areas which would see the highest number of immigrants i.e. the cities, voted to remain.

Callan57

How do we know it's "exceptional" ????
We really need much tighter investigation of who is getting charity status before they get the status or a red cent of taxpayer money. Pointless waiting to react after another Prime Time investigation ... when the financial horse has bolted.

Heard last night on Prime Time "the CEO opened all the post himself" Surely that in itself should have raised questions.

BarryD

Joe O'Toole is on a hiding to nothing with this. It doesn't matter what logical conclusions he comes to or how he phrases it.

The 'We Won't Pay' brigade will just ignore him completely and if he says white, they'll say black.

This water thing is nothing to do with the real issue of providing water and taking away sewage. It's solely a vehicle to engineer social unrest and get people involved in street protest for the furthering of 'the revolution'.

And admirable public spirited desire to serve the state from Joe....

neris

BarryD wrote: »

Brendan Ogle and his ilk are quite mad - suggesting we should have to vote to leave the EU on the basis of having to pay a piddling amount towards his water & sewage. It's exactly his like who fed distortions & nonsense to the British electorate.

And Brendan - there is no such f******* thing as a 'Right to Water'. Take a trip out of ivory tower sometime and visit ordinary households in rural Ireland where we all pay for our water and if we don't, we don't get any.

he,d wana try live in spain where you have to pay a couple of grand a year to your local authority for bin collection, roads etc then pay separately for water

Callan57

That woman is disgraceful ... easiest thing in the world to whip up racism & xenophobia and then walk away from the consequences and do your Pontius Pilate act

Lady Chatterton

I really enjoyed Tracy Coyne's summer lunch/dinner ideas today. She's so down to earth and her suggestions are always simple and really tasty. We need more chefs/cooks on television and radio like her.

BarryD

Sinn Féin chap wants Jeremy Corbyn to stand by his guns and for the English Labour party to split - I wonder why that would be now???? !!

Talk about naked political opportunism, the left devouring the left.

Harry Angstrom

BarryD wrote: »

Sinn Féin chap wants Jeremy Corbyn to stand by his guns and for the English Labour party to split - I wonder why that would be now???? !!

Talk about naked political opportunism, the left devouring the left.

It was funny when Sean asked him what would happen if most of the SF parliamentary party didn't have any confidence in Gerry as their leader. Considering the Shinners make the Stepford wives look like rebellious tearaways, I doubt that situation will ever arise.

BarryD

BarryD wrote: »

Sinn Féin chap wants Jeremy Corbyn to stand by his guns and for the English Labour party to split - I wonder why that would be now???? !!

Why??

Labour has no MPs in Northern Ireland. SF has no MPs in Great Britain.

So SF is not in competition with the British Labour Party.

BarryD

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

Why??

Labour has no MPs in Northern Ireland. SF has no MPs in Great Britain.

So SF is not in competition with the British Labour Party.

No, not directly - but SF and left wing groups on the 'hard left' are busy trying to fracture the traditional Labour vote whether that be in Ireland or UK or elsewhere in Europe. The weakening and demise of Labour in the UK would suit them nicely in this strategy. It's a long game to build up their power base in NI and the Republic.

BarryD

BarryD wrote: »

No, not directly - but SF and left wing groups on the 'hard left' are busy trying to fracture the traditional Labour vote whether that be in Ireland or UK or elsewhere in Europe. The weakening and demise of Labour in the UK would suit them nicely in this strategy. It's a long game to build up their power base in NI and the Republic.

This makes no sense.

Labour are not a threat to SF in NI, because Labour have no electoral presence in NI, in fact they don't even allow candidates to run for the Northern Ireland Assembly, and SF have no interest in GB by definition. You're really clutching straws here.

I have no time for Shinners, but any claim that they are trying to orchestrate the demise of Labour in other countries is tinfoil-hat territory.

BarryD

You need to take a wider view - the undermining of Labour in Britain & elsewhere will inevitably reinforce the undermining of the Labour Party vote in Ireland - and hence a flow of votes, as they hope to SF and others on the left playing the same game. There's only so much 'left wing' vote to go around in Ireland, it has a natural limit and SF want to maximise their portion of it. So it is in their interests to see Labour destroyed in the UK, regardless of the consequences for the rest of the populace there, which of course SF would lose little sleep over anyway.

Brendan Bendar

BarryD wrote: »

Sinn Féin chap wants Jeremy Corbyn to stand by his guns and for the English Labour party to split - I wonder why that would be now???? !!

Talk about naked political opportunism, the left devouring the left.

Those lads don't care , as long as those who are elected and in power are embarrassed and damaged, they don't worry about the blue on blue .

Carpet bombing.

Take everything out,no worries as to who gets hit.

BarryD

Mad stuff this chap is describing if that's the full story - army lads just turning up and opening fire on stock in fields near farmhouse without any warning???

Callan57

BarryD wrote: »

Mad stuff this chap is describing if that's the full story - army lads just turning up and opening fire on stock in fields near farmhouse without any warning???

Somehow I have doubts about ... willing to bet there is at least another side to this story :rolleyes:

alaimacerc

BarryD wrote: »

There's only so much 'left wing' vote to go around in Ireland, it has a natural limit and SF want to maximise their portion of it

Why's there a "natural" limit in Ireland, and why would it be so much lower than the "limit" in essentially every other developed world -- or at least European -- democracy? Is there some deep and immutable reason why Ireland would be perpetually more conservative than every comparable country?

Maybe the constant knifing of each by for votes by the parties in question is a significant part of the reason for their lack of success to this point? In which case, perhaps we won't ever get a "normal" party of the left until after SF have been made redundant by a united Ireland (and optionally gone through a generation of them lording it over us as "the party of national liberation -- only a traitor would ever vote for anyone else). And the "no unpopular tax, never!" smash-the-state segment of the left by... I'm not sure, better maths education in schools?

alaimacerc

MrsD007 wrote: »

I really enjoyed Tracy Coyne's summer lunch/dinner ideas today. She's so down to earth and her suggestions are always simple and really tasty. We need more chefs/cooks on television and radio like her.

Maybe more especially radio, given the "mad starey eyes" aspect...

IvyTheTerrible

Wow, the brass neck on that British artist in west Cork. Doesn't like the way the UK is going (but so ignorant that he conflates England with Northern Ireland and the British Isles) and obviously mean immigration as he starts the sentence with "I'm not racist", but no issue with him coming over to Ireland (put money on it he took plenty of advantage of the artist's tax free status.
Pot and kettle, or what?

BarryD

alaimacerc wrote: »

Why's there a "natural" limit in Ireland, and why would it be so much lower than the "limit" in essentially every other developed world -- or at least European -- democracy?

We have a good many 'disadvantaged' people in Ireland who might vote left and we also have a 'liberal left' vote. But there are a larger number of citizens here who are reasonably comfortable - have jobs, mortgages maybe, own their own properties and so on. This larger latter group have assets, savings, pensions and more to lose if a left wing government came to power here. They might moan now & then about social matters etc., but when it comes to voting for politicians they're always going to vote for more centrist people and policies who will not threaten their assets and who won't rock the boat too much.

So unless there's some major shift in wealth and assets, the left wing vote is naturally limited. Turkeys don't vote for Christmas etc

touts

BarryD wrote: »

Mad stuff this chap is describing if that's the full story - army lads just turning up and opening fire on stock in fields near farmhouse without any warning???

Then Mattie McGrath coming on was pure comic gold. Ranted about how it was a disgraceful situation then actually admitted he knew nothing about it but......

I was waiting for Sean to hang up on him :-)

alaimacerc

BarryD wrote: »

So unless there's some major shift in wealth and assets, the left wing vote is naturally limited. Turkeys don't vote for Christmas etc

Ah yes, the old "champagne social effete metropolitan elite" guff. I've no lack of material on those lines from the Daily Mail or the Indo, if I've ever in need of it. But as I said: what's the inherent difference between Ireland and every other country with somewhat more "normal" left/right politics?

I think you're conflating happenstance, like the whole civil war racket, the limited industrial base, and so, with anything that's inevitable in the long run.

Callan57

IvyTheTerrible wrote: »

Wow, the brass neck on that British artist in west Cork. Doesn't like the way the UK is going (but so ignorant that he conflates England with Northern Ireland and the British Isles) and obviously mean immigration as he starts the sentence with "I'm not racist", but no issue with him coming over to Ireland (put money on it he took plenty of advantage of the artist's tax free status.
Pot and kettle, or what?

Ah but I bet he considers himself an "ex pat" not an immigrant :rolleyes:

alaimacerc

Callan57 wrote: »

Ah but I bet he considers himself an "ex pat" not an immigrant :rolleyes:

Or that Ireland's not really "foreign". *summons the vengeful spirit of Dara O'Briain on this guy's ass*

alaimacerc

IvyTheTerrible wrote: »

(but so ignorant that he conflates England with Northern Ireland and the British Isles)

Hardly an unusual level of "ignorance" as such, mind. There was some "expert" on recently (Lar somebody?) that persistently referred to "England and Ireland" when from context, he could very plainly only logically mean Ireland and the UK as a whole (or Island of Ireland and GB, "these islands", however you're saying that yersel').

But you'd think that being from one part of this archipelago, and living in another part, would somewhat enlighten him... but you'd not want to get your hopes up too high either, evidently.

BarryD

alaimacerc wrote: »

Ah yes, the old "champagne social effete metropolitan elite" guff. I've no lack of material on those lines from the Daily Mail or the Indo, if I've ever in need of it. But as I said: what's the inherent difference between Ireland and every other country with somewhat more "normal" left/right politics?

I think you're conflating happenstance, like the whole civil war racket, the limited industrial base, and so, with anything that's inevitable in the long run.

Da what?? I think you could look into the higher incidence of home ownership in this wee country, the absence of an industrial revolution, the capacity to export our youth and our exposure to markets & circumstances well outside our control. I think there is a tradition of left of centre voting in this country but it slops around between Fianna Fail, Fine Gael & Labour. Will it move further left - I very much doubt it, people have too much to lose and that's what focuses peoples mind in the voting booth. As for our nearest neighbours and other European states, similar forces seem to apply. Sure a country like Greece saw a major rise of the left but that was in crisis mode.

But why would change be inevitable - as long as things stay the way they are, no need for change.

alaimacerc

BarryD wrote: »

Da what?? I think you could look into the higher incidence of home ownership in this wee country, the absence of an industrial revolution, the capacity to export our youth and our exposure to markets & circumstances well outside our control.

And I think I just covered that, by and large. Either not unique to Ireland, or unlikely to be politically meaningful in the longer term.

I think there is a tradition of left of centre voting in this country but it slops around between Fianna Fail, Fine Gael & Labour.

In what sense is plumping for either of the Civil Wars "left of centre voting"? Is that when you vote for an objectively socially conservative party with plainly economically right-wing economic policies, but say "Simon [Harris, Coveney, etc] Says this is a left-wing vote"?

But why would change be inevitable - as long as things stay the way they are, no need for change.

I believe I asked you why the status quo was supposedly inevitable -- are we just playing the traditional burden of proof games, then? OK, try plotting the combined FF+FG vote over time, and tell me again how "nothing will ever change" is a realistic prospect.

BarryD

alaimacerc wrote: »

OK, try plotting the combined FF+FG vote over time, and tell me again how "nothing will ever change" is a realistic prospect.

Try plotting the combined FF+FG+IND FF+IND FG+PD+SD+Renua+Green+SF vote or whatever else you're having and it won't be far off the old hegemony. I don't take SF as a left party particularly, they'd happily morph their colours like FF or FG into any colour that would give them power.

Where the centre is and what is 'left' or 'right' depends very much on one's own perspective & position in society.

Where is the prospect for change? There is none, don't take a few extra people marching on the streets to complain about paying for their water & sewage to be a significant move to the left!

We live in a reasonably prosperous middle class society in Ireland with reasonable social welfare benefits. The Socialist Party etc., may wait a long time for that to change.

Callan57

She thanked Joe O'Toole for being honest about water ... she should follow his lead and admit that what she wants is that someone else pay for the water she uses & pays for everything else aswell

P. Breathnach

Callan57 wrote: »

She thanked Joe O'Toole for being honest about water ... she should follow his lead and admit that what she wants is that someone else pay for the water she uses & pays for everything else aswell

Well, she did - the AAA/PBP unlimited resource of "progressive taxation".

Brendan Bendar

P. Breathnach wrote: »

Well, she did - the AAA/PBP unlimited resource of "progressive taxation".

Often wonder what the definition of progressive taxation from the AAA/PBP really is.

Poor John Taxpayer and Joan Taxpayer working their hoops off to pay max tax at over 32k to fund the lot operating on the edge of the envelope?

Nah , duddnt fool this poster.

Callan57

Brendan Bendar wrote: »

Often wonder what the definition of progressive taxation from the AAA/PBP really is.

Poor John Taxpayer and Joan Taxpayer working their hoops off to pay max tax at over 32k to fund the lot operating on the edge of the envelope?

Nah , duddnt fool this poster.

It means "should be paid by someone but definitely not by me or my socialist mates :rolleyes:

Callan57

"Augmented Reality" ... well Holy God