Bertie's big day in Congress

darkman2

...so anyway I read somewhere there is bit of a rumour doing the rounds that some members of congress, possibly even the speaker, are not entirely happy with Bertie's visit now. Doubt there is much truth in it but basically the way US media agencies greeted his resignation with terms like 'corrupt' and 'scandal' was probrably a bit harsh considering no one knows all the facts.


Anyway Wednesday is his big day and maybe its best to concentrate on his speech and the fact that it is an honour for the Irish people to have our Taoiseach speak to a joint session of Congress and leave the other stuff out of this thread.

Did you know that Fine Gael have had the most Taoiseachs address congress which I find bizarre considering they have only been in government for all of 12 years! - Maybe they just got lucky Anyway im sure congress will be stupdified when they hear Bertie speak! - 'eh,eh,eh'.........I wonder what Bertie is actually going to say in his speech? He has to keep the waffle going for half an hour;)

Anyone have any idea what he might speak about besides the North!? Its on at 4pm on Wednesday on RTE 1.:)

CerebralCortex

Have to say he had a good speech in Westminster. I'm expecting him to talk out his arse about how the Irish feel about the US and vice versa on our behalf and he'll do it well.

Hitchhiker's Guide to...

going to be fairly hard for him to top the Westminster one.

edanto

Hopefully he'll pay tribute to the FDI of all the US multinationals, as well as do something to encourage them to stay despite the spectre of tax harmonisation.

It is a good moment for him, he has steered the country through prosperous times and there is a lot to celebrate. This is a great place to live and he has been the leader for a decade.

Unwittingly, he's done great things for political dialogue by telling half truths about his personal finances and forced people like myself to become far more familiar with boring long winded texts and reports than I would prefer, out of curiousity to get to the bottom of it.

I would hope he only touches on the scandal briefly, if at all - in Congress he's representing Ireland and not himself. We have such a shared heritage with the diaspora and business links that it should be an uplifting speech.

If he was ballsy, he might make a reference to Mess-opotamia, but he's not so he'll probably toe the line. If he wanted to stick his head over the parapet, it could be done in a friendly and oblique way by saying something like "America has done the hard yards in Iraq, removed an evil and violent man from power and is now in a position to rebuild the fabric and infrastrucure of civil society. We will support them on the world stage to do that (pause) multilaterally"

turgon

Maybe he will thank the US for not invading Ireland and try to discern when they plan to take over the whole world. May as well know cause it dosent seem that unlikely.

What an OTT comment by myself.

Liam Byrne

turgon wrote: »

Maybe he will thank the US for not invading Ireland and try to discern when they plan to take over the whole world. May as well know cause it dosent seem that unlikely.

What an OTT comment by myself.

Not THAT OTT, really.....they've been known to invade countries using the excuse that those countries had a minority population of terrorists.....of course, we don't have oil, but I'd bet that they're keeping an eye on how much Shell are piping inland up in Mayo!!! We'd better not start selling it in euro, anyway, just to be safe!!!

If Bertie managed to come out and quiz Bush on some of the hows and whys, of their lies and crap foreign policies, or ask why they're abusing our airport, then I might manage to regain some respect for him before he skulks off into the shadows like his predecessor Haughey.....hardly likely, though.....that'd involve Bertie having an opinion and conviction, which goes against his "I agree with everyone" sham persona.

Still, those two will probably understand each other alright, even aside from mangling the English language; given that both give off the supposed "man of the people" persona while acting the complete maggot and driving their countries economies and reputations into the ****e, they're two of a kind.....

Whatever he does or doesn't say doesn't affect me; it was said above that he's representing Ireland and not himself......I'll have to disagree, because he's unlikely to represent me while he's licking Bush's arse......

guinnessdrinker

I hope he makes a good speech but I wonder what difference it will make anyway, whether it's good or bad.

And I also wonder how much of the speech will he write himself?

_feedback_

guinnessdrinker wrote: »

And I also wonder how much of the speech will he write himself?

You'd have to think that he'd make the effort to write it himself and have people look over it ... It is his last big moment in the spotlight, for the moment at least. Looking forward to hearing what he talks about.. hopefully he'll do a good speech. As someone else said, it'll be hard to top Westminster, but reckon he'll give it his best shot!

He didn't have the best nights sleep though, according to RTE:

http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0430/ahernb.html

Maskhadov

:d:d:d

juuge

guinnessdrinker wrote: »

And I also wonder how much of the speech will he write himself?

I doubt very much if bertie has ever written a speeh in his life. The guy can barely put two words together...... We should all be very proud.;)

Vorsprung

juuge wrote: »

I doubt very much if bertie has ever written a speeh in his life. The guy can barely put two words together...... We should all be very proud.;)

eh in fairness, it's all about de delivery

Liam Byrne

bigjimthefirst wrote: »

eh in fairness, it's all about de delivery

True....so if the speechwriter delivers it in a brown envelope, he should have no problems....hope he knows what today's exchange rates is, though!!!!

Ah no, let's be fair - our Bertie is bound to give another Sterling performance.....you can bank on it!!!

The_Minister

What time/ radio channel will it be on?

humberklog

3.45 is when radio and tv are going over to it. AHRTE

partholon

s' on now.

not a bad speach so far. getting pleanty of applause. covered 9/11 and the peace process up to now.

Rockee

Lots of ovations too. Im proud.

The_Minister

Good speech, bit rushed though.

thebigshot

Bertie over paying tribute to his masters. What a puppet.

humberklog

Not bad but delivery of speeches work much better when the orator works 'off book'. I don't mean ad-lib just practice lines. Can't think of one irish polititian that when making speech or longish announcement that works off book. Pity, it lessens impact when the viewer has zero eye contact with orator.

kerry4sam

well i for one have to admit to being proud of An Taoiseach today In all honesty he done well ... little to no speech inpediments which i was expecting.

Seriously, when he spoke of being the first Irish Leader to inform the United States of Ireland being at Peace i was and the standing ovation he received for that alone was amazing...credit all round to the speech-writters and of course to him, for his delivery ...

Job well-done

kerry4sam

He addressed all the major issues that has affected Ireland in the past and even affecting Ireland today ... Was happy that he started his speech with speaking about the un-documented Irish ... and the standing ovation that received is promising

Mr Minraise

I also though he delivered it very well and covered all the major issues he should have. The only thing he did badly was he kept messing with the cuffs of his shirt which i found very distracting.

Also lol at Nancy Pelosi's introduction. Im 99% sure she said Bertie A. Hern instead of Bertie Ahern. Pretty bad IMO not even knowing his proper name.

kerry4sam

have to agree ... too much figiting with his cuffs but he was obviously nervous ... I've seen him speak at various Ard Fheiseanna and today i can count the number of times he looked at the audience in front of him (during the speech at times of applause), with one hand ... I felt a more frequent look up and at least address the standing audience would have gone down well

Guy:Incognito

kerry4sam wrote: »

and not pronouncing his name right :eek: hello, it's not that hard to pronouce :rolleyes:

Was just going to say that. You'd imagine she would have at least run it by someone to make sure it was right. Bertie A-hern indeed,

kerry4sam

and not pronouncing his name right :eek: hello, it's not that hard to pronouce :rolleyes: but thats a minor incident on a day that was

The_Minister

^^Timemachine!!!

turgon

humberklog wrote: »

Not bad but delivery of speeches work much better when the orator works 'off book'. I don't mean ad-lib just practice lines. Can't think of one irish polititian that when making speech or longish announcement that works off book. Pity, it lessens impact when the viewer has zero eye contact with orator.

On the ball!!! Felt the exact same thing when watching, as if he was trying to avoid the crowd. Made it feel like he weren't connecting with the Americans.

On criticism I have of the speech is the way congress speaker (nancy something) jumped off her seat once 9/11 was mentioned. And then he got an ovation. I think Americans are to caught up in their patriotisms and cant get over 9/11.

kerry4sam

The_Minister wrote: »

^^Timemachine!!!

:rolleyes:

juvenal

Very well done; whatever about the recent controversy, he did us proud.

I've just watched it here:

http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0430/ahernb.html

kerry4sam

I wonder now with the response he received to "the Irish built America, now i hope you look afer the un-documented Irish" will anything actually be done or were the members of the houses just caught up in the moment

Riddle101

When i heard his speech i was like, you know Bertie's an alright guy, he has done a lot for the country even though i've never really agrred ti the oul kiss ass, but still a heart warming speech none the less

berliner

Ahern talked too fast during the speech.I doubt half of the unfortunate listeners had a clue what the guy was talking about.

Zaphod

humberklog wrote: »

I don't mean ad-lib just practice lines. Can't think of one irish polititian that when making speech or longish announcement that works off book.

Harney. Rabitte. Higgins (X2).

EamonnKeane

Mr Minraise wrote: »

I also though he delivered it very well and covered all the major issues he should have. The only thing he did badly was he kept messing with the cuffs of his shirt which i found very distracting.

Also lol at Nancy Pelosi's introduction. Im 99% sure she said Bertie A. Hern instead of Bertie Ahern. Pretty bad IMO not even knowing his proper name.

Did she call him Tea-sack of Eye-er-lund?

Hermy

Stekelly wrote: »

Was just going to say that. You'd imagine she would have at least run it by someone to make sure it was right. Bertie A-hern indeed,

These are the same people who say I-raq.:rolleyes:
By the way, why wasn't George Bush present?

EamonnKeane

Hermy wrote: »

By the way, why wasn't George Bush present?

Because he is neither a Congressman nor a Senator?

Also, what's with him being the first leader of an Ireland "at peace"? There was a notable absense of violent conflict 1922-39, 1945-68 he's forgetting.

The_Minister

EamonnKeane wrote: »

Because he is neither a Congressman nor a Senator?

Also, what's with him being the first leader of an Ireland "at peace"? There was a notable absense of violent conflict 1922-39, 1945-68 he's forgetting.

I think it was Ireland at Peace, and addressing America.

Vorsprung

Just watched it there, watched his Westminister speech as well and between the 2 I think he definitely did us proud.

kerry4sam

EamonnKeane wrote: »

Also, what's with him being the first leader of an Ireland "at peace"? There was a notable absense of violent conflict 1922-39, 1945-68 he's forgetting.

The_Minister wrote: »

I think it was Ireland at Peace, and addressing America.

Yeah from my understanding he was saying that he was the first Irish leader to address the United States stating that Ireland was as peace, as opposed to going to the US of A asking for help/assistance in having peace on the ground

Hermy

EamonnKeane wrote: »

Because he is neither a Congressman nor a Senator?

Thanks EK.
Just wondered, that's all.

Liam Byrne

Saw some excerpts on the paper - cliché of the day seems to have been "don't mention the war" :P

brianthebard

kerry4sam wrote: »

I wonder now with the response he received to "the Irish built America, now i hope you look afer the un-documented Irish" will anything actually be done or were the members of the houses just caught up in the moment

Think of all the lovely tax they could earn if they document the undocumented. I imagine they wouldn't mind sorting out the Irish immigrants, but there are so many others that would be looking for the same treatment if the Irish got documented.

kerry4sam

and with this being an election year in America nothing will be done until next year at the very earliest but the issue had to be raised by him anyways