Green party Galway meeting

PRAF wrote: »

FF have been in government for 19 of the 27 times we've had general elections. They consistently polled over 40% during their existence. They bought most of those votes with their particular style of parish pump politics. They were particularly good at playing the role of the local 'fixer' and 'stroke merchant' who you could go to in order to get around the 'system'. This kind of politics is utterly corrupt and devoid of integrity.

I just cannot understand how you can blame the Greens for the atrocities that FF have inflicted on the nation. FF have continued to put the holding of power ahead of any other motive (remember Bertie - 'our ethics are to win power and to stay in bloody power').

The Greens, god bless their little eco friendly socks, are guilty of joining up with FF in order to get some of their policy agenda implemented. I agree that it was a mistake but c'mon, lets keep some perspective here.

The Greens are not the bogeymen you are looking for to take the blame for everything that FF did. How about you focus your anger on FF? What about your friends and relatives who voted for FF?

Could we pretend for a moment we live in the grown up world ?

You are trying to project a world where it was all FF bad and all green good. Wrong, wrong, wrong !
FF have in thier time done good and some very good , e.g martin's smoking ban was a remarkable pice of work, both courageous and something that was and continues to be admired and repeated. I have personally listened to foreigners praising it both whilst i was here in Ireland and abroad. Doesnt mean I voted for martin but it does mean i am going to object to this puerile nonsense that all the bad was FF and all the good was green.
The Greens enabled FF. Worse they hypocritically dropped thier moral objections to FF as soon as they got into power. Ahern;s reign of destruction was only possible because of the green's hypocrisy : We are nobody's conscience " - sound familiar ?. They gave Ahern the moral authority and permission to remain on as taoiseach after th debacle of his mahon testimony. They could have forced him out and allowed FF to elect a new leader and we possibly could have seen a real leadership election. Instead they betrayed every principle they had.
The PDs were true to themselves for a long period, the Greens capitulated immediately. They deserve to be forgotten.

Arfan wrote: »

You had a good argument going there and then your needle got stuck on the same point it did last time. I'm starting to think it's not just the record is broken.[/QU

Anyone who is worried about ' Martian Rights' has probably quite enough on his plate, so dont worry about me !
Quote " I am Arfan and I support Martian rights. "

PRAF wrote: »

Out of curiosity, is it just the Irish Green party and their record in govt that you have a problem with or is it with the whole 'green' movement in general?
To my mind, the Irish Greens were / are a very imperfect bunch. However, they were / are the only political party advancing the 'green' agenda to my mind. IMO they were unlucky and in some ways unfairly scapegoated for all of the wrongs that occurred on FF's reign of terror.

Tell me , why were so many environmentalists pushed out of the Green Party ? You know the ones the ' professional Greens used to make funny jokes about, the ' sandal wearers'.
At one point it seemed the Greens split into the 'Sandal wearers and the ' Armani wearers''.

bijapos wrote: »

There are certain cabinet/state papers that must be carried in the presence of AGS, they cannot be carried by a private person in a private car. Thats the regulation whether we like it or not.

When he was minister I saw Ryan cycling to work on a number of occasions with no Ministerial car following him, I've also seen him in the car a few times and my gf saw him on the Luas often enough too when he was a Minister. Its a ridiculous discussion to be honest.

You may feel this is a ridiculous discussion, but it is about part of the narrative that has brought us to being bankrupt as a country. When the Greens talk about ' sustainability, it is hypocrisy - they were part of the Government that made us as a country unsustainable. Nothing we say here could be as ridiculous as absurd or as self -seeking as the action of the greens and their equal partners FF.

Greens = FF= Greens = FF=Greens = FF = Greens = FF = Greens......

bijapos wrote: »

I don't see how the discussion as to how the Greens travelled to work, be it by bike or by car has had any major relevance to the economic problems of the country. What the Greens did in Dail Eireann is one thing, how they got themselves and their papers there is not worth talking about imo but fire away all you want.

The small things often give us a clue as to how the big things occur. For example, to understand how former Green Chris O Leary came very close to being elected as a TD for the Sinn fein Party, at the last election, whilst his colleague and Party chairman, Dan Boyle was humilitated at the election, it helps to know that chris O Leary put up one or two posters protesting at education cuts in the window of the Green party office in Douglas St Cork. these were removed by Boyle and shortly after O Leary was no longer using the office - the Greens office in Cork was apparently ' Dan Boyle's Constituency Office and not the Green Party office in Cork. It was rather controversial at the time and there were letters to local papers on Boyle's behalf and the matter was covered extensovely on some sites like P.Ie if I remember rightly.

Arfan wrote: »

Touché sir. I shall dispense with metaphor. Do not repeat arguments as if restating them differently somehow defends them from reasonable debate. Do not treat character attacks as arguments. And because three is a good number do not dredge up unrelated quotes without so much as providing a source as backup. I don't see how martians have any bearing on the performance of the Greens' in government. Unless you think otherwise?

Completed unrelated to the topic: I believe it too early to tell the full extent of the fallout of the FF-Green government. At the very least another general election and a few years of the policies they implemented are needed before we can fully state whether it was a case of the blind leading the blind.

I should advise i generally tend to do the very things that strangers tell e not to do - it is a character flaw, but i have found it a particularly good trait when dealing with GP:) supporters !
As regards it being too early to tell - ask the EU, IMF and any other sane body on this planet, particularly those to whom we have to go on bended knees to beg for money.
I had not really noticed that much reasonable debate from you. As for my providing sources, i do expect people posting on Politicis to have a certain minimum knowledge about the topics they are posting on.
What are you not clear on specifically that requires refs ?

Arfan wrote: »

You would not debate if you were uninterested in what other people have to say. I certainly am not dismissing you just because you're a GP supporter. It wouldn't matter to me if you were a turkey who voted for Christmas. The argument precedes the speaker here.

You quoted me without providing a source. A glib reference to a glib post perhaps but others need to know it exists before they can decide it true.

Your flair for the dramatic is heartening but of little relation to the topic. As I said before the green party had little say in most government policy. They were at best a side-show as Fianna Fail frequently proved by sidelining them come announcements. One might even call them yes-men, until of course they said no.

Still in school ?

kopite4 wrote: »

It said it all ff,labour and sinn fein all felt too important or in case got dry couldn't stick around to hear the real people's TD talk about today's Ireland. The greens will again cause people will see sinn fein as b/s and labour as major b/s.

Could i suggest you edit the post as it doesnt make a lot of sense as it stands ?

anymore wrote: »

Still in school ?

I'm afraid you've lost me. Could you explain the witticism and how it relates to the topic at hand?

Arfan wrote: »

I'm afraid you've lost me. Could you explain the witticism and how it relates to the topic at hand?

Yes i could .....no I wont !