Has PBP/Solidarity/RISE actually done anything?

Mad_maxx

Patser wrote: »

I don't know.

FF have had their Lazarus moment already, coming back from 2009 IMF crash, but strangely i can't see them surviving Michael Martin. They've no wiggle room.

FG occupy the right if them, and especially compared to Martin suddenly seem much more competent and in control so polls show them booming at FF's expense.

To the left you've SDs, SF and Labour all looking to make ground on various issues, an all (even Labour to an extent) having a bit a momentum now.

FF just seem to be stuck in the middle with no identity left since they went into coalition with FG, so next election could very easily become FG vs SF (with SDs, Lab, and what's left of FF being minor coalition partners). A SF led coalition is very much on the cards, I wouldn't even rule out a rainbow SD, Lab, Green, Ind govt depending on what scandals might hit any party (FG or SF) over next few strange years

FF have no business courting urban liberals , no self respecting urban liberal would be caught dead voting for FF , Michael Martin chose to try and woo that demographic while ignoring the socially conservative vote out there

whatever about his own personal beliefs , it was extremely poor strategically

Wanderer78

Patser wrote: »

I don't know.

FF have had their Lazarus moment already, coming back from 2009 IMF crash, but strangely i can't see them surviving Michael Martin. They've no wiggle room.

FG occupy the right if them, and especially compared to Martin suddenly seem much more competent and in control so polls show them booming at FF's expense.

To the left you've SDs, SF and Labour all looking to make ground on various issues, an all (even Labour to an extent) having a bit a momentum now.

FF just seem to be stuck in the middle with no identity left since they went into coalition with FG, so next election could very easily become FG vs SF (with SDs, Lab, and what's left of FF being minor coalition partners). A SF led coalition is very much on the cards, I wouldn't even rule out a rainbow SD, Lab, Green, Ind govt depending on what scandals might hit any party (FG or SF) over next few strange years

all great points, but the political left is also in serious trouble, and this isnt just an irish problem, the political left has actually lost its identity, it has taken on the political and economic ideologies of the alternatives, particularly over the last few decades, it completely abandoned its base, its lost. we re all ultimately ending up with very impudent governments, with very little change occuring, because of severe curtailment of the abilities to do so, something serious needs to change quickly, or.......

Wanderer78

Wanderer78 wrote: »

all great points, but the political left is also in serious trouble, and this isnt just an irish problem, the political left has actually lost its identity, it has taken on the political and economic ideologies of the alternatives, particularly over the last few decades, it completely abandoned its base, its lost. we re all ultimately ending up with very impudent governments, with very little change occuring, because of severe curtailment of the abilities to do so, something serious needs to change quickly, or.......

To me the Left were originally the supporters of the workers and workers rights. They now seem to look after the work shy, while fighting amongst themselves.

Wanderer78

Deleted User wrote: »

To me the Left were originally the supporters of the workers and workers rights. They now seem to look after the work shy, while fighting amongst themselves.

the traditional political left were indeed this, but over the last few decades, they ve effectively abandoned their base. long term unemployment is far more complex than you may think, but it is true, the political left are completely lost, they dont know what or who they are, or who they truly represent, and what to do in general

Patser

Wanderer78 wrote: »

the traditional political left were indeed this, but over the last few decades, they ve effectively abandoned their base. long term unemployment is far more complex than you may think, but it is true, the political left are completely lost, they dont know what or who they are, or who they truly represent, and what to do in general

The left in Ireland is just too fractured, and often over single ideological differences, look at the left wing parties:
SF - left but with NI focus
Greens - left but with environmental focus
SDs - left but with more Liberal focus
Labour - left but with union membership history
PBP/Solidarity/RISE/IND4Change - far left but splitters in best Life of Brian vein


I see little reason there beyond maybe political history why some at least couldn't form a bloc - Lab adding their experience and grassroots to SDs youth and dynamics. Get the Greens in in next election, even on a voting pact and those 3 parties could probably gain 30 to 40 seats as a bloc, rather than scrabbling for transfers amongst themselves at lower end of counts.

If they made very public overtures to Richard Bob Barrett to join a full on left alliance, it would make it hard on PBP to not join without looking too uninterested in actually doing anything.

If they don't they run real risk of another SF surge swallowing them up - all those smaller left parties owe a lot to SF transfers and failure to run 2nd candidates

JohnnyFlash

FTA69 wrote: »

They split off from them over a big hoo ha about identity politics apparently.

A split? Jesus, that must have came as a shock for all involved....

L1011

dubrov wrote: »

Ruth Coppinger almost managed to nationalise Dell to secure jobs.

No, she didn't. She shouted about it but absolutely no moves were made towards it

And had it been done, there would have been an outdated factory with no orders - Dell sure as hell wouldn't have continued ordering kit from an expensive plant

Ireland is vastly too dear an economy to do really basic assembly jobs in. That's the important thing to note - its not manufacturing, its assembly, of foreign made parts. Much cheaper to assemble them where those parts are made.

Ten years prior to closure most of the parts were being made here too - Foxconn in Mullingar making cases, 3Com in Blanchardstown making network cards and modems, Intel making motherboards in Ireland (moved to somewhere cheaper to use the capacity for far higher complexity items), Seagate making the hard diskes, etc etc etc. By the time Dell closed none of them were. In every case either it was extremely simplistic work (cases); made obsolete by technology changes (a PC doesn't have a seperate network card anymore, its onboard) or the Irish plant moved to more complicated products.

FTA69

JohnnyFlash wrote: »

A split? Jesus, that must have came as a shock for all involved....

Unbelievable. I never thought I’d see the day. Needless to say the struggle (with reality) continues.

Regardless of the fronts these groups construct which often have success drawing people in, at the core of them remains the party structure that is essentially a cult. The SWP especially take in young generally middle class idealists, burn them out and then discard them. They’re also rife with weird internal power dynamics and older fellas trying to hop off the young ones.

Their only goal is to build their own organisation at whatever cost. I had a few of them involved in a strike I organised in 2017 and they were a nightmare. After 24 days out we came to an agreement, the workers had nothing left in the tank. Enter the Socialist Party then demanding we continue a failing industrial action so they could flog a few papers and leech off it for a few more weeks. They didn’t give a f*ck about the damage they’d cause and derided me and others as utter sellouts with them the only potential saviours.

Any campaign or issue their only goal is to parasite off it or control it and if they’re rebuffed or outmanoeuvred they’ll attempt to split it or destroy it. Absolutely dire organisations.

mohawk

[Deleted User] wrote: »

To me the Left were originally the supporters of the workers and workers rights. They now seem to look after the work shy, while fighting amongst themselves.

I 100% completely agree. I would also add that globally the left seems far more interested in identify politics then making any real changes that really benefit society.

blanch152

Wanderer78 wrote: »

Very unfair there, we re not the only country experiencing de-industrialisation, Dell shut for many reasons, and our governments aren't helping the situation either

Explain how our government isn't helping the situation when we attract the most FDI and have so many jobs and tax from multinationals?

blanch152

FTA69 wrote: »

Unbelievable. I never thought I’d see the day. Needless to say the struggle (with reality) continues.

Regardless of the fronts these groups construct which often have success drawing people in, at the core of them remains the party structure that is essentially a cult. The SWP especially take in young generally middle class idealists, burn them out and then discard them. They’re also rife with weird internal power dynamics and older fellas trying to hop off the young ones.

Their only goal is to build their own organisation at whatever cost. I had a few of them involved in a strike I organised in 2017 and they were a nightmare. After 24 days out we came to an agreement, the workers had nothing left in the tank. Enter the Socialist Party then demanding we continue a failing industrial action so they could flog a few papers and leech off it for a few more weeks. They didn’t give a f*ck about the damage they’d cause and derided me and others as utter sellouts with them the only potential saviours.

Any campaign or issue their only goal is to parasite off it or control it and if they’re rebuffed or outmanoeuvred they’ll attempt to split it or destroy it. Absolutely dire organisations.

They have infiltrated a number of the large public sector unions. Won't be long before some sector is taken out on strike on some pretext that ends up in a long struggle about nothing.

PommieBast

blanch152 wrote: »

They have infiltrated a number of the large public sector unions. Won't be long before some sector is taken out on strike on some pretext that ends up in a long struggle about nothing.

The posters of Che Guevara in the windows of the Unite office on Abbey Street sum it up for me.

James Brown

Deleted User wrote: »

To me the Left were originally the supporters of the workers and workers rights. They now seem to look after the work shy, while fighting amongst themselves.

In what way? I hear this a lot but the only back up is reference to some people sponging off the system.
Can you give an example or two?

suicide_circus

What are the ideologically differences between PBP and Rise?

FTA69

suicide_circus wrote: »

What are the ideologically differences between PBP and Rise?

There’s far more similarities than differences but it’s largely as a result of the divisions between the two in Britain. The Socialist Party traditionally practiced entryism, they were a large tendency in the Labour Party called ‘Militant’ before they were thrown out by Kinnock and subsequently by the Irish Labour Party at home. As such over here the SP tends to have more of a working class character having scooped loads of young socialist and union types in the 80s. They’re more influential in the unions as well. The SWP on the other hand were anti the Labour Party from the outset.

Ironically Ireland was a massive ideological schism between the two with the SP being viciously anti-Republican while the SWP professed support for what they viewed as an anti-colonial liberation struggle.

Needless to say 99.99% of people couldn’t give a sh*te about any of the above.

alias no.9

L1011 wrote: »

No, she didn't. She shouted about it but absolutely no moves were made towards it

And had it been done, there would have been an outdated factory with no orders - Dell sure as hell wouldn't have continued ordering kit from an expensive plant

Ireland is vastly too dear an economy to do really basic assembly jobs in. That's the important thing to note - its not manufacturing, its assembly, of foreign made parts. Much cheaper to assemble them where those parts are made.

Ten years prior to closure most of the parts were being made here too - Foxconn in Mullingar making cases, 3Com in Blanchardstown making network cards and modems, Intel making motherboards in Ireland (moved to somewhere cheaper to use the capacity for far higher complexity items), Seagate making the hard diskes, etc etc etc. By the time Dell closed none of them were. In every case either it was extremely simplistic work (cases); made obsolete by technology changes (a PC doesn't have a seperate network card anymore, its onboard) or the Irish plant moved to more complicated products.

WiFi was the trigger for the end of Dell assembling PCs in Ireland. Their USP was user specified desktops built to order. The drift towards laptops and tablets meant no more building to user specification. It might surprise you to know that Apple still make iMacs in Cork, but only the ones built to a user specification.

suicide_circus

FTA69 wrote: »

There’s far more similarities than differences but it’s largely as a result of the divisions between the two in Britain. The Socialist Party traditionally practiced entryism, they were a large tendency in the Labour Party called ‘Militant’ before they were thrown out by Kinnock and subsequently by the Irish Labour Party at home. As such over here the SP tends to have more of a working class character having scooped loads of young socialist and union types in the 80s. They’re more influential in the unions as well. The SWP on the other hand were anti the Labour Party from the outset.

Ironically Ireland was a massive ideological schism between the two with the SP being viciously anti-Republican while the SWP professed support for what they viewed as an anti-colonial liberation struggle.

Needless to say 99.99% of people couldn’t give a sh*te about any of the above.

That's interesting. Does entryism account for the 'momentum' group in the UK Lab party and the influx of intersecrionality and identity politics practitioners?

Is Richard Boyd Barrett more a uniony type worker's socialist and Paul Murphy more into ideologically purity and grand internationlist communism?

L1011

alias no.9 wrote: »

It might surprise you to know that Apple still make iMacs in Cork, but only the ones built to a user specification.

Me, no - as Apple were a customer of mine in the distant past and I've actually been in the plant and gawped at the assembly line. That's all they built there back then too; but some of my mid 90s normal and even low end Macs were built there.

Niche and high value tech manufacturing is still viable here. Box shifting isn't.

L1011

FTA69 wrote: »

There’s far more similarities than differences but it’s largely as a result of the divisions between the two in Britain. The Socialist Party traditionally practiced entryism, they were a large tendency in the Labour Party called ‘Militant’ before they were thrown out by Kinnock and subsequently by the Irish Labour Party at home. As such over here the SP tends to have more of a working class character having scooped loads of young socialist and union types in the 80s. They’re more influential in the unions as well. The SWP on the other hand were anti the Labour Party from the outset.

Ironically Ireland was a massive ideological schism between the two with the SP being viciously anti-Republican while the SWP professed support for what they viewed as an anti-colonial liberation struggle.

Needless to say 99.99% of people couldn’t give a sh*te about any of the above.

To add to this, the split between SP/Solidarity and RISE was about whether they'd go in to Government with SF, basically. SP won't, RISE will.

mariaalice

I knew someone who had their own socialist-communist party, well they had about 5 members as far as I can figure out those sorts of organisations tends to attract intelligent oddballs or someone looking for answers.

What it comes down to is a sort of secular religion that says follow us paradise is just around the corner.

FTA69

suicide_circus wrote: »

That's interesting. Does entryism account for the 'momentum' group in the UK Lab party and the influx of intersecrionality and identity politics practitioners?

Is Richard Boyd Barrett more a uniony type worker's socialist and Paul Murphy more into ideologically purity and grand internationlist communism?

No not really to be honest. Entryism is when one organised group tries to latch onto another larger vehicle. Momentum had very few Trotskyists in it, a handful were in a couple of tiny sects but none to have a significant effect. Labour went from something like 150k members to 550k at one stage. Most people joining it were genuine people, many of them young and they saw an idealistic vision for significant change that was and is needed. However many of them also did have the identity politics outlook and a few people who got heavily involved with it were absolute screechers in that regard. In the main though, people joined Labour and Momentum because they saw a chance to change things for once. I left Momentum though because it became whacky races on a number of fronts.

As for the SWP, Boyd Barrett is the quintessential middle class intellectual who was attracted to the SWP. The SP over here as I said would have a lot more blue collar types in it but also their fair share of middle class types too. I’m talking in very broad strokes here obviously. Murphy and Barrett as I said would have far far more similarities than differences.

As someone else said, I think Murphy is somewhat genuine in wanting to take part in a broad left government - the other lot just want to build their own cults. These groups exist to perpetuate themselves.

JohnnyFlash

I do find the constant splits, renaming, and contortions of the far-left parties to be highly amusing if nothing else. Where do the Communist Party of Ireland/Connolly Youth Movement fit into all of this? I presume they hate the Trots, but do they have any splits themselves, or are they more Stalinist in crushing internal dissent? You wouldn’t hear much from them in general.

I always presume the adult version was filled with bearded oddballs who smell vaguely of mushrooms and live in a bedsit. While the youth wing is filled with junior versions of the above who listened to too much Rage Against the Machine and watched to the Soviet Union anthem too many times on YouTube.

FTA69

JohnnyFlash wrote: »

I do find the constant splits, renaming, and contortions of the far-left parties to be highly amusing if nothing else. Where do the Communist Party of Ireland/Connolly Youth Movement fit into all of this? I presume they hate the Trots, but do they have any splits themselves, or are they more Stalinist in crushing internal dissent? You wouldn’t hear much from them in general.

I always presume the adult version was filled with bearded oddballs who smell vaguely of mushrooms and live in a bedsit. While the youth wing is filled with junior versions of the above who listened to too much Rage Against the Machine and watched to the Soviet Union anthem too many times on YouTube.

I’ve good time for a few of them actually, the ones I met are doing good work in unions and trying to organise young people over crap conditions in hospitality etc as well as beginning to organise renters.In general the Communist types would have a more level headed approach and they don’t go into organisations or campaigns with a view to controlling them, they wouldn’t be as politically sectarian so to speak.

Richard Hillman

Gino Kenny got the Dieing With Dignity Bill through. Agree with it or not, he managed to get something that the Dáil agreed on in the majority. He also nearly got one through in regard to Cannabis. He's been in there 4 years and and shown he can work with people and propose things that have a chance.

Richard Boyd Barrett has been there for 9 years and hasn't even got close to achieving anything. He has absolutely no ability to compromise or work with people. The only way he would ever go into government is if they had a majority and he had no other option.

I'm on the opposite side to somebody like Gino Kenny but he is a good politician. He can work with people and work on things that are achievable. The rest of them are charlatans. Afraid of responsibility. Totally unwilling to work with people. Professional Opponents.

blanch152

Richard Hillman wrote: »

Gino Kenny got the Dieing With Dignity Bill through. Agree with it or not, he managed to get something that the Dáil agreed on in the majority. He also nearly got one through in regard to Cannabis. He's been in there 4 years and and shown he can work with people and propose things that have a chance.

Richard Boyd Barrett has been there for 9 years and hasn't even got close to achieving anything. He has absolutely no ability to compromise or work with people. The only way he would ever go into government is if they had a majority and he had no other option.

I'm on the opposite side to somebody like Gino Kenny but he is a good politician. He can work with people and work on things that are achievable. The rest of them are charlatans. Afraid of responsibility. Totally unwilling to work with people. Professional Opponents.

The Dying with Dignity Bill hasn't gone through. It only got sent to committee stage. Will languish there indefinitely.

suicide_circus

FTA69 wrote: »

Boyd Barrett is the quintessential middle class intellectual

Paul Murphy's origins are also rigidly middle class, i saw it with my own eyes

JohnnyFlash

suicide_circus wrote: »

Paul Murphy's origins are also rigidly middle class, i saw it with my own eyes

Murphy? He makes Eoin Ó Broin and Eoghan Murphy seem like paupers in comparison. He spent years working on a PhD about socialist law before being parachuted into a seat in Europe. Dude knows as much about working class struggles as I do about string theory.

FTA69

I like that Gino Kenny actually, no time for the Trots in general but him and Joe Higgins were decent skins I think. Higgins has lovely Irish too, was watching him on TG4 there before.

mariaalice

JohnnyFlash wrote: »

Murphy? He makes Eoin Ó Broin and Eoghan Murphy seem like paupers in comparison. He spent years working on a PhD about socialist law before being parachuted into a seat in Europe. Dude knows as much about working class struggles as I do about string theory.

Lots of lazy stereotyping there.

Mad_maxx

mohawk wrote: »

I 100% completely agree. I would also add that globally the left seems far more interested in identify politics then making any real changes that really benefit society.

That's because the economic war of ideas died in 1989

They focused on the culture wars since and are on the winning side there so far