What will happen to sinn fein after this election.

IAMAMORON

marieholmfan wrote: »

Yes but it might cost them transfers. I'd say that Marcella Kennedy will get in before Flanagan and he may now be transfer toxic.

No I don't believe so.

In fact anyone who is involving sentiment from a conflict that occurred 100 years ago has their heads firmly in the clouds. Ireland is thankfully a very different place, we should be very grateful to our republican heroes, but this country massively needs to move on.

No one voting next month was even alive in 1920. If they manage to not transfer their vote to Charlie Flanagan as result? No chance, they were never transferring in the first place.

Voters either still identify with the 1920's or they don't.

James Brown

IAMAMORON wrote: »

No I don't believe so.

In fact anyone who is involving sentiment from a conflict that occurred 100 years ago has their heads firmly in the clouds. Ireland is thankfully a very different place, we should be very grateful to our republican heroes, but this country massively needs to move on.

No one voting next month was even alive in 1920. If they manage to not transfer their vote to Charlie Flanagan as result? No chance, they were never transferring in the first place.

Voters either still identify with the 1920's or they don't.

Like the Maria Bailey, Dara Murphy issues it's about the character of the politicians that make up the party.
Some floating voters are giving razor thin support to FG as is.

Dyr

Matt Barrett wrote: »

I think all parties need to find a back bone. There should be no 'no go' areas.
The first party to get in and take a run at the HSE and the Civil Service etc. will win my respect.
FF/FG are not those parties. Kenny had the best chance for that.
We need a change from FF/FG.
I'll be voting SD/Indie/SF etc.
The Greens are a novelty party and Labour cannot be trusted.

The SDs, SF and Assorted are less likely to reform the HSE and the Civil Service.

James Brown

Bambi wrote: »

The SDs, SF and Assorted are less likely to reform the HSE and the Civil Service.

Than who, the parties who didn't and won't?

ghost of ireland past

I think it's appropriate that people should be very disillusioned about the prospects on offer when it comes to politicians.

Irish politicians have no vision in my view. What do they stand for? I feel that when you listen to them they don't really stand for anything.

We need real politicians with vision. Like Victor Urban for example, who at least is proud of his country's Christian heritage and he intends to honour it, and to protect it. That makes him worthwhile to get behind, because he stands for something.

I have no interest in Irish politicians because I get the impression they don't stand for anything, and Sinn Fein are no different.

With Sinn Fein it seems to be, 'Ireland for the whole world, except the Brits', and that's not a vision that people can get behind.

Pearse Doherty will become leader.

Dyr

Deleted User wrote: »

Pearse Doherty will become leader.

Doherty refused to stand for leadership because he had a young family.

Now unless that was just to cover up that SFs senior string pullers told him they wanted Mary Lou then he aint going to be taking over as leader anytime soon.

Dyr

ghost of ireland past wrote: »

I think it's appropriate that people should be very disillusioned about the prospects on offer when it comes to politicians.

Irish politicians have no vision in my view. What do they stand for? I feel that when you listen to them they don't really stand for anything.

We need real politicians with vision. Like Victor Urban for example, who at least is proud of his country's Christian heritage and he intends to honour it, and to protect it. That makes him worthwhile to get behind, because he stands for something.
.

Does Christianity not have a thing about thou shalt not nick money from the tax payer?

Loafing Oaf

ghost of ireland past wrote: »

We need real politicians with vision. Like Victor Urban for example, who at least is proud of his country's Christian heritage and he intends to honour it, and to protect it. That makes him worthwhile to get behind, because he stands for something.

We have such politicians, or more accurately wannabe politicians, in the form of Justin Barrett, Ronan Mullen, John McGuirk etc. Problem for you is nobody votes for them...

padd b1975

They're definitely missing the whiff of sulphur that Adams brought to the party.
There's plenty of morons out there that found his folksy/sinister rhetoric strangely seductive.

The Mary Lou generation simply don't appeal to that cohort.

NIMAN

Bambi wrote: »

Doherty refused to stand for leadership because he had a young family.

Now unless that was just to cover up that SFs senior string pullers told him they wanted Mary Lou then he aint going to be taking over as leader anytime soon.

SF don't do leadership contests.

If I was a betting man I'd say PD was told they were going for the female leader and go along with it.

But I suspect he might be in the running for the next leader role if MLMD doesn't turn the party's fortunes around soon.

FrancieBrady

I think this is make or break for ML. She got a bit of a boost in the bye elections and being back in Stormont will help. But I think with retirements and as somebody said, 'that lack of spark' the best might be to just tread water.

FF/FG are the same party, it's a shame the rest cannot form a decent cohesive bloc and offer a real opposition party with some clout here. Going into government is just self destruction here sadly.

ghost of ireland past

ghost of ireland past wrote: »

I think it's appropriate that people should be very disillusioned about the prospects on offer when it comes to politicians.

Irish politicians have no vision in my view. What do they stand for? I feel that when you listen to them they don't really stand for anything.

We need real politicians with vision. Like Victor Urban for example, who at least is proud of his country's Christian heritage and he intends to honour it, and to protect it. That makes him worthwhile to get behind, because he stands for something.

I have no interest in Irish politicians because I get the impression they don't stand for anything, and Sinn Fein are no different.

With Sinn Fein it seems to be, 'Ireland for the whole world, except the Brits', and that's not a vision that people can get behind.

Theocratic Ireland is in the grave, and long may she stay there.

ghost of ireland past

Our national vision doesn't have to be a religious vision, but nor do we have to hate our past, or betray it.

But we do need to stand for something, beside modernity and consumerism, and growth for growth's sake. Life should be about more than that.

We're so constrained in what we can talk about.

Why is there so much corruption and crime in the west?
Why is there a war on drugs?

mynamejeff

They will get a hammering and go back to robbing banks and taxing drug dealers ?

no stupid people will vote for them inspite of the shambles they have made of the north

first armed criminal gang in government in the world

blanch152

dulpit wrote: »

You say you want a party who will get in and take a run at the HSE/etc, but then say the Greens are a novelty party and Labour can't be trusted, but these are the parties who have actually had a go at government in the past, but got bashed for it..

There are some people who will perpetually vote for a “hurler on the ditch” party. They like to be able to complain about whoever is in power without ever offering solutions or suggestions. Voting independent is usually one sign, but support for the SDs or SF is another.

To be fair to FF, FG, Labour, Greens, and before them the PDs, they have all been willing to take the responsibility of government.

James Brown

What about people who don't trust Labour, don't like the Greens and are aware of FF/FG's records, former FG/FF voters unhappy with them?

Personally I'll gamble on an unknown before I'd back failures and me feiners.

tayto lover

blanch152 wrote: »

There are some people who will perpetually vote for a “hurler on the ditch” party. They like to be able to complain about whoever is in power without ever offering solutions or suggestions. Voting independent is usually one sign, but support for the SDs or SF is another.

To be fair to FF, FG, Labour, Greens, and before them the PDs, they have all been willing to take the responsibility of government.

And we saw what happened to the Greens and Labour after they backed the government parties the last time. They abandoned all their own policies for a wee bit of power and suffered in the next elections. Their leaders sold out for power and pensions.

LuasSimon

The new Sinn Fein are big into the whole transgender - Abortion - gay marriage - travellers rights and general PC stuff which may work in Dublin and some other urban areas but they have lost a lot of the old republican vote to Aontu- independents - Fianna Fáil . The 3-4% vote alone that aontu will get in rural Ireland will cost Sinn Fein seats .
Sinn Fein seem to be more into traveller rights than a United ireland .

James Brown

tayto lover wrote: »

And we saw what happened to the Greens and Labour after they backed the government parties the last time. They abandoned all their own policies for a wee bit of power and suffered in the next elections. Their leaders sold out for power and pensions.

The idea that you're not legit or cool if you don't vote FF or FG is gas.
Labour have not made any moves to rebrand or fix themselves IMO.
The Greens same.

SF need promote supporting the tax paying worker.

hmmm

There's no point to SF.

A United Ireland will probably happen eventually, and it can't be through a "defeat" of unionists. They'll have to feel they can benefit to ensure a smooth union, and the last party they will trust is SF. The existence of SF in my opinion makes a UI less likely.

After that you have their scattergun economic policy which most voters can see through. They are fighting the hard-left for the tiny vote who are in favour of handouts to people who aren't much interested in working. They are promising money for everything. Voters worry that taxes will increase massively in a SF government. Their record in NI has been pretty poor.

Their social policies make little sense, because other than a few media-savvy leaders their membership is largely made up of quite conservative people. Really SF should be going after the FF vote, not the FG/Labour vote.

So, ultimately, what's the point of SF?

James Brown

hmmm wrote: »

There's no point to SF.

A United Ireland will probably happen eventually, and it can't be through a "defeat" of unionists. They'll have to feel they can benefit to ensure a smooth union, and the last party they will trust is SF. The existence of SF in my opinion makes a UI less likely.

After that you have their scattergun economic policy which most voters can see through. They are fighting the hard-left for the tiny vote who are in favour of handouts to people who aren't much interested in working. They are promising money for everything. Voters worry that taxes will increase massively in a SF government. Their record in NI has been pretty poor.

Their social policies make little sense, because other than a few media-savvy leaders their membership is largely made up of quite conservative people. Really SF should be going after the FF vote, not the FG/Labour vote.

So, ultimately, what's the point of SF?

If you like them you vote for them. You could say worse about others at least SF took a stand. It's easier to cadge votes when you will tell lies to get elected.
I see them as more likely to look after the tax paying worker. They dont and never did own the concept of a UI for me.

hmmm

Matt Barrett wrote: »

If you like them you vote for them. You could say worse about others at least SF took a stand. It's easier to cadge votes when you will tell lies to get elected.
I see them as more likely to look after the tax paying worker. They dont and never did own the concept of a UI for me.

Took a stand? They say "yes" to everything. Free money for this, free money for that. We only have to look at NI to see how poor they have been when actually in power.

Accusing politicians of telling "lies" is lazy commentating - no politician has the money or the power to do everything they'd like to do, and they have to make the hard decisions on trade-offs. Let's see when SF get into power whether they can achieve 100% of what they have promised.

CrankyHaus

hmmm wrote: »

.

Their social policies make little sense, because other than a few media-savvy leaders their membership is largely made up of quite conservative people. Really SF should be going after the FF vote, not the FG/Labour vote.

I'd say this new focus is based on a strategy of engaging younger voters. The Gay Marriage and Abortion referendums and climate strike could be presented as proof of a new generation of voters looking for woke candidates.
Social media has been well harnessed by SF in this regard. It may work, but the UK's last election, with vocal Jezza support and Bojo abuse online not transferring to the ballot box, suggests it may not. It seems that Twitter etc are less the commanding heights than an alienating foghorn.

I'll be genuinely interested to see how they get on.

JohnnyFlash

padd b1975 wrote: »

They're definitely missing the whiff of sulphur that Adams brought to the party.
There's plenty of morons out there that found his folksy/sinister rhetoric strangely seductive.

The Mary Lou generation simply don't appeal to that cohort.

I presume Martin ‘The Man with the Van’ Ferris is retiring as well. What about Dessie Ellis I wonder?

blanch152

tayto lover wrote: »

And we saw what happened to the Greens and Labour after they backed the government parties the last time. They abandoned all their own policies for a wee bit of power and suffered in the next elections. Their leaders sold out for power and pensions.

From Wikipedia:

"In almost four years in Government, from 2007 to 2011, the Green Party contributed to the passage of civil partnership for same-sex couples,[32] the introduction of major planning reform,[33] a major increase in renewable energy output,[34] progressive budgets,[35] and a nationwide scheme of home insulation retrofitting.[36]"

They also oversaw the introduction of the first carbon levy in Ireland. They are all solid achievements for a minority party. You can't expect a minority party to achieve most of their objectives, because they are obviously a minority party.

The one thing you can say about them is that they were naively fooled by FF on the bank bailout.

Over the last decade and a half then, the Green Party, despite having far fewer seats, have delivered more for their voters than Sinn Fein, who as always have sat on their hands on the sidelines.

tayto lover

blanch152 wrote: »

From Wikipedia:

"In almost four years in Government, from 2007 to 2011, the Green Party contributed to the passage of civil partnership for same-sex couples,[32] the introduction of major planning reform,[33] a major increase in renewable energy output,[34] progressive budgets,[35] and a nationwide scheme of home insulation retrofitting.[36]"

They also oversaw the introduction of the first carbon levy in Ireland. They are all solid achievements for a minority party. You can't expect a minority party to achieve most of their objectives, because they are obviously a minority party.

The one thing you can say about them is that they were naively fooled by FF on the bank bailout.

Over the last decade and a half then, the Green Party, despite having far fewer seats, have delivered more for their voters than Sinn Fein, who as always have sat on their hands on the sidelines.

They may have contributed more than SF but they always succeeded in costing the taxpayers more. What about them demanding that we buy diesel cars? Look where that got us.

blanch152

tayto lover wrote: »

They may have contributed more than SF but they always succeeded in costing the taxpayers more. What about them demanding that we buy diesel cars? Look where that got us.

To be fair, it was the car companies that lied about emissions from diesel vehicles, the Greens can't be blamed for acting on the false information.

tayto lover

blanch152 wrote: »

To be fair, it was the car companies that lied about emissions from diesel vehicles, the Greens can't be blamed for acting on the false information.

I know a few of them in my area. They don’t fill me with confidence Blanch.
Chancers of the highest order. Madcap ideas. My choices in this GE are even worse than last time and that’s bad.

blanch152

tayto lover wrote: »

I know a few of them in my area. They don’t fill me with confidence Blanch.
Chancers of the highest order. Madcap ideas. My choices in this GE are even worse than last time and that’s bad.

Out in Dublin 15, we have Roderic O'Gorman, who has a sensible practical approach.