Ireland and Albania...

ODS

During the 'Celtic Tiger', Albania used to be a joke reference for somewhere poor, backward, corrupt and submissive. After communism, that country got caught up in a massive pyramid scheme -

Wikipedia wrote:

the rudimentary financial system became dominated by Ponzi schemes, and government officials endorsed a series of pyramid investment funds.

- which ultimately in 1997, collapsed. (Sound familiar? *cough, Irish property market, cough*)

The 3 million Albanian population went nuts and dissent broke out, resulting in the fall and subsequent replacement of their government. They rebelled over the loss of $1.2 billion.

Last Sunday new analysis by journalist Damien Kiberd indicates Ireland's actual national debt is heading for €200 billion.

Alone the expected cost of Anglo Irish Bank has risen from 4 billion as was the governments original estimate, to 25 billion, and last week was reported as probably going to go north of €35 billion... Today further 'massive losses' are going to be announced at the 'Anger Irish Bank' - http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2010/0831/breaking2.html

Having offered us "Berlin or Boston", our 'leaders' have delivered us an economic Baghdad. By contrast, having also had an economic collapse, Iceland has since replaced its government, flushed out the rot, locked up a few responsible people, and is recovering... Meanwhile in Ireland, directors who sat on bank boards during the making of the mess are still sitting there - and paid accordingly. Why is it that in Japan disgraced bankers and speculators commit hari kari, in America they go to jail - yet in Ireland they go on holiday?

In my opinion, business confidence cannot return while we allow the people who created the mess preside over its supposed repair. Without penalty there is no deterrent against more corruption and book-cooking. This state no longer has even the pretense of a a republic, but is a kleptocracy :mad:

I am not advocating Albania as a perfect solution - up to 2000 died in the '97 unrest... but what I am wondering is, when are we as a people going to grow some balls???

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1997_unrest_in_Albania



Note to Mods, I put this in AH for wide feedback as its not just a political anorak topic

Chinasea

I hear what you are saying, but who voted the said government back in again, in again and in again. I don't think anything has changed - apathy rules and Joe Duffy/forums thrive in Ireland.

ODS

Chinasea wrote: »

I hear what you are saying, but who voted the said government back in again, in again and in again. I don't think anything has changed - apathy rules and Joe Duffy/forums thrive in Ireland.

So is it beyond our ability to grow some balls?

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

ODS wrote: »

So is it beyond our ability to grow some balls?

Yep.

super_furry

Irish people don't care. They'll sit around a grumble and moan, but then go to the pub, get ****ed up and forget about it.

Yes it's bad on paper but there's no one starving yet so how could a revolt work.. People can't get angry enough to take down a government when there's still jobs, a working banking system and a high level of social welfare.

200bn debt sounds the exact to me same as 40bn did during the good times. They're just big numbers that lose meaning.

Wibbs

ODS wrote: »

but what I am wondering is, when are we as a people going to grow some balls???

I hate to say it, but you'll wait a very long time for that. Contrary to how we like to see ourselves, we are not rebellious as a culture/people. Sure we celebrate it in song and word, but in deed rarely. At least in our own country. A nation of tutting twitching windows does not a rebel often make.

I do agree that the figures involved and the... I was going to call it corruption, but its just as much amateur hour greed and stupidity, do make for a ridiculous picture. The fact we haven't strung people up by their ankles in law at least is even more ridiculous.

I would say Albania is a bad comparison though. When their "boom" went crashing down around their ears, they had nothing left. When one has nothing to lose, going batshít on the streets is as easy as not. When you've got kids and a mortgage and are worn down by debt(often of your own making), but life appears to go on around you, then taking to the streets seems a long way away. The young, childless and with nothing to lose are usually the ones who revolt.

Iceland is a much better comparison and in that comparison we are lacking. And we ahould be ashamed. We bent over for the English, we bent over even further for the church, so it doesn't come as a shock that we bend over for these people. As a nation we have very bendy backs. Look at the scandals that have followed various public political figures. Look at how their "peeeple" backed them the next time they put X on their vote. Indeed it seems in this country its a good way to get votes. Look at the barely disguised contempt held by many of our politicos for the people they represent. Especially when they've been found to have their hand in the greasy till. A till of our money. The Flynn family are a good example. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beverley_Flynn and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P%C3%A1draig_Flynn. The former is still an elected representative. It beggars belief.

Like I said, don't hold your breath, for while parish pump gombeenism and tugging forelocks to your "betters" and Shure isnt he/she greatism is in play, you'll have long gone blue before anything changes.

Dyr

Because we are a cosy little country where the media and politicians and power players are bestest buddies with room enough at the trough so long as you edge out joe public once the going gets tough.


All it would take to change it would be a for a few of these c**ts to wind up swinging from lamp posts. They think that they're untouchable.

starbelgrade

Ireland and Albania

Is that match on after the Armenia one?

ODS

super_furry wrote: »

Irish people don't care. They'll sit around a grumble and moan, but then go to the pub, get ****ed up and forget about it.

Yet it happened before - in the lead up to 1921 - and this wasn't exactly a country known for its abstinence then; if anything we were far worse at living up to national stereotypes... But we did it - we got some balls and made some progress.

Can we rediscover courage and focus it to positive effect? Its not that we are an embarrassment to past generations who had courage - the real crime is we will be a shame to future generations for seeing them stuck with someone else's casino bill

topper75

Deleted User wrote: »

a high level of social welfare.

The Irish have balls. They also have Novocaine for the wallet.

Thing is, the govt is borrowing that Novocaine and they are also borrowing for public sector wages.

That cannot continue indefinitely. Then you will see something.

Terry

Give me a shout if you're going to take down the dail. I'm in.
It'll probably just be the two of us though. See Wibbs's post above.

Brendog

Ah now its just something for Irish people to complain about.
We'll end up in the pub complaining, forget about it and wake up covered in garlic sauce and a kebab.....Its a tradition.



Also, anyone remember the eurovision? I don't know where Albania is. All I know is their female singer had sound tits

ODS

Wibbs wrote: »

I hate to say it, but you'll wait a very long time for that. Contrary to how we like to see ourselves, we are not rebellious as a culture/people. Sure we celebrate it in song and word, but in deed rarely. At least in our own country. A nation of tutting twitching windows does not a rebel often make.

I do agree that the figures involved and the... I was going to call it corruption, but its just as much amateur hour greed and stupidity, do make for a ridiculous picture. The fact we haven't strung people up by their ankles in law at least is even more ridiculous.

I would say Albania is a bad comparison though. When their "boom" went crashing down around their ears, they had nothing left. When one has nothing to lose, going batshít on the streets is as easy as not. When you've got kids and a mortgage and are worn down by debt(often of your own making), but life appears to go on around you, then taking to the streets seems a long way away. The young, childless and with nothing to lose are usually the ones who revolt.

Iceland is a much better comparison and in that comparison we are lacking. And we ahould be ashamed. We bent over for the English, we bent over even further for the church, so it doesn't come as a shock that we bend over for these people. As a nation we have very bendy backs. Look at the scandals that have followed various public political figures. Look at how their "peeeple" backed them the next time they put X on their vote. Indeed it seems in this country its a good way to get votes. Look at the barely disguised contempt held by many of our politicos for the people they represent. Especially when they've been found to have their hand in the greasy till. A till of our money. The Flynn family are a good example. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beverley_Flynn and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P%C3%A1draig_Flynn. The former is still an elected representative. It beggars belief.

Like I said, don't hold your breath, for while parish pump gombeenism and tugging forelocks to your "betters" and Shure isnt he/she greatism is in play, you'll have long gone blue before anything changes.

Good points there Wibbs - like the phrase re a nation of tutting twitching windows...

But today more massive losses will be announced at Anglo, where it is heading north of 35 b at cost to the exchequer, after we were lied to that it would cost 4 b :mad:

As a people we were sold a pup - encouraged by pretend leaders to confuse debt with wealth, with critics silenced or black listed in terms of employment prospects. We deserved better; after peace emerged in the north and we began to make some economic progress in the 90s, we could have been something.

Prior to '97 Albania wasn't known as a rebellious country. As topper75 says, this can't continue indefinitely...

Wibbs

ODS wrote: »

Yet it happened before - in the lead up to 1921 - and this wasn't exactly a country known for its abstinence then; if anything we were far worse at living up to national stereotypes... But we did it - we got some balls and made some progress.

It very nearly didnt happen. It was as much to do with woeful misreading by the British of the feelings on the street and how they reacted to it. If they had handled things better, especially after the 1916 rebellion, I'd give at least even odds we'd still have a foreign monarch on our coin.

Can we rediscover courage and focus it to positive effect? Its not that we are an embarrassment to past generations who had courage

What past generations? I'm serious too. For way too long we either fought each other or fought the oppressor in very small numbers. The final rebellion that got us out from under that yoke was a perfect storm. Then of course afterwards we went batshít on each other.

the real crime is we will be a shame to future generations for seeing them stuck with someone else's casino bill

I agree. People born this very day will be paying for this and its likely even their unborn children will be doing same.

dasdog

When we cannot borrow to pay wages/welfare the trouble will start. I'm thinking this will happen sometime around the middle of next year. The (up to) €38bn for Anglo (not €24bn Mr. Dukes) will break us.

Wibbs

The other issue of course is what do you do after? Lets say it's Viva la Revolution next Tuesday, then what? What do you replace these structures and some of the morons and criminals in them with? More of the same? Different names same shít?

Obviously some of these muppets have to see cell time. Whatabout the debt? Personally I would have let Anglo fail while shoring up the other banks. I would also change how government is run in this country. I'd get rid of proportional representation for a start. It's perfect for parish pump politics. I'd also change how ministers are appointed. As it stands very very few(if any) of our ministers are experts on the portfolios they're given. I'd completely restructure the civil service. Cut out the dead wood and dead money. Ditto for the health service.

ODS

Wibbs, you make a lot of sound points there - and I agree with many of them, such as after Easter '16 and the way it was handled by the brits, the conditions so created became a perfect storm.

However, perhaps it is too much emphasis that is placed on how the killings of the 1916 leaders in terms of how the population subsequently reacted. Sure it was the lit match - however it would most likely have been of little consequence had the socio economic conditions not been the tinder. And even then, after '16, it was only with the continued denial of the democratically long expressed wish of the majority of voters for management of their own affairs...

My point being, this seems to be where we are heading again - a governance lacking a credible mandate acting against the wishes of the vast majority of its own electorate, without holding to account those that created the mess. That to my mind increasingly looks like a government that lacks legitimacy.

So is there going to be some sort of 'match' that sparks before change occurs?

By the way, has anybody else heard the rumours about the army and gardai training together for purposes of crowd / riot control?

Wibbs

ODS wrote: »

But today more massive losses will be announced at Anglo, where it is heading north of 35 b at cost to the exchequer, after we were lied to that it would cost 4 b :mad:

And again nothing will happen.

As a people we were sold a pup

Not quite. We bought a pup. We never asked how much is that doggy in the window. We are as responsible as the morons who led us. Who is more foolish? The fool r the one who follows him?

Prior to '97 Albania wasn't known as a rebellious country.

Eh not quite. The Albanian's have rebelled many times against quite a few foes. Way more than us.

bullpost

The only ones that can really change this situation are the young.

FF has the rest of the country under some sort of spell that I don't understand but its pretty powerful mumbo.

The FF cute hoorism is like a cancer in this country and must be replaced by the young with something more substantial.

Paradoxically the really old are the only ones who have showed any cojones recently when they marched on the Dail.

Unfortunately most of the younger generation seem to have more pressing priorities such as facebook these days.

ODS

Wibbs wrote: »

The other issue of course is what do you do after? Lets say it's Viva la Revolution next Tuesday, then what? What do you replace these structures and some of the morons and criminals in them with? More of the same? Different names same shít?

Obviously some of these muppets have to see cell time. Whatabout the debt? Personally I would have let Anglo fail while shoring up the other banks. I would also change how government is run in this country. I'd get rid of proportional representation for a start. It's perfect for parish pump politics. I'd also change how ministers are appointed. As it stands very very few(if any) of our ministers are experts on the portfolios they're given. I'd completely restructure the civil service. Cut out the dead wood and dead money. Ditto for the health service.

Wibbs, let me know if you are ever running for office - I completely agree with you!

Ireland Inc needs serious strategic and structural reform - state paid functionaires, be they elected or full-time, need to be accountable. Equally agree regarding ending the geographic clientelism, whether it be local authorities collecting 'development' levies for their own use, or whether it be ministerial appointments made simply on the basis of accidental geographic selection rather than aptitude.

Like you I suspect, I much rather reform to revolution - as often with the latter, further mess and muppets simply emerge. Problem is revolution often occurs when reform has been thwarted - as has and is happening in this state. I don't want revolution but I fear that it is increasingly likely if accountability and reform are being stymied - particularly when this is to the benefit of the financial retrofitting of politically well connected players...

CJhaughey

ODS wrote: »

By the way, has anybody else heard the rumours about the army and gardai training together for purposes of crowd / riot control?

I believe the Army has a good stock of Riot-control gear bought quite recently.
I don't for a minute think they will have to use it.
The population is too passive.

ODS

Wibbs wrote: »

We bought a pup. We never asked how much is that doggy in the window. We are as responsible as the morons who led us. Who is more foolish? The fool r the one who follows him?

Not I lord copper, speak for yourself if you did - for my own part I actively disagreed with the maladministration of the state as it was happening, and tried to play my own part in preventing some of the mess - and at not an insignificant cost to my own career. Probably would have been better if I had been proven wrong...

ODS

CJhaughey wrote: »

I believe the Army has a good stock of Riot-control gear bought quite recently.
I don't for a minute think they will have to use it.
The population is too passive.

I heard something along those lines as well. Convenient the entire army is now being held within the country - could it be that peace-keeping may have to be done at home?

Certainly sounds as if a social insurance policy is being put in place by those that give the orders...

I am hearing Wicklow is being used as a location for training with the gardai - but the terrain of Glen of Imaal doesn't exactly strike me as the best setting in which to train for urban riots

ejmaztec

The government's even trying to amend the the bankruptcy laws, so that their arse-licking crooked chums will be back in business in 6 years instead of 12.

pickarooney

Wibbs wrote: »

It very nearly didnt happen. It was as much to do with woeful misreading by the British of the feelings on the street and how they reacted to it. If they had handled things better, especially after the 1916 rebellion, I'd give at least even odds we'd still have a foreign monarch on our coin.

I bet a shiny euro you have the king of Spain or Belgium somewhere in your pocket

If nobody was prepared to stand up and be counted during the 'good times' - and let's face it, every one of us knew that the Celtic Tiger was a great big piss-filled balloon - instead sucking the diseased marrow of the beast, then how does anyone expect that they will now. Every idiot who spent money he didn't have is to blame for the mess, yet somehow one or two bankers and ministers get all the abuse now. People won't revolt because they're apathetic, certainly, the same apathy that allowed the monstrous charade of wealth to continue for so long.

ODS

Wibbs wrote:

If they had handled things better, especially after the 1916 rebellion, I'd give at least even odds we'd still have a foreign monarch on our coin.

pickarooney wrote: »

I bet a shiny euro you have the king of Spain or Belgium somewhere in your pocket

Off topic, just as a point of info, we almost did end up with a foreign monarch on our coinage after 1916 - as was wished for by some of the Irish Republicans :eek:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_Joachim_of_Prussia

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

pickarooney wrote: »

I bet a shiny euro you have the king of Spain or Belgium somewhere in your pocket

If nobody was prepared to stand up and be counted during the 'good times' - and let's face it, every one of us knew that the Celtic Tiger was a great big piss-filled balloon - instead sucking the diseased marrow of the beast, then how does anyone expect that they will now. Every idiot who spent money he didn't have is to blame for the mess, yet somehow one or two bankers and ministers get all the abuse now. People won't revolt because they're apathetic, certainly, the same apathy that allowed the monstrous charade of wealth to continue for so long.

In fairness, not every idiot who spent will be blamed out by the governement. I agree, they dug their own graves, bu tthey certainly have a right to pissed off with pool management (unless they voted FF, in which yeah - fvck 'em!)

SugarHigh

I love how people think that a revolt would solve anything. The constant rioting in Greece just made their problems worse while we have been internationally praised for taking the correct measures.

The_Minister

Wibbs wrote: »

We bent over for the English, we bent over even further for the church, so it doesn't come as a shock that we bend over for these people. As a nation we have very bendy backs.

If by 'bent over for the English' you mean 'had a bloody rebellion every 50 or so years' then you are correct - otherwise no.

It's also worth noting that one of the reasons we were so attached to the Church is that so many clergymen lost their lives opposing the British and made themselves targets by campaigning for land reform. Whatever about the modern church, the Church from 1600s to about 1850 was very positive for the Irish people.

dasdog

SugarHigh wrote: »

I love how people think that a revolt would solve anything. The constant rioting in Greece just made their problems worse while we have been internationally praised for taking the correct measures.

Correct measures my hole. Nothing serious has happened austerity wise yet. The upcoming budget will hurt a lot of people and yet barely put a dent in to the defecit (another €3bn needed?). We are on the road to a soverign default next year but I'm guessing the ECB will step in and assist or the € project is in very serious trouble. The people who got us in to this mess are the ones trying to get us out and they haven't a fvking clue what they are doing.

Stockholm Syndrome is a phrase that was mentioned last night and it best sums up our governments dealings. Rioting is not the solution but when people cannot heat homes/buy food/petrol etc they will stop being docile and get very angry. At the moment I think heads are still very firmly shoved in the sand.

Celly Smunt

super_furry wrote: »

Irish people don't care. They'll sit around a grumble and moan, but then go to the pub, get ****ed up and forget about it.

i'm having a problem now with people doing nothing but giving out about the irish that do nothing,what are YOU going to do?

CJhaughey

dasdog wrote: »

The people who got us in to this mess are the ones trying to get us out and they haven't a fvking clue what they are doing.

They are working very hard to ensure the big time political contributors are kept solvent, without the financial support from their mates in the financial sector they are finished.
The current rules on bankruptcy have the potential to if not finish, seriously damage the political/financial elite in this country.
Thats the reason they are trying to change the bankruptcy law where you cannot hold political power if you have been declared bankrupt.
Thats also the reason that most of the boards of the banks are still staffed by the same people that oversaw the creation of this mess.

ODS

SugarHigh wrote:

I love how people think that a revolt would solve anything. The constant rioting in Greece just made their problems worse while we have been internationally praised for taking the correct measures.

The overthrow by Albanians of their rotten regime did fix their problems: Currently Albania's GDP is 2.2%, the same as Germany's, having ranged between 5% and 7% throughout the last decade. For more, see http://www.indexmundi.com/albania/gdp_real_growth_rate.html

Meanwhile, regarding the FF-driven line of the international praise being heaped upon us for 'taking the correct measures' - perhaps you might want to have a look at one of the main articles running in the New York Times since yesterday, in which it is headlined 'DUBLIN — Can one bank bring down a country?'. Article in full is below.

Of course FF isn't purely to blame - but by being the biggest and most central (and corrupt) part of governance over the last 12 years, they are the biggest part of the problem. However, other vested propertied interests are also critical to the problem as they too are going along with the NAMA scheme , which is designed to keep up the paper value of property at all costs by way of cross-subvention of the rest of the economy. This artificial intervention into the market place hasn't worked and cannot work - Dublin city centre property values despite NAMA are down 50%, the same as Dubai. What NAMA is achieving however, is that by loading the cost of this onto the rest of the economy, it is ensuring that we are unable to write down our cost base level - and so preventing any return to having a competitive export economy.

Perhaps when people in this country look beyond what our own over-paid media commentators with their own vested property interests are saying, people might wake up? Despite sympathetic utterances by the 'stars' / talking heads of our state broadcaster, the reality is that in numerous cases they are paid more than the overpaid elected bureaucrats and top-paid permanent bureaucrats - and so these talking heads are loathe to see the system change. The manner by which our media has been effectively bought doesn't simply stop either with salary cheques in RTÉ. For example, the editor of the Irish Times Geraldine Kennedy may be publicly perceived as being associated with the downfall of Bertie Ahern, yet the reality is that the Irish Times themselves were at the heart of the most rampant speculation - acquiring myblackhole.ie myhome.ie for €50 million, as well as having been heavily dependent on advertising from property. They bought the lie too and compromised as a result, are most likely exposed by way of their commercial and private interests. Just recall how Madam Kennedy of the Irish Times wrote the following in 2006:

"If Germany’s economy does indeed relapse into slowdown, its electorate may have to conclude that the time has finally come to accept a strong dose of its medicine.

In doing so, it can draw inspiration from that medicine’s success in reducing unemployment in Ireland to the lowest level in the EU."

From
http://dublinopinion.com/2010/08/17/geraldine-kennedy-2006-germany-must-follow-irelands-lead-for-the-student-has-now-become-the-master/

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha :rolleyes:

Today the pro-failed establishment outlook of the Irish Times continues unabated. Recent headlines read like a desperate man clinging to tufts of grass while hanging off a cliff, where any vaguely positive straw in the wind is being used to suggest recovery is happening - be it car sales (all imports), or other distractions. Point being, that RTÉ and the Irish Times are massaging as opposed to informing public opinion. Just because dissent is not being properly reported on, doesn't mean its not happening or steaming up. While this suits the increasingly illegitimate regime in Merrion Street and Leinster House, this is not a recipe that can or will last. Down 7.6% circulation in latest figures, The Irish Times has been increasingly abandoned by private sector interests as we simply do not believe it - increasingly its a news paper to reassure civil servants, and bears resemblance to Pravda in the USSR circa 1987.

My own thinking is that people will not voluntarily move on our rotten regime - until they have to. As with some other posters considerations, with further very deep cuts coming down the tracks, I am inclined to agree this could perhaps happen next spring - though equally a hot sweaty summer could also a backdrop (riots / public political disorder tends to have a higher frequency in summer months).

Just as a point of clarity, I don't desire physical political action - however when reform is thwarted such an outcome seems increasingly likely.

In such regard, and in view as to how that country subsequently got back on track, Give me Albania any day :mad:




Support of Anglo Irish Bank Strains Ireland
By LANDON THOMAS Jr.
Published: August 31, 2010

DUBLIN — Can one bank bring down a country?

Anglo Irish Bank, the midsize Irish lender whose profligacy has come to symbolize the excesses of the real estate bubble here, is doing its best to find out.

No other country aside from Iceland suffered a banking bust as severe as Ireland’s during the financial crisis. Ireland was also the country that took the most direct route in tackling the problem, by recognizing upfront the bad loans of its devastated banks and transferring them to government ledgers.

Both the United States and Britain avoided such a move by taking stakes in their troubled banks and, in the case of Britain, insuring their worst-performing loans.

Now the Irish government’s strategy is being called into question as its credit rating suffers and its borrowing costs resume their upward trajectory. Ireland’s struggle to cope with its mounting bank losses could well be a harbinger for other parts of Europe and for the United States as stuttering economic growth and stagnant housing markets put further strain on bank balance sheets.

Anglo Irish, which on Tuesday reported a first-half loss of 8.2 billion euros ($10.4 billion) also said the government had injected an additional 8 billion euros ($10.16 billion) into the bank, bringing total aid so far to 22 billion euros.

Mike Aynsley, the bank’s chief executive, said Tuesday that he expected the government’s total investment in the bank to be about 25 billion euros ($31.75 billion). He added that commercial property, the bank’s core lending market, which is already down 60 percent, had not yet reached bottom.

“Anytime you see a correction like that, you will see carnage,” he said. “But we think that the 25 billion euros will be largely sufficient.”

Analysts here expect the bank’s defunct loans to hit 35 billion euros, or about 22 percent of Ireland’s gross domestic product — a hard-to-believe figure, given that Anglo Irish at its peak was just the third-largest bank in Ireland. In 2008, total Irish bank lending to households and nonfinancial companies was more than 200 percent of G.D.P. — by far the highest such ratio in the euro zone.

The growing losses at Anglo Irish and other Irish banks are expected to cost the government 80 billion to 90 billion euros, according to Standard & Poor’s, which says 35 billion euros will be needed for Anglo Irish — a figure the government and Mr. Aynsley say is significantly overstated.

The ratings agency said that the country’s banking liabilities would push its debt-to-G.D.P. ratio to 113 percent in 2012, higher than Spain’s and Belgium’s and approaching the levels of countries like Italy and Greece.

Last week, S.& P. downgraded Ireland’s credit rating to AA-minus from AA, a change that has driven the already steep spread, or risk premium, on 10-year Irish government bonds to new highs of 5.5 percentage points — second in the euro zone only to Greece’s 11 percentage points.

“This is out of control and the markets see it now,” said Peter Mathews, an independent banking and real estate consultant here, who for the last year has been waging a furious one-man crusade, warning of Anglo Irish’s escalating losses and calling for the bank to be liquidated — with bond holders, not the Irish taxpayer, taking the hit.

“How bad can it get?” Mr. Mathews said. “Irish debt paper could stop being tradable, and the outside agencies like the European Union and the International Monetary Fund might have to come in.”

Mr. Mathews’s view in this regard represents an extreme. Economists at the Economic and Social Research Institute, an independent organization here, cite the government’s cash cushion of about 40 billion euros — much of it set aside at the outset of the crisis — as a crucial safety net that separates Ireland from Greece.

The government, for its part, argues that Ireland’s approach to bad loans — taking them off the balance sheets of the banks and then assuming responsibility for them — was correct.

“Our banks would have probably assumed zombie-like status if we had delayed in recognizing these impairments,” said John Corrigan, the chief executive of the country’s debt management agency. Part of his organization is the National Asset Management Agency, the government group that has spent the year buying bad loans from banks.

“The downgrade was deeply disappointing to us, but we still have a better credit rating than Italy and Portugal,” he said. And international bond investors, who own about 85 percent of the government’s debt, continued to buy its paper, he said.

Will the Anglo Irish loans lead to a buyers’ strike by investors?

“No,” said Mr. Corrigan with a vigorous shake of his head. “We have enough liquidity to take us well into the second quarter next year.”

While Mr. Mathews and the government may be opposed on how to handle the problem, they agree on how absurd the lending practices at Anglo Irish were.

Even by the standards of the global banking collapse, Anglo Irish stood out. From a loan book of about 75 billion euros when the government took over in 2009, Anglo Irish says that it has only about 12 billion euros in loans that it classifies as performing. The bank is expected to transfer 36 billion euros in troubled loans to the asset management agency — about half its existing loans.

“It was mad — a credit cocaine run,” said Mr. Mathews, his voice rising in frustration.

He was standing outside a gravel-strewn 25-acre plot, flanked by a housing project and the rough Dublin docklands. In 2006, as Ireland’s real estate frenzy reached its peak, a group of developers paid 412 million euros ($523.2 million) for this industrial site, backed by a 300 million euro loan from Anglo Irish.

Mr. Mathews, a former banker who now advises real estate developers, estimates that the land may now be worth only 20 million euros — if it can be sold at all.

It is not just in Ireland that the bank’s aggressive lending stood out. Through its private client division in Boston, Anglo Irish was one of the most wildly eager property lenders in the United States. It financed the construction of skyscrapers in Chicago and shopping centers in Boston, not to mention lending more than $500 million to a series of troubled and in some cases failed real estate projects in New York.

Most notorious of those was a top-of-the-market, $393 million mortgage in 2007 to the Apthorp, a luxury apartment building in New York that has been home to celebrities like the writer Nora Ephron and the actor Al Pacino.

After a series of legal disputes, the building’s developers are struggling to convert the complex into an upscale condominium. Anglo Irish recently said that rents on the units would be paid directly to the bank — an indication, analysts say, that the project’s developers may be facing further financing strains.

“It was just the height of hubris,” Mr. Mathews said as he drove away from the deserted development site in Dublin. “And why should Citizen Joe and Mary pick up the tab for this when it was the bondholders that had all the aces in their hand?”


http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/01/business/global/01anglo.html?_r=1&dbk

Kasabian

tl:dr

I thought we were playing Armenia

ODS

Kasabian wrote: »

tl:dr

I thought we were playing Armenia

That joke appeared yesterday in the first 10 posts - it was funny then / your joke fail

Kasabian

ODS wrote: »

That joke appeared yesterday in the first 10 posts - it was funny then / your joke fail

That is why I said it was too long , didn't read.

Ok now ?

Well done Starbelgrade , kudos to you and your wit.

ODS

Kasabian wrote: »

That is why I said it was too long , didn't read.

Ok now ?

Well done Starbelgrade , kudos to you and your wit.

Ah there pet, pay some attention and you might be able to keep up; otherwise if threads are too long, why post a comment?

Alternatively, Beano subscriptions that way

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>

prinz

ODS wrote: »

Prior to '97 Albania wasn't known as a rebellious country. As topper75 says, this can't continue indefinitely...

Albanians have been doing nothing else for at least a century. They just were never very successful. They had resistance movements during WW2 and again under the communist regime for 50 odd years. When you have that in your recent history overthrowing a civilian government, without an army/state security apparatus to maintain control, is child's play.

Kasabian

ODS wrote: »

Ah there pet, pay some attention and you might be able to keep up; otherwise if threads are too long, why post a comment?

Alternatively, Beano subscriptions that way

---

>

I wanted to post my joke.

* must renew Beano subscription

* must not react to arrogant response from ODS.

* oh! a rabbit

Sorry what were you saying?

Kasabian

Anyway my thoughts.

Any sort of revolt / civil unrest will only exasperate the problems we are having in this country.
It is not within these shores that decisions on our future will be made if we as a nation rise up.

All the major economic decisions will be made by others as is the case for all bankrupts.
Any comparison with Albania is futile IMO and ultimately this country will pull it's self out of the mire in parallel with the global economy..

What we need to do express our dis-satisfaction with the shower that put us in this sate, when next at the polling station.
Also we need ensure that the next shower in are placed in a transparent enviornment to be judged by the people who but them there.

Politicians should be answerable to the people and this enforced by the laws of the land.

ODS

prinz wrote: »

Albanians have been doing nothing else for at least a century. They just were never very successful. They had resistance movements during WW2 and again under the communist regime for 50 odd years. When you have that in your recent history overthrowing a civilian government, without an army/state security apparatus to maintain control, is child's play.

Okay maybe I am being taken a bit too literally, but fact is they weren't known as a rebellious country. Of itself this may have been a slight over simplification on my part - yet by the same token, historically Ireland hasn't been less rebellious than Albania, whether or not one agrees with the manner by which political violence occurred throughout the past 100s of years, up until and including the 1990s in the North.

Equally, by your reasoning, it also could be argued that as our state has very limited armed resources by which to protect itself, an overthrow would require as equal an effort as that achieved by the people who were living in Albania, a state that had its disposal the inheritance of major cold war military infrastructure by which its regime could be protected.

prinz

ODS wrote: »

Equally, by your reasoning, it also could be argued that as our state has very limited armed resources by which to protect itself, an overthrow would require as equal an effort as that achieved by the people who were living in Albania, a state that had its disposal the inheritance of major cold war military infrastructure by which its regime could be protected.

Simply put you cannot compare the two. The majority of the Albanian population lost basically every penny they had, they were ripped off by corrupt officials who were pocketing the money directly and using it in drugs and arms deals. The government fell. A new government took charge, people still revolted. It had nothing to do with punishing the government or the State. It was people seizing the opportunity in the chaos to make some money back. What happened was criminal gangs and armed militias taking over parts of the country with no rule of law left whatsoever and only to one end, profit for themselves. It ended up in the UN bringing a force in to restore calm and stop the anarchy and basically resulted in the Kosovo mess. Yes, let's go down that route :rolleyes:

ODS

Kasabian wrote: »

Anyway my thoughts.

Any sort of revolt / civil unrest will only exasperate the problems we are having in this country.
It is not within these shores that decisions on our future will be made if we as a nation rise up.

All the major economic decisions will be made by others as is the case for all bankrupts.
Any comparison with Albania is futile IMO and ultimately this country will pull it's self out of the mire in parallel with the global economy..

Well I do appreciate you are setting out your stall. But I totally disagree:

ultimately this country will pull it's self out of the mire in parallel with the global economy

To my mind, this is the same Bertie logic that it was Lehmans and the international recession that was primarily responsible for our mess. It wasn't - we were, and in particular those that headed the regime that have led us to where we are

Any sort of revolt / civil unrest will only exasperate the problems we are having in this country.
It is not within these shores that decisions on our future will be made if we as a nation rise up.

Albania seems to be doing perfectly fine thank you very much - GDP currently at 2.2%, having ranged between 5 - 7% over the last decade. This they have achieved on the back of a revolution, and without international economic insulation such as EU membership and the Euro.

Albania, Iceland - countries that are either doing relatively very well or on the road to recovery. They don't have the cancer that is FF or the poison that is NAMA where short-sighted stupid elites are bought off to the cost of the rest of the economy and society. See the difference?

prinz

ODS wrote: »

Albania seems to be doing perfectly fine thank you very much - GDP currently at 2.2%, having ranged between 5 - 7% over the last decade. This they have achieved on the back of a revolution, and without international economic insulation such as EU membership and the Euro.

It wasn't a revolution.

ODS

prinz wrote: »

Simply put you cannot compare the two. The majority of the Albanian population lost basically every penny they had, they were ripped off by corrupt officials who were pocketing the money

That sounds remarkably familiar to a certain other kleptocracy in which I have been living for the last while. I am trying to spot the difference, you know

Kosovo is a distraction, and simply because it occurred shortly after was not a result of the 1997 uprising - the rampant and ugly breakout of nationalism in the demise of Yugoslavia had much more to do with it; as far back as 1945 Marshall Tito of Yugoslavia had in fact agreed to largely release Kosovo to Albania, before reneging.


By the way fellows, can either of you tell me how the weather is down in 65-66 Mount Street today - its sunny around the rest of the city

prinz

ODS wrote: »

Kosovo is a distraction, and simply because it occurred shortly after was not a result of the 1997 uprising -

Who do you think were busy emptying police and army bases in Albania of weapons and ammunition? And pocketing money for themselves? What happened in Albania was not a widespread revolution of the people, it was public unrest hijacked by scumbags for their own gain and profit. Albania today has as much the UN and Italy to thank as anything else, as it was they who restored order for the Albanian people.

ODS

prinz wrote: »

It wasn't a revolution.

Up to 2000 dead doesn't strike me as a picnic.

And just in case I am being misunderstood as advocating revolution, as already stated, I don't desire physical political action - yet when reform is thwarted such an outcome seems increasingly likely.

prinz

ODS wrote: »

Up to 2000 dead doesn't strike me as a picnic..

It was criminal gangs murdering and looting and getting what they could while they could, and clashes with the police and army. The Albanian people had already legitimately forced a change of government. What happened after that was opportunism.

ODS

prinz wrote: »

Who do you think were busy emptying police and army bases in Albania of weapons and ammunition? And pocketing money for themselves? What happened in Albania was not a widespread revolution of the people, it was public unrest hijacked by scumbags for their own gain and profit. Albania today has as much the UN and Italy to thank as anything else, as it was they who restored order for the Albanian people.

Okay, what we can agree on is:

- Major civil unrest broke out after maladminstration by a government that encouraged a population into unsustainable speculation on a bubble

- This was not preferable and should have been avoided - provided the government had intervened responsibly so as to prevent such circumstances arising. But for their own reasons they didn't - just as our own regime is failing to do.

- During situations of civil unrest, ugly social behaviour occurs with 'scumbags' stealing and looting whatever they can - be it in Albania in '97 or our own looters that availed of Easter Week 1916.

- Ultimately the great majority of the Albanian population benefitted from the regime replacement that occurred, with GDP between 5 - 7% for the last decade, and at 2.2% during the current recession.

- Public order was restored in 1997 with the assistance of outside states - a scenario that would also likely to repeat itself if such unrest were to occur here. Equally notable is that those outside interests did not force the previous discredited regime back onto the Albanian electorate; I don't see why it should be any different here.

ODS

prinz wrote: »

The Albanian people had already legitimately forced a change of government.

Ok, so how do you reckon that should be achieved here?