General Irish Government discussion thread [See Post 1805]

An Ciarraioch

If that Prime Time debate is any indicator, the next three weeks will be a long slog.

is_that_so

hotmail.com wrote: »

Without a doubt Martin will have to go if FF don't go into government after this election.

Leo's future is a little more uncertain given that he's much younger and only in the job 2 and a half years.

I don't think anyone in FG is in any great rush to challenge Leo and he'll probably stay on until the end or close to the end of the next Dail. Coveney knows he should be next so no point in upsetting anything.

is_that_so

An Ciarraioch wrote: »

If that Prime Time debate is any indicator, the next three weeks will be a long slog.

Yeah put Pearce in with people and he's like a dog with bone, still Mr Angry. Chambers is lightweight. Howlin has that slightly pompous Labour thing going and Simon is just "reasonable".

hotmail.com

Verona Murphy on TV3 Nightly Show.

Has she replaced Casey lad as the go to personality to get ratings?

Lass1992

Anybody plan on voting for Irish Freedom Party, Irish National Party or Renua?

markodaly

is_that_so wrote: »

2002 was a bland and waffly manifesto from FG and a poor campaign. Noonan was always a poor choice as leader. Feisty in individual exchanges but not in any way inspirational. FF had a better, more focused approach. They also had the brilliantly simple slogan of "A lot done. More to do".

Focused, when you mean opening up the public purse for all and sundry. 100% agree with you there.

The seeds of the crash and insolvency was sown in 2002.

is_that_so

markodaly wrote: »

Focused, when you mean opening up the public purse for all and sundry. 100% agree with you there.

The seeds of the crash and insolvency was sown in 2002.

Eh no, I was just talking about their manifesto in the 2002 GE. The seeds were selling sown when they took out the one dissenting voice of McCreevy. For all his flathulachas, he did spot there was a danger.

Bishop of hope

Lass1992 wrote: »

Anybody plan on voting for Irish Freedom Party, Irish National Party or Renua?

nota.

golfball37

Lass1992 wrote: »

Anybody plan on voting for Irish Freedom Party, Irish National Party or Renua?

If they run in Clare, yes.

Scoundrel

Lass1992 wrote: »

Anybody plan on voting for Irish Freedom Party, Irish National Party or Renua?

I'd rather let Edward Scissorhands preform my next prostate exam.

seamus

My gut feeling in general from media, online and talking to people, is that if this election were to be held tomorrow, it'd be broadly more of the same. People are broadly of the mind that some things have gone well, some things have gone awful, but there isn't a politician in the country who would have made a difference if they had the reins.

The "protest" vote in 2016 for Independents will drop off because they had so little impact, Greens will see their success in the EU replicated, and SF will take a few extra percent. FF & FG will land back in around the same.

And I'm not sure the electorate are at all in the mood for a mud-slinging contest this time around. The last 4 years of politics in the Anglophone world have been an exceptional quagmire of negativity and sh1t-stirring, that the tide is starting to turn against the mud slingers rather than those hit by it.

So IMO, excepting some revelation or exceptional campaigning on the part of anyone, I think we're headed for some form of FF/FG coalition, either minority or formal.

tobsey

An Ciarraioch wrote: »

This is an excellent political profiler quiz - as well as having tons of questions on each topic, it gives you a position on various axes, such as libertarian v authoritarian, multiculturalist v assimilationist, Keynesian v lassez-faire, and of course, your party score:

https://ireland.isidewith.com

For me:
Green
SD
Labour
FG
SF
FF

I was sceptical of that as I was doing the quiz but it's pretty close to the order I'd have gone for. There's a big gap in my head though between FG and SF, that's probably where I'll put the independents with a few other small changes.

marno21

Hopefully people will have some sense and not flock to the Green Party in droves to address "climate change anxiety".

Remember that the party leader in the past year has worked to obstruct the country's foremost public transport project in order to facilitate a minority of car owners, their Cork division has objected to improved building densities in a sprawling city trying to reverse its behaviour. These policy positions have no place in a party claiming to hold green credentials.

Hotblack Desiato

An Ciarraioch wrote: »

This is an excellent political profiler quiz - as well as having tons of questions on each topic, it gives you a position on various axes, such as libertarian v authoritarian, multiculturalist v assimilationist, Keynesian v lassez-faire, and of course, your party score:

https://ireland.isidewith.com

Lot of very US-centric questions there which are non-issues here. E.g. gay marriage and adoption rights. Or whether Ireland should kill terrorists overseas :rolleyes:

seamus wrote: »

The "protest" vote in 2016 for Independents will drop off because they had so little impact

Shane Ross has had a large negative impact :mad: electric car uptake still tiny yet public charging network inadequate, transport emissions through the roof, public transport bursting at the seams, no start on the Dublin Metro, and no railway rolling stock will be delivered for years to come. All this as lack of availability and affordability of housing is forcing people to commute further and further.

And I'm not sure the electorate are at all in the mood for a mud-slinging contest this time around. The last 4 years of politics in the Anglophone world have been an exceptional quagmire of negativity and sh1t-stirring, that the tide is starting to turn against the mud slingers rather than those hit by it.

Hopefully. Which means SF and the far-left alphabet soup will continue their decline...

An Ciarraioch

Virtually half the electorate have no confidence in any of the party leaders to be Taoiseach:

https://www.thejournal.ie/general-election-poll-6-4965691-Jan2020/

hotmail.com

Hopefully crime will become a feature of this campaign and will lead to changes.

The scale of the drug crisis is enormous in this country.

An Ciarraioch

If Eoin O'Malley's prediction is accurate, looks like an FF-Lab-Green-SD minority coalition:

https://politicalreform.ie/2020/01/15/early-2020-election-predictions/

Topgear on Dave

hotmail.com wrote: »

Hopefully crime will become a feature of this campaign and will lead to changes.

The scale of the drug crisis is enormous in this country.

Regular murders have become totally normalised. There is even a thread dedicated to it on here. Its like some kind of bizarre soap opera in there.

Its insane.

Water John

An Ciarraioch, I posted that link on the Predictions thread, hope you don't mind.
https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=112260352#post112260352

I think its a fair shot at the numbers.

seamus

An Ciarraioch wrote: »

Virtually half the electorate have no confidence in any of the party leaders to be Taoiseach:

https://www.thejournal.ie/general-election-poll-6-4965691-Jan2020/

That's actually a quite a big concern IMO. It's the perfect scenario for a populist to waltz in as "new blood" and present themselves as some kind of messiah for the jaded voter, someone who's going to "drain the swamp", etc.

is_that_so

seamus wrote: »

My gut feeling in general from media, online and talking to people, is that if this election were to be held tomorrow, it'd be broadly more of the same. People are broadly of the mind that some things have gone well, some things have gone awful, but there isn't a politician in the country who would have made a difference if they had the reins.

The "protest" vote in 2016 for Independents will drop off because they had so little impact, Greens will see their success in the EU replicated, and SF will take a few extra percent. FF & FG will land back in around the same.

And I'm not sure the electorate are at all in the mood for a mud-slinging contest this time around. The last 4 years of politics in the Anglophone world have been an exceptional quagmire of negativity and sh1t-stirring, that the tide is starting to turn against the mud slingers rather than those hit by it.

I think we collectively take a fairly dim view of negative campaigning. It's rarely a huge feature although there might be some clods slung locally! Disagree on Greens as the locals are far more reflective of support. SF had better hope is not reflective of theirs as that will lose them quite a few seats.

VinLieger

Jesua christ ive heard several parties floating ideas to actually lower the retirement age, weve got an aging population for fvck sake, thats is living longer and longer, the retirement age needs to increase if we want the country to function in any meaningful way

Topgear on Dave

VinLieger wrote: »

Jesua christ ive heard several parties floating ideas to actually lower the retirement age, weve got an aging population for fvck sake, thats is living longer and longer, the retirement age needs to increase if we want the country to function in any meaningful way

Which means that the number of pensioners voting will increase, and their influence will increase.

We are going to be in difficult circumstances in future.

An Ciarraioch

VinLieger wrote: »

Jesua christ ive heard several parties floating ideas to actually lower the retirement age, weve got an aging population for fvck sake, thats is living longer and longer, the retirement age needs to increase if we want the country to function in any meaningful way

Although I thought, largely due to immigration, that we had one of the youngest average populations in the EU?

tayto lover

Topgear on Dave wrote: »

Which means that the number of pensioners voting will increase, and their influence will increase.

We are going to be in difficult circumstances in future.

Maybe we need to cull them?

Topgear on Dave

tayto lover wrote: »

Maybe we need to cull them?

It might solve pension funding difficulties but I cant see any parties running with that as an electoral policy. :pac:

VinLieger

An Ciarraioch wrote: »

Although I thought, largely due to immigration, that we had one of the youngest average populations in the EU?

We do but its not going to offset the spike in worker to retiree ratio were gonna see in the next 20 years, currently its 5:1 by 2040 it is looking to be as low as 3:1. Immigration helps but the only real solution was to stop making having children so expensive 15 years ago which would have stopped our birthrate dropping as low as it currently has.


Lowering the retirement age is incredibly irresponsible, and too be honest maliciously ignorant of any politician to suggest

Chips Lovell

Mod Note

Please read the charter folks. No link or image dumps. This is a discussion forum, not a feed.

hotmail.com

hotmail.com wrote: »

Hopefully crime will become a feature of this campaign and will lead to changes.

The scale of the drug crisis is enormous in this country.

well it should do, Dublin council gave a builder the phone number of a well known criminal so the councilors could pay him off. The council told the builder in cherry orchard to pay it and charge it to the council as "Fencing" for site!"

the defence from DCC was that they didn't pay the money directly, HOWEVER they were paying for fences that never existed and also introducing builders to criminals!!

So yes, it bloody should be because it's not just scumbag drug dealers at street level it's your local council!!

hotmail.com

hotmail.com wrote: »

Hopefully crime will become a feature of this campaign and will lead to changes.

The scale of the drug crisis is enormous in this country.

The trouble is that part of the solution will be unpalatable to many.