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Germany putting the foot down
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Try criticising Germany for things they have done which you dont agree with and see how far that gets you.
Yes some Germans and indeed other Europenas (politicans manily I would bet) do see our vote on Lisbon as being a slap in the face.
Afterall the original constitution was negotiated by Irish PM and Ireland has always gotten way more out of EU than we ever contributed.I am not German
I think we guested that by now :rolleyes:I think you're grasping at straws.
The EU, or rather the european central bank may or may not have to "do something", but "the Germans" or Germany on their own/off their own batt? ...forget it.
Yes but what Eurozone economies have the wherewithall to provide most of the necessary funds for any bailouts ?
Who is the biggest economy in the Eurozone ?Valid argument, but just try talking to Germans about their mistakes. How would they feel if we attacked them in the press and without a proper argument - read Fergalr's comment earlier.
It was just a cheap shot.
Ah perish the thought anybody outside our little country would mention the fact that we have a political system, a financial regulatory system, and a banking sector that is a crock of sh** and we are not really doing anything to rectify the situation.
So the fact that in comparison to other EU member state politicans our politicans are on much higher renumeration and expenses is not a proper argument for stating the bleedin obvious as it seems this guy did.
If like fergalr you bring the US into it, it doesn't make the Germans look bad, it just makes us look ten times worse, but of course if you can't see that and would rather complain about people pointing out our problems then fine :rolleyes:
PS it is anything but a cheap shot, it is costing us billions and what worries this German gentleman is will it cost him and his compatriots billions as well
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Opel is looking for 3.3 billion euros from the german govement, and the public opinion is heavily divided on that issue. Some people say, Opel has to be rescued at any price, other people argue, that the state cannot bail out every company thats in financial difficulties at the moment.
3.3 bn to rescue Opel?!? How much did we put into Anglo? It seems that there is a bargain to be had in Germany that could create a lot of Irish jobs
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Fratton Fred wrote: »The weak Sterling must have really hit the German car market. I know the UK is one of BMW and VAG's larger markets so not only would they be selling less cars, the ones they do sell are worth a lot less to the parent company.
When the world gets out of this recession, it could look very different. If Opel go bust what next, GM themselves? Ford?
Fratton Fred Ford, GM and Chrysler are in deep deep trouble, remember their bailout by Washington.
GM is being crucified by pensions and healthcare costs of current and ex employees.
As well as Opel, Saab is in deep trouble.
Ford offloaded Land Rover, Jaguar and Aston Martin in 2007 & 2008 to Tata.
Yes some of Britains famous marks are owned by people from one of the old colonies or was india ever an actual colony ?
Volvo is the only one left in Ford's Premier Automotive Group.
AFAIK the only profitable arm of Ford a few years ago was their leasing division, everything else was in the red.
Chyrsler's famous merger (or shoudl that be takeover by) with Daimler Benz ended in 2007 when the Germans managed to offload over 80% of the company to Cerberus Capital Management.
BTW their 19% stake was worth zero book value according to Daimler Benz in 2008.
The American car companies sales are down because even Americans are buying Japanese cars because of reliability and fuel economy.
fergalr I wasn't saying you were complaining, like another poster, about the German complaining about our overpaid politicans.
That's a lot of complaining by the way
I was alluding to fact that bringing in US consituency size makes us look even worse.
Yes it isn't the best measure of how a politican should be paid, but it is one that should be still be taken into account.
Our politicans are well paid, they have ministerial pensions even though not pension age and still in the Dail, they have it seems unvouched for expenses and then government members have added perk of having paid civil servants doing their constituency work so that they can get a jump on being relected.
They are very well remunerated and honestly they come up far shorter, I would bet, than the elected representatives of most other countries.0 -
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Dannyboy83 wrote: »I understand your point and your logic is perfectly reasonable.
Thanks.Dannyboy83 wrote: »On the other hand, people have to start a protest; somewhere;sometime;concerning something.
They do - it's a fair point.
I just think that 'protest' or statement of grievance, has to be very rational, and well thought out. If it's not, it either doesn't get support, because it's written off as the 'lunatic fringe' (perhaps unjustly) by the majority of people - or perhaps worse, if it causes change, the change might do more harm than good. (I don't want to re-derail this thread with lisbon, but the 'commissioner' issue there would be an example of this for me - while I think there's plenty of valid reasons against lisbon, the seemingly widely misunderstood changes to the commissioners is probably going to result in bad solutions in the long run).Dannyboy83 wrote: »Where do you suggest people should start to look for reform?
This isn't an easy question to answer.
(Also, I don't think that pointing out that a particular approach is flawed means you should have to suggest another approach.)
I guess people could try and lobby/protest for some sort of credible alternative to the current political choices in Ireland - or demand reform off of the existing choices.
Not reform in that they have to take a pay cut - reform in that they must do a better job in future.
Everyone is fixated on bankers salaries, and TDs salaries.
Really, those things don't matter much at all.
Sure, a bank exec getting 3million euro salary rankles when your being told to pay an extra 10% levy - but the reason for the problems wasn't that all the 3million euro salaries caused the banks to get into trouble; nor was it that the high cost of TDs salaries caused the economy to sink. It's that banks were mismanaged, and that the government apparently mismanaged the economy.
Like, if the problem is that people think our current government incompetent, then organise protest against government incompetence, not against their salaries. Write to your local TD and tell them what you think, and that they'll lose your vote if their party doesn't put someone more credible in charge.
If the opposition isn't credibly competent to vote in, write to them and tell them that they need to change their leadership.
If they don't listen, move along the line.
I'm not an economist, nor a political activist (far from both!).
But, like a lot of Irish people, I'm trying to get my head around the idea that Ireland, as a nation, was not run as well as it should have been. Special interests, incompetence, mismanagement, average joe footing the bill...
...I guess I'm just saying that if we don't all want to be footing another bill in 20 years, then there's no point getting worked up about TDs salaries being 10% higher than they should be, or what they are relative to germany - instead, we should be trying to figure out what caused this whole mess in the first place, and how to put people in charge that will A) Credibly and competently clean it up
Reduce the risk of it re-occurring.
I don't think it's anyway partisan or fringe to suggest that many Irish people are not convinced about our current leadership - and indeed the other potential leadership candidates - ability to fulfil these objectives.
That's the problem we should be thinking about - not what some german guy said about relative salaries.0 -
Dannyboy83 wrote: »I understand your point and your logic is perfectly reasonable.
Thanks.
They do - it's a fair point.
I just think that 'protest' or statement of grievance, has to be very rational, and well thought out. If it's not, it either doesn't get support, because it's written off as the 'lunatic fringe' (perhaps unjustly) by the majority of people - or perhaps worse, if it causes change, the change might do more harm than good. (I don't want to re-derail this thread with lisbon, but the 'commissioner' issue there would be an example of this for me - while I think there's plenty of valid reasons against lisbon, the seemingly widely misunderstood changes to the commissioners is probably going to result in bad solutions in the long run).
This isn't an easy question to answer.
(Also, I don't think that pointing out that a particular approach is flawed means you should have to suggest another approach.)
I guess people could try and lobby/protest for some sort of credible alternative to the current political choices in Ireland - or demand reform off of the existing choices.
Not reform in that they have to take a pay cut - reform in that they must do a better job in future.
Everyone is fixated on bankers salaries, and TDs salaries.
Really, those things don't matter much at all.
Sure, a bank exec getting 3million euro salary rankles when your being told to pay an extra 10% levy - but the reason for the problems wasn't that all the 3million euro salaries caused the banks to get into trouble; nor was it that the high cost of TDs salaries caused the economy to sink. It's that banks were mismanaged, and that the government apparently mismanaged the economy.
Like, if the problem is that people think our current government incompetent, then organise protest against government incompetence, not against their salaries. Write to your local TD and tell them what you think, and that they'll lose your vote if their party doesn't put someone more credible in charge.
If the opposition isn't credibly competent to vote in, write to them and tell them that they need to change their leadership.
If they don't listen, move along the line.
I'm not an economist, nor a political activist (far from both!).
But, like a lot of Irish people, I'm trying to get my head around the idea that Ireland, as a nation, was not run as well as it should have been. Special interests, incompetence, mismanagement, average joe footing the bill...
...I guess I'm just saying that if we don't all want to be footing another bill in 20 years, then there's no point getting worked up about TDs salaries being 10% higher than they should be, or what they are relative to germany - instead, we should be trying to figure out what caused this whole mess in the first place, and how to put people in charge that will A) Credibly and competently clean it up Reduce the risk of it re-occurring.
I don't think it's anyway partisan or fringe to suggest that many Irish people are not convinced about our current leadership - and indeed the other potential leadership candidates - ability to fulfil these objectives.
That's the problem we should be thinking about - not what some german guy said about relative salaries.
Well, I don't think anyone would object to that.
But the time for ideals has passed.
We must set quantifiable targets.
We cannot ask our politicians to perform better, it would be like sticking our heads in the sand and hoping it would go away.
A) We need to establish some quantifiable criteria for the government to meet starting from April If they don't meet it, they must be ejected from office immediately (Military coup
C) and appoint someone who can do it for us before the Germans appoint the IMF
Ideas of quantifiable targets:
Shortfall = y
Income= x
===========
Reduce expenditure= z
Tax increases = a
Other ideas:
A) TD expenses must be accounted for TD salary must take a 20-40% hit
& so forth;
The only possible way to reform without the country descending into chaos is to start at the top.
[Anybody who has ever played a fooking computer game simulation like Sim City would be able to grasp these basics, I cannot understand how our government have failed to]0 -
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