[Permabear]

Originally Posted by dlofnep

You lack faith in the strength Ireland has at the bargaining table, and yet - all public commentators disagree with you.

You quoted selective opinion from people like McWilliams and Krugman. You then used that selective opinion as as a proxy for what all economists and all public commentators allegedly believe. And then you went even further to insinuate that every expert on the planet would be in favour of Sinn Féin's proposals.

Please find me one credible economist who has stated that Sinn Féin's plan is the way forward for Ireland. Not an economist who talks in general terms about the dangers of austerity measures, or about the unfeasibility of the IMF/EU bailout plan—but one credible economist who has stated publicly that he or she endorses what Sinn Féin has proposed.

[MickyMally]

I don't mind Kenny being on the front of the papers, the media is, was, and always will be run by groups of wealthy people who have agendas, just accept the fact.
My main concern is our debt, everything else will fall into place if we know how much we all have to pay, and how we will pay it. So our ability to repay is based on growth, and conjecture using figures from the Dept. of Finance, who failed to forecast surpluses when things were booming, and then failed to forecast deficits when we began to slide towards our "soft landing".
So anyone with one bit of grey matter must take into account that these so called experts are more off the mark than on it, which leaves me with the opinion of the unconnected experts who all say we will not be able to pay, and that is taking into account another 2/3 austerity budgets.
Read my lips We Cannot Repay, so let us think of ways of sorting this out, and forget about Stag Hunting, tagging sex offenders, and the "Morning after Pill" which can be dealt with when the economy is sorted out.

[Blowfish]

Originally Posted by dlofnep

You lack faith in the strength Ireland has at the bargaining table, and yet - all public commentators disagree with you.

They also disagree completely with Sinn Fein. What McWilliams etc. are talking about is defaulting solely on bank debt and not on sovereign debt. Because of the deficit, getting rid of the IMF/EU deal will pretty much guarantee sovereign default.

[Jackovarian]

http://www.breakingnews.ie/election/...ad-493808.html

They ran a story last night saying the same thing, but now they're sure apparently.

The reason I started this thread, and I actually forgot once I started ranting a bit, was to draw up the coincidence between this and the lisbon 2 campaign.

Almost all media publications were pro lisbon. I wasn't looking for an Anti Lisbon stance, but rather a neutral objective opinion.

Its the same sickening scenario again. I dont care if the media are just jumping on the "who's popular" bandwagon.
Would an objective, impartial opinion be too much to ask for?

[finnvalley]

It seems highly likely that there is indeed a media bias towards Fine Gael, otherwise surely some of them would've copped on that Fine Gael's recent leadership debacle, or to quote Michael Noonan, was 'a stroke' to make Enda Kenny look like a strong leader. Bad enough as Fianna Fail are, at least when Michéal Martin opposed Brian Cowen, it was immediately apparent that his leadership bid was genuine. Fine Gael on the other hand are a party who one day had no confidence in their leader, the next, he was the greatest thing since sliced bread, and the people who so vehemently opposed his leadership quickly fell into rank.

Maybe despite his lack of personality and communication skills, the man does deserve to be Taoiseach...he certainly fooled the nation on that one!

[nesf]

Originally Posted by dlofnep

The Mirror is certainly behind Fine Gael. Their articles are riddled with bias. So much for the media playing an nonpartisan role in politics.

Only RTE are required to be unbiased. The newspapers can be as biased as they like, and in fact it's difficult to find a newspaper in this country without some bias towards a particular political stance (if not a party per se). The better newspapers are the ones that are open about what their bias is, e.g. the Economist which makes no bones about being decidedly centrist with a heavy favouring towards free trade. You might not agree with how the Economist analyses things but you can't be under any illusions that it espouses a completely neutral viewpoint if you pay attention.