Yes vote a vote for "Stabiltiy"

Heads the ball · 27-07-2012 12:40pm

View wrote: »

Yes it was as the claim was permanent austerity not austerity when your economy is out of control. Rejecting the treaty also didn't alter that we need austerity to meet our pre-existing commitments on the deficit under EU law.

Its permanent in that it is perpetual. And while rejecting the treaty wouldnt have altered our preexisting committments, it would mean would would not be endorsing them further, nor would we be endorsing their enforcement

View wrote: »

Again, no legal basis exists for such rulings. If the court starts "inventing" the EU Treaties , the member states will not tolerate it and one or more member states could well leave as a result.

Of course a legal basis could exist.

View wrote: »

To address the more substantial point on the use of referenda.

OK

View wrote: »

Well, then you are stuck with the "tough luck" scenario where the result is fully "fair and democratic" and you have a problem accepting it because you lost.

No its not tough luck. Im pointing out the problems with the system. Its not fair and democratic if we are manipulated in a cynical manner

View wrote: »

An interesting argument but the electorate get a free vote and if they vote for people you don't like, that is their democratic decision. No one ever said you get a veto on democratic decisions, did they?

Certainly not. I think we as the electorate are culpable and need to wake up

View wrote: »

Again, ultimately, an argument against the use of referenda.

Can I be really clear here again - I am in favour of referenda

View wrote: »

You are presuming the electorate are "acting like sheep" when, in fact, the electorate voted in favour of us joining the EU and there is no indication of any serious desire to leave or even wide-spread opposition to the objectives/tasks it is tasked with working towards.

I think there is a serious portion of the electorate who would favour leaving Europe - granted it may not be 50% after the spin merchants and media machine are finished with us.

ArmaniJeanss · 27-07-2012 12:52pm

It's very insulting to call people 'sheep' just because they have the temerity to not vote the way you want.

crusher000 · 27-07-2012 1:15pm

But if people vote for an agenda based on the fear off " Well if the main parties are telling us it's doom for the country if we don't vote their way" opinion not actual quote taken from a voter and people follow suit they can be compared to sheep. As they're are no offical statistics on people that voted out of fear of the alternative we will never know ( just wait someone will now post a link showing statistics on poeple that voted out of fear of the alternative). I am always open to correction and don't take it personely.

View · 27-07-2012 1:33pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

Its permanent in that it is perpetual.

Running a deficit is not mandatory therefore austerity is neither permanent nor perpetual. Hence, to claim either is scaremongering.

Heads the ball wrote: »

And while rejecting the treaty wouldnt have altered our preexisting committments, it would mean would would not be endorsing them further, nor would we be endorsing their enforcement

We have already endorsed them and their enforcement since both were already included in the pre-existing treaties. The courts are free to enforce if they so choose.

Heads the ball wrote: »

Of course a legal basis could exist.

You mean like the legal basis for ETs invasion could exist. You ignored the second part of my comment I see.

Heads the ball wrote: »

No its not tough luck. Im pointing out the problems with the system. Its not fair and democratic if we are manipulated in a cynical manner

In the Supreme Court's opinion, yes it is a case of tough luck. If we don't have that nuanced legal debate, we get to live with the our ill informed decisions, all of which argues politically-speaking against the use of referenda.

Heads the ball wrote: »

Certainly not. I think we as the electorate are culpable and need to wake up

That presumes they are asleep...

Heads the ball wrote: »

I think there is a serious portion of the electorate who would favour leaving Europe - granted it may not be 50% after the spin merchants and media machine are finished with us.

I don't dispute there is a small portion of the electorate against the EU. The purpose of holding referenda though isn't to keep re-holding the 1972 referendum on membership though...

marienbad · 27-07-2012 1:33pm

crusher000 wrote: »

But if people vote for an agenda based on the fear off " Well if the main parties are telling us it's doom for the country if we don't vote their way" opinion not actual quote taken from a voter and people follow suit they can be compared to sheep. As they're are no offical statistics on people that voted out of fear of the alternative we will never know ( just wait someone will now post a link showing statistics on poeple that voted out of fear of the alternative). I am always open to correction and don't take it personely.

This is just rubbish , may I ask did you vote out of fear ?

Heads the ball · 27-07-2012 1:47pm

I think your entire post misses the point and is bordering on unconvincing tit for tat stuff.

View wrote: »

Running a deficit is not mandatory therefore austerity is neither permanent nor perpetual. Hence, to claim either is scaremongering.

Lets put it this way, the only time we will not have austerity is during periods when we are in surplus

View wrote: »

We have already endorsed them and their enforcement since both were already included in the pre-existing treaties. The courts are free to enforce if they so choose.

Some of the terms of the treaty were never put to referendum before this referendum so you cant say "we have already ratified them" - the government did so. If we are opposed to the terms we should not vote "yes" on the basis that "ah shur they are already binding on us" because the rules on enforcing these (in my opinion, very very bad) rules have been strengthened

I see you are refusing to read my clarification that I am in favour of referenda so Im not sure In willing to keep going round and round with you on this if you cant accept a fact like that

View · 27-07-2012 3:22pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

Lets put it this way, the only time we will not have austerity is during periods when we are in surplus

Hence the claim of "permanent austerity" was false and deliberate scaremongering, so spare us the "only the yes side cheats" line.

Heads the ball wrote: »

Some of the terms of the treaty were never put to referendum before this referendum so you cant say "we have already ratified them" - the government did so.

I specified the pre-existing treaties all of which were approved in referenda. The point about the government is a bit irrelevant, since what the Oireachtas ratifies, is what "we" ratify as per the constitution.

Heads the ball wrote: »

If we are opposed to the terms we should not vote "yes" on the basis that "ah shur they are already binding on us" because the rules on enforcing these (in my opinion, very very bad) rules have been strengthened

I never suggested we should and the result was in favour. A referendum is a Yes/No question, not a "which of a 101 possible options should we go for?" question. The time for that debate is before we - the state/people (as it acts for us in international negotiations) - opt for one of the possible options.

Heads the ball wrote: »

I see you are refusing to read my clarification that I am in favour of referenda so Im not sure In willing to keep going round and round with you on this if you cant accept a fact like that

I have read the clarification, I just doubt you favour the practice of them unless they return the result you prefer.

As I said, the Supreme Court thinks we should hold nuanced legal debate. In reality, we hold a "Jerry Springer" debate in which if it is "fair" for your side to "cheat", you are just whinging if the other side "out-cheats" you and the whole process is politically meaningless - the political equivalent of "casting dice".

The alternatives to that, as I outlined earlier, are either: a) never to alter the constitution, b) restrict what can be claimed and counter-claimed in the referendum (a highly difficult and dubious issue) or c) dispense with them and move to parliamentary ratification only.

Those are the options. Currently, we live with the "Jerry Springer" option and will do so, I suspect, until such time as it back-fires badly on us.

FreudianSlippers · 27-07-2012 3:39pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

Spain would not be considered the definition of stability right now,

So... wait... you can't compare unstable countries in a test of stability; rather only who is more stable of... stable countries?

Heads the ball · 27-07-2012 3:53pm

FreudianSlippers wrote: »

So... wait... you can't compare unstable countries in a test of stability; rather only who is more stable of... stable countries?

My point is if you are arguing "Ireland is stable" or something close to that you cannot point to a country that is unstable and say "we are better than they are." Well you can say it if you like but it cant really support the assertion that we are "stable"

Or put another way. Lets consider stability in linear form. 0 to 100.

0 is completely unstable and 100 is perfectly stable. Lets say 50 is the point at which you can be considered stable.

Lets say Spain is plotted as a 35.

Beating Spain does not mean we are stable.

Probably an over-elaborate example. As a more general point there is a tendancy during debates on this forum for people to say "at least we arent as bad as Spain or Greece" but thats not meaningful in my opinion. I dont consider myself blessed that we havent descended into Greece's situation - I dont settle for that - nor do I point to that as economic success, or evidence of excellent economic policies or evidence of FG being awesome, or as justification for pursuing grossly inequitable right wing policies

Like i said earlier, we arent as bad as Somalia - but what does that prove?

Sorry for the rant.

PS does that picture look like Jackie Chan?

FreudianSlippers · 27-07-2012 4:13pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

My point is if you are arguing "Ireland is stable" or something close to that you cannot point to a country that is unstable and say "we are better than they are." Well you can say it if you like but it cant really support the assertion that we are "stable"

Or put another way. Lets consider stability in linear form. 0 to 100.

0 is completely unstable and 100 is perfectly stable. Lets say 50 is the point at which you can be considered stable.

Lets say Spain is plotted as a 35.

Beating Spain does not mean we are stable.

Probably an over-elaborate example. As a more general point there is a tendancy during debates on this forum for people to say "at least we arent as bad as Spain or Greece" but thats not meaningful in my opinion. I dont consider myself blessed that we havent descended into Greece's situation - I dont settle for that - nor do I point to that as economic success, or evidence of excellent economic policies or evidence of FG being awesome, or as justification for pursuing grossly inequitable right wing policies

Like i said earlier, we arent as bad as Somalia - but what does that prove?

Sorry for the rant.

PS does that picture look like Jackie Chan?

I think the point you're missing is a net one. There are no "stable" countries; one would argue the most stable is the USA who are currently $15.9trillion in debt (that's over $50,000 per citizen and over $139,000 per taxpayer).
We must therefore compare ourselves to other "unstabe" countries - what are they doing wrong and/or what can we do to not get in that position.

Furthermore, comparing ourselves to Spain and Greece (et al) is necessary because of our shared currency and issues.

Heads the ball · 27-07-2012 4:34pm

FreudianSlippers wrote: »

I think the point you're missing is a net one. There are no "stable" countries; one would argue the most stable is the USA who are currently $15.9trillion in debt (that's over $50,000 per citizen and over $139,000 per taxpayer).
We must therefore compare ourselves to other "unstabe" countries - what are they doing wrong and/or what can we do to not get in that position.

Furthermore, comparing ourselves to Spain and Greece (et al) is necessary because of our shared currency and issues.

I certainly take your point re we may need to compare ourselves to other program countries to say X is working there and can X work here etc etc... but i dont think blanket "we are not as bad as Spain" works for me. Lets put it this way, if it was election time and a FGer/Labour-er pulled that line I would run him.

I mean what does it prove? Nothing in my opinion. Or at least the person selling this point didnt say:

"We followed policy X and but country Y did not and as a result country Y ended up worse in respect of Z." Like something like that I could buy, but a blanket response (and i have received it on other threads too) is a bit of a cop out.

Its meaningless to use that line in an argument as I could point to Germany and say "we are not as good as they are!" but what would that prove - nothing.

I mean one of your fellow mods is pleading with me on another thread to give him a number to back up my point. And in general thats a fair question so perhaps showing how exactly not being as bad as Spain supports the stability assertion would help...

BOHtox · 05-08-2012 1:30pm

Max Power1 wrote: »

I see you those.... and raise you.

Ill just leave this here:

Yes to Jobs - Yes to Lisbon.

But yet, where are these jobs?

Have you ever heard an MNC not saying they're here because we're in Europe. The promise wasn't net jobs but there's ~100,000 people employed by these MNCs. Maybe you don't want them...

poeticseraphim · 14-08-2012 2:29pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

And I think the media have a huge degree of culpability - I cant think of more than three/four journalists/TV presenters who I think are thorough.

I cannot think of any.

Laminations · 14-08-2012 2:38pm

If you're falling over and someone suggests you put out your hands, do you conclude they were wrong because the fall still hurts?? You don't know how sore landing on your face could've been. And that's the problem, we are trying to stave off a situation and therefore we don't have the experience of that predicted worse situation to compare to how we are now.

You can't ask are we stable. The question is are we more stable now than we would have been if we didn't vote yes. Difficult to gauge as we don't have both situations to compare.

Heads the ball · 14-08-2012 3:07pm

So it was pretty reckless for the "yes" side to claim a yes vote would bring about stability.

Laminations · 14-08-2012 3:19pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

So it was pretty reckless for the "yes" side to claim a yes vote would bring about stability.

Nowhere did they claim that the crisis would end with the passing of the treaty. It was always just a part of the solution. Necessary but not sufficient.

Scofflaw · 14-08-2012 3:26pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

So it was pretty reckless for the "yes" side to claim a yes vote would bring about stability.

Meh, it's pretty standard for politicians to claim that a vote for some proposal will bring us towards some nebulous better state, and equally standard practice for those who oppose the vote to claim that since we're not all the way to whatever that promised better state was the vote was actually worse than useless, and likewise for them to claim that those who voted for the proposal obviously voted because of the claims of their opponents.

Both are political bolloxology and a complete waste of everyone's time. Unfortunately, there's nothing I can do about politicians doing it.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Heads the ball · 14-08-2012 4:14pm

Scofflaw wrote: »

Meh, it's pretty standard for politicians to claim that a vote for some proposal will bring us towards some nebulous better state, and equally standard practice for those who oppose the vote to claim that since we're not all the way to whatever that promised better state was the vote was actually worse than useless, and likewise for them to claim that those who voted for the proposal obviously voted because of the claims of their opponents.

Both are political bolloxology and a complete waste of everyone's time. Unfortunately, there's nothing I can do about politicians doing it.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Yes but its lies - not just harmless gob****tery, but lies

We were never going to get stability just for voting yes.

Laminations · 14-08-2012 4:35pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

Yes but its lies - not just harmless gob****tery, but lies

We were never going to get stability just for voting yes.

Take your own metric, stability on a scale of 0 to 100. Once we've moved towards 100 and not towards 0 as a result of the vote then that is towards stability (even if we are at 35).the problem is that the vote alone doesn't determine our movement on the scale and even with the yes vote movement towards stability can be slowed by other factors, but you'd need to explain how voting yes would make us more unstable. And you'd need to do so with some fortune tellers ability to gauge that instability with the one we supposedly prevented.

Dave! · 14-08-2012 4:39pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

Yes but its lies - not just harmless gob****tery, but lies

We were never going to get stability just for voting yes.

I'd be pretty confident in saying that nobody, not even down the pub, locked out of their head, has ever said that, ever. Those words have never been put together in that sequence before, under any circumstances.

Heads the ball · 14-08-2012 4:51pm

Dave! wrote: »

I'd be pretty confident in saying that nobody, not even down the pub, locked out of their head, has ever said that, ever. Those words have never been put together in that sequence before, under any circumstances.

Ahem. Then you'd be wrong.

http://www.lucindacreighton.ie/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Stability-Treaty-Campaign-Launch.jpg

Laminations · 14-08-2012 5:16pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

Ahem. Then you'd be wrong.

http://www.lucindacreighton.ie/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Stability-Treaty-Campaign-Launch.jpg

I suppose you take umbrage with the slogan 'seatbelts save lives' because most fatalities the passengers in the cars have seatbelts on. You have little appreciation of the language used in campaigning for preventative measures.

That poster behind LC is no more saying a yes will definitely guarantee stability than a road safety campaign is purporting that a seatbelt will definitely save your life. It's just safer than no seatbelt, and a yes was safer than a no vote in terms of stability.

Heads the ball · 14-08-2012 6:08pm

Laminations wrote: »

Heads the ball wrote: »

Ahem. Then you'd be wrong.

http://www.lucindacreighton.ie/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Stability-Treaty-Campaign-Launch.jpg

I suppose you take umbrage with the slogan 'seatbelts save lives' because most fatalities the passengers in the cars have seatbelts on. You have little appreciation of the language used in campaigning for preventative measures.

That poster behind LC is no more saying a yes will definitely guarantee stability than a road safety campaign is purporting that a seatbelt will definitely save your life. It's just safer than no seatbelt, and a yes was safer than a no vote in terms of stability.

No i dont have issue with seatbelt slogans. As i understand there is evidence that wearing seatbelts has saved lives in the past.

The statement is pretty clear and is unqualified that we should vote yes for stability.

Respectfully, I think it is you who has the under appreciation of language here - I am taking the words at their plain meaning. Seems that it was a lie to me.

Heads the ball · 14-08-2012 6:11pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

Laminations wrote: »

Heads the ball wrote: »

Ahem. Then you'd be wrong.

http://www.lucindacreighton.ie/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Stability-Treaty-Campaign-Launch.jpg

I suppose you take umbrage with the slogan 'seatbelts save lives' because most fatalities the passengers in the cars have seatbelts on. You have little appreciation of the language used in campaigning for preventative measures.

That poster behind LC is no more saying a yes will definitely guarantee stability than a road safety campaign is purporting that a seatbelt will definitely save your life. It's just safer than no seatbelt, and a yes was safer than a no vote in terms of stability.

No i dont have issue with seatbelt slogans. As i understand there is evidence that wearing seatbelts has saved lives in the past.

The statement is pretty clear and is unqualified that we should vote yes for stability.

So wheres my stability?

southsiderosie · 14-08-2012 9:15pm

Heads the ball wrote: »

So wheres my stability?

MOD NOTE:

That's enough. You have not contributed much to this thread beyond a bunch of wild assertions and smart-arse comments that have only served to irritate other posters rather than stimulate discussion. It is not fair to punish everyone else for your acting the bollix, so I'm going to leave the thread open, but don't post in this thread again.

I'll also add that before posting anywhere else in this forum think long and hard about whether your comments drive things forwards, or drive things in circles, because there has been far too much of the latter from you and it needs to stop.

FreudianSlippers · 15-08-2012 7:25am

Heads the ball wrote: »

Yes but its lies - not just harmless gob****tery, but lies

We were never going to get stability just for voting yes.

No it isn't. Perhaps "Yes for stability" is too simple; what they really meant was "No for more instability and uncertainty"

Yes vote a vote for "Stabiltiy"

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