The return of Declan Ganley

Tea drinker

IrishTonyO wrote: »

Being part of the Euro and the years preceding it lead to record low interest rates, which is one, if not the main cause of the banking problem we are experiencing now.

I Agree with this. Sure weren't we told all along we can't set our interest rate to dampen the economy and now *at the worst possible time* the interest rates magically rise! we should have left the Euro years ago, leaving with now is possibly too late.

Tea drinker

djpbarry wrote: »

I would say poor management was the main cause of the crisis – had banks no control over the interest rates they were offering on their financial products?

These dopes are far more liable for our poor standing than the low interest Euro. Is there something about their previous behaviour which leads you to belive in what you typed above or are you just highlighting their failings? Central bank is in charge of lending regardless, anoher bunch of morons.

Scofflaw

Tea drinker wrote: »

I Agree with this. Sure weren't we told all along we can't set our interest rate to dampen the economy and now *at the worst possible time* the interest rates magically rise! we should have left the Euro years ago, leaving with now is possibly too late.

Not sure what you're trying to say there - the ECB hasn't raised interest rates:

IT, 02/10 wrote:

The European Central Bank held interest rates at a record low today and extended its liquidity safety-net in response to a lopsided recovery and worries about vulnerable banks.

And the point that Irish banks have raised their interest rates, and that the Central Bank is "in charge of lending" are rather opposed to the handy laying of the blame at the doors of the ECB.

Still, since Declan Ganley predicted none of these things, I'm not sure what the relevance is.

cordially,
Scofflaw

djpbarry

Tea drinker wrote: »

Is there something about their previous behaviour which leads you to belive in what you typed above or are you just highlighting their failings?

The latter. The banks didn't have to offer cheap credit to everyone who asked and everyone (not literally everyone, of course) didn't have to blow said credit on property. Blaming our economic collapse on low interest rates is like blaming McDonalds for obesity.

Raskolnikov

Has anyone been following him on Twitter? http://twitter.com/declanganley

While Brian Cowen, Eamonn Gilmore and Enda Kenny are all advocating slash and burn policies to appease the Wall Street speculators, Ganley seems to be one of the few sane voices that's willing to say that enough is enough. I don't agree with him on a lot of things, but right now, he's one of the few sane voices who doesn't seem hellbent of wrecking the country for future generations.

galwayrush

Raskolnikov wrote: »

Has anyone been following him on Twitter? http://twitter.com/declanganley

While Brian Cowen, Eamonn Gilmore and Enda Kenny are all advocating slash and burn policies to appease the Wall Street speculators, Ganley seems to be one of the few sane voices that's willing to say that enough is enough. I don't agree with him on a lot of things, but right now, he's one of the few sane voices who doesn't seem hellbent of wrecking the country for future generations.

Have to agree, looks like his pre Lisbon treaty warnings that were scoffed at are sadly turning out to be true. Right now, i'd vote for him.

djpbarry

Raskolnikov wrote: »

While Brian Cowen, Eamonn Gilmore and Enda Kenny are all advocating slash and burn policies to appease the Wall Street speculators, Ganley seems to be one of the few sane voices that's willing to say that enough is enough.

Ganley will say whatever the listener du jour wants to hear – it’s all a load of hollow sound-bites.

evercloserunion

galwayrush wrote: »

Have to agree, looks like his pre Lisbon treaty warnings that were scoffed at are sadly turning out to be true. Right now, i'd vote for him.

Such as?

jock101

kickoutthejams wrote: »

He canvassed me during the 2009 elections, very dodgy character.

And the other clowns are not?:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:
Especially the one's in power!:mad:

galwayrush

evercloserunion wrote: »

Such as?

Loss of sovereignty , European army.

goose2005

Scofflaw wrote: »

We tried that last time with the Libertas manifesto for the Euro elections, and they definitely hadn't published them on the 1st of June, 4 days before the vote. I'm not sure if they ever did publish a manifesto - the only summary of their position I've seen is on Wikipedia, scarily enough.

I don't think I've ever seen a summary of FF's positions beyond "um... do, you know, good things?"

Ben Hadad wrote: »

Will Declan be heavily funded this time around from unknown sources, which may or may not have an affect on his political convictions?

Well my friendly local FF TD got €10,000 from the construction industry to fund her campaign.

K-9

galwayrush wrote: »

European army.

There must be jobs in it. Where do I enlist?

PanchoVilla

He predicted a further loss of Irish sovereignty and an erosion of Ireland's power in the EU. The new changes to Lisbon the Germans are demanding regarding the suspension of voting rights for any country deemed in violation of EU standards fits into that category quite nicely. Lisbon is far from over and we have yet to see what's really planned for the EU. Give it another few years and I think people like Scofflaw will be/should be apologizing to people like Ganley.

Edit: I believe another change proposed will make bank bailouts mandatory throughout the EU, meaning Ireland will not only be forced to bail out our own incompetent banks but those of other EU countries through EU budget contributions.

irishh_bob

Tea drinker wrote: »

I Agree with this. Sure weren't we told all along we can't set our interest rate to dampen the economy and now *at the worst possible time* the interest rates magically rise! we should have left the Euro years ago, leaving with now is possibly too late.

we should never have joined the eurozone in the 1st place , thier are many reasons but the main reason why we shouldnt is because the britts didnt , thier by far our biggest trading partner and due to the strength of the euro v sterling this past number of years , our exports have suffered badly

K-9

PanchoVilla wrote: »

The new changes to Lisbon the Germans are demanding regarding the suspension of voting rights for any country deemed in violation of EU standards fits into that category quite nicely.

That isn't in the agreed plan AFAIK. I think Euro sceptics hear some politician saying these things and forget that EU is about 27 countries or 16 with the Euro. Just because a few politicians say something doesn't mean it will happen.

K-9

irishh_bob wrote: »

we should never have joined the eurozone in the 1st place , thier are many reasons but the main reason why we shouldnt is because the britts didnt , thier by far our biggest trading partner and due to the strength of the euro v sterling this past number of years , our exports have suffered badly

We reduced our dependence on them and the Euro area is now our biggest export market. Breaking our economic ties with them isn't all bad news.

PanchoVilla

K-9 wrote: »

That isn't in the agreed plan AFAIK. I think Euro sceptics hear some politician saying these things and forget that EU is about 27 countries or 16 with the Euro. Just because a few politicians say something doesn't mean it will happen.

No, it's very much part of the plan and Merckel is pushing it pretty hard. They've tabled it for the moment as many EU member states are very concerned with it but it hasn't been dismissed completely.

Berlin is now insistent that the bailout fund needs to be put on a permanent and sound legal footing, partly because it fears the German constitutional court will rule that the fund breaches article 125 of the Lisbon Treaty, namely the no bailout clause.

Germany also wants the EU to be able to suspend a country's voting rights if it repeatedly breaches deficit and debt rules. If that option and the bailout fund both require a re-opening of the Lisbon Treaty, says Berlin, then so be it.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2010/1028/treaty.html

Edit: By the article it would seem that the EU was in violation of the Lisbon Treaty when they bailed out Greece. Now they want to change the treaty quickly to avoid any legal repercussions for making that decision.

1. The Union shall not be liable for or assume the commitments of central governments, regional, local or other public authorities, other bodies governed by public law, or public undertakings of any Member State, without prejudice to mutual financial guarantees for the joint execution of a specific project. A Member State shall not be liable for or assume the commitments of central governments, regional, local or other public authorities, other bodies governed by public law, or public undertakings of another Member State, without prejudice to mutual financial guarantees for the joint execution of a specific project.

http://www.lisbon-treaty.org/wcm/the-lisbon-treaty/treaty-on-the-functioning-of-the-european-union-and-comments/part-3-union-policies-and-internal-actions/title-viii-economic-and-monetary-policy/chapter-1-economic-policy/393-article-125.html

K-9

PanchoVilla wrote: »

No, it's very much part of the plan and Merckel is pushing it pretty hard. They've tabled it for the moment as many EU member states are very concerned with it but it hasn't been dismissed completely.



http://www.rte.ie/news/2010/1028/treaty.html

Edit: By the article it would seem that the EU was in violation of the Lisbon Treaty when they bailed out Greece. Now they want to change the treaty quickly to avoid any legal repercussions for making that decision.



http://www.lisbon-treaty.org/wcm/the-lisbon-treaty/treaty-on-the-functioning-of-the-european-union-and-comments/part-3-union-policies-and-internal-actions/title-viii-economic-and-monetary-policy/chapter-1-economic-policy/393-article-125.html

Focusing on what one country wants, while interesting, means little.

Here's a good piece from after the negotiations:
Compromise may heal rift for now, but trouble lies ahead - The Irish Times - Sat, Oct 30, 2010

However, there are fears in Berlin that Germany’s powerful constitutional court will take issue with it in a ruling due next spring.
This helps explain Dr Merkel’s push for a revision of the treaty, something designed to iron out any lingering questions over the legality of the rescue mechanism. She has a result on this front, but her plan to deprive governments with wayward finances of their voting rights was rebuffed. Her opponents on this front included Greek prime minister George Papandreou, a man so hostile to the notion of “second-class” EU membership with no votes that he is reputed to have told Dr Merkel she might as well take back Berlin’s loans to Athens.




Most of the proposals seem reasonable enough. Wish they had actually fined McCreevey and Cowen for ignoring warnings on the economy!

djpbarry

PanchoVilla wrote: »

No, it's very much part of the plan and Merckel is pushing it pretty hard.

Might have something to do with the fact that several member states, including Ireland, keep pissing German money up a badly-insulated wall. Just a thought.

PanchoVilla

K-9 wrote: »

Focusing on what one country wants, while interesting, means little.

Here's a good piece from after the negotiations:
Compromise may heal rift for now, but trouble lies ahead - The Irish Times - Sat, Oct 30, 2010

However, there are fears in Berlin that Germany’s powerful constitutional court will take issue with it in a ruling due next spring.
This helps explain Dr Merkel’s push for a revision of the treaty, something designed to iron out any lingering questions over the legality of the rescue mechanism. She has a result on this front, but her plan to deprive governments with wayward finances of their voting rights was rebuffed. Her opponents on this front included Greek prime minister George Papandreou, a man so hostile to the notion of “second-class” EU membership with no votes that he is reputed to have told Dr Merkel she might as well take back Berlin’s loans to Athens.




Most of the proposals seem reasonable enough. Wish they had actually fined McCreevey and Cowen for ignoring warnings on the economy!

So they broke the treaty which they wrote up and everyone signed up to and now want to change the treaty quickly to avoid legal ramifications for breaking it in the first place. I don't know, but that sounds pretty suspect to me. I wonder if these questionable changes will only be the first in a complete reworking of the entire treaty without the consent of the original signatories. Reminds me of the countless broken treaties signed between the U.S. federal government and the native Americans during the 19th and 20th centuries.

PanchoVilla

djpbarry wrote: »

Might have something to do with the fact that several member states, including Ireland, keep pissing German money up a badly-insulated wall. Just a thought.

It actually has nothing to do with what Ireland does with EU funding. We only get EU funding for specific projects and the EU are careful to ensure it's spent correctly.

This is about stealing money from taxpayers to bail out corrupt, incompetent private banks throughout Europe. It's about making that practice legally binding so that future governments will be forced to bail out private banks using taxpayers money. It's a complete reversal of article 125 of the Lisbon Treaty.

Lockstep

jock101 wrote: »

And the other clowns are not?:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:
Especially the one's in power!:mad:

No other candidate came close to being as dubious as him.

I've been canvassed by pretty much every party in the West (even Republican Sinn Féin came to my house) but he was by far the creepiest.

sensibleken

kickoutthejams wrote: »

No other candidate came close to being as dubious as him.

I've been canvassed by pretty much every party in the West (even Republican Sinn Féin came to my house) but he was by far the creepiest.

dead right, he's CEO of rivada networks who are a military contractor for the US army. And refused to divulge where he got his money from.

I love the way he courted the anti- war crowd without them doing even a tiny bit of research on the man.

djpbarry

PanchoVilla wrote: »

It actually has nothing to do with what Ireland does with EU funding. We only get EU funding for specific projects and the EU are careful to ensure it's spent correctly.

I didn’t mean literally. It’s about putting a solid mechanism in place to essentially ensure that, so far as is possible, we don’t end up with another Greek crisis in the Eurozone.

PanchoVilla wrote: »

This is about stealing money from taxpayers to bail out corrupt, incompetent private banks throughout Europe. It's about making that practice legally binding so that future governments will be forced to bail out private banks using taxpayers money. It's a complete reversal of article 125 of the Lisbon Treaty.

I have no idea where you’re getting that from, but it sounds like something straight out of the Declan Ganley hand-book.

Lockstep

djpbarry wrote: »

I have no idea where you’re getting that from, but it sounds like something straight out of the Declan Ganley hand-book.

He gave me a copy of his book "The fight for flight of Democracy"
Really bizarre stuff.

Scofflaw

There seems to be a good deal of confusion over what's happening at the moment, but there are a few clear points:

1. the "Lisbon Treaty" is not being re-opened. The Lisbon Treaty is finished with - it was an amending treaty, and has done its bit. Any revisions involve opening the Treaty on European Union or the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, which were the treaties Lisbon amended.

2. the bailout fund for Greece isn't an EU fund, but an intergovernmental fund in the form of a limited company with the countries as stakeholders. It is therefore not in breach of Article 125, because it is not legally a Union issue.

3. German involvement in the fund has been challenged on the basis that it is against the German constitution and against the EU treaties - however, the case is highly unlikely to be successful. The participants are serial unsuccessful litigators against anything EU - having previously attempted to block Lisbon and the adoption of the euro - and include our old friend Schnachtscheider, who was responsible for the particularly daft claim that Lisbon reintroduced the death penalty.

4. unless the German case is, to general surprise, successful, claiming that the Treaties have already been breached has no legal foundation.

5. the Germans have not succeeded in getting the suspension of voting rights included in the sanctions deal - that turns out to have been a sacrificial pawn. That's hardly surprising, since it was never going to be a runner, but the Germans have to be on board:

Merkel was reportedly the central figure in the negotiations, taking a hard line on Germany’s demands. However, she failed to push through the suspension of voting rights for those EU countries failing to fulfil their financial commitments.

“Merkel became quite emotional during the debate about voting rights,” said one EU diplomat.

But by abandoning that demand, the chancellor was able to convince other EU leaders to back her other priorities.

As for trade with the UK, it now forms only 16% of our exports, and 30% of our imports, whereas the eurozone countries form 45% of our exports and 28% of our imports.

Finally, what Declan Ganley claimed about Lisbon remains 99% spoof, and the main reason people think he's right is because they still don't know what's going on. His claims relied on people misunderstanding the EU, Lisbon, and Ireland's relationship with the EU - luckily for his credit in No circles, some people still cling to those misunderstandings. People are like that, though - there are still believers in orthodox Stalinism out there, next to the MMR-autism people, the mercantilists, and the rest of the some of the people who can be fooled all of the time.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Avgas

Scofflaw wrote: »

There seems to be a good deal of confusion over what's happening at the moment, but there are a few clear points:

2. the bailout fund for Greece isn't an EU fund, but an intergovernmental fund in the form of a limited company with the countries as stakeholders. It is therefore not in breach of Article 125, because it is not legally a Union issue.

3. German involvement in the fund has been challenged on the basis that it is against the German constitution and against the EU treaties - however, the case is highly unlikely to be successful."

Some more details to back these welcome assertions would be welcome Scofflaw if you've time. How can you be so sure about assertions 2 and 3? (Your other points are totally sound)

I found this on the web which puts across a different view (please convince me its all wrong).

"the German think-tank Centrum für Europäische Politik has now also produced a very interesting study on the topic. In the study, the CEP trashes the legality of the €60 billion credit facility, agreed in May (as part of the €500 billion bailout package). This facility, as we set out here, involves the European Commission borrowing on the markets, using the EU budget as collateral. The legal base for the fund is Article 122 of the EU Treaties, intended to provide assistance to EU states in the event of natural disasters or sudden energy blackouts, ("exceptional circumstances" beyond a member state's control, as the text states).

The study is all over the German press - and it certainly provides ammunition to the legal challenges against the bailout, currently making their way through the German Constitutional Court. The study claims that the public has been deceived on several points, arguing that the aid scheme will not be limited to three years, as the Commission claims, but would be “installed indefinitely”.

http://openeuropeblog.blogspot.com/2010/07/is-eurozone-bailout-legal.html


I'm not familiar with this German think-tank. Of course its possible its partisan and reflecting more the fringes of CSU/FDP type rhetoric of the issue. Moreover since then it may have been defused as an 'expert view'....but I for one am far from convinced a neat argument can be made that the German legal challenge is without any foundation or chance of success.....if it wasn't such a threat why all the supposedly limited Treaty changes that nobody says they want?

IrishTonyO

Scofflaw wrote: »

There seems to be a good deal of confusion over what's happening at the moment, but there are a few clear points:

1. the "Lisbon Treaty" is not being re-opened. The Lisbon Treaty is finished with - it was an amending treaty, and has done its bit. Any revisions involve opening the Treaty on European Union or the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, which were the treaties Lisbon amended.

2. the bailout fund for Greece isn't an EU fund, but an intergovernmental fund in the form of a limited company with the countries as stakeholders. It is therefore not in breach of Article 125, because it is not legally a Union issue.

3. German involvement in the fund has been challenged on the basis that it is against the German constitution and against the EU treaties - however, the case is highly unlikely to be successful. The participants are serial unsuccessful litigators against anything EU - having previously attempted to block Lisbon and the adoption of the euro - and include our old friend Schnachtscheider, who was responsible for the particularly daft claim that Lisbon reintroduced the death penalty.

4. unless the German case is, to general surprise, successful, claiming that the Treaties have already been breached has no legal foundation.

5. the Germans have not succeeded in getting the suspension of voting rights included in the sanctions deal - that turns out to have been a sacrificial pawn. That's hardly surprising, since it was never going to be a runner, but the Germans have to be on board:



As for trade with the UK, it now forms only 16% of our exports, and 30% of our imports, whereas the eurozone countries form 45% of our exports and 28% of our imports.

Finally, what Declan Ganley claimed about Lisbon remains 99% spoof, and the main reason people think he's right is because they still don't know what's going on. His claims relied on people misunderstanding the EU, Lisbon, and Ireland's relationship with the EU - luckily for his credit in No circles, some people still cling to those misunderstandings. People are like that, though - there are still believers in orthodox Stalinism out there, next to the MMR-autism people, the mercantilists, and the rest of the some of the people who can be fooled all of the time.

cordially,
Scofflaw

I think you should clarify the above which you claim are clear points. Some are facts and some are your opinions, you should identify which are facts and which are your opinions.

Scofflaw

Avgas wrote: »

Scofflaw wrote: »

There seems to be a good deal of confusion over what's happening at the moment, but there are a few clear points:

2. the bailout fund for Greece isn't an EU fund, but an intergovernmental fund in the form of a limited company with the countries as stakeholders. It is therefore not in breach of Article 125, because it is not legally a Union issue.

3. German involvement in the fund has been challenged on the basis that it is against the German constitution and against the EU treaties - however, the case is highly unlikely to be successful."

Some more details to back these welcome assertions would be welcome Scofflaw if you've time. How can you be so sure about assertions 2 and 3? (Your other points are totally sound)

To be fair, there is a certain legal sleight of hand involved here. The fund is not set up as an EU fund, but an intergovernmental SPV with the participating states as shareholders - details are here, and the states aren't guaranteeing the loans made to member states, but instead are guaranteeing the funds raised from third parties by the company. The fund is not legally based in the EU Treaties, but has its own intergovernmental agreement - the European Financial Stability Facility Framework Agreement (in Ireland, participation in that Agreement takes the form of the European Financial Stability Facility Bill 2010). No breach of Article 125 is involved, because no member state is taking on the liabilities of any other, but only a liability to third parties who the fund raises money from.

However, the point about legal sleight of hand is that the law is what is written as the law, as we've found in the case of NAMA with developers' wives.

As to the German case, there's quite a bit of analysis out there on it, and the most likely result seems at the moment to be a dismissal on the basis of the plaintiffs having no standing:

The latest case also doesn’t have strong chances for success, one law professor said.

“Calling it absurd sounds a bit hard, but the suit seems to claim that German citizens have an individual right to have the government keep the currency stable,” Christian Graf von Pestalozza, professor emeritus of constitutional law at Berlin’s Free University, said in an interview yesterday. “We all know it doesn’t work that way. At least in the copy of the constitution I have, you don’t find such a right.”

Individual Harm

The court is likely to reject the case for procedural reasons, because individual citizens can’t base a suit on the fact that EU laws may have been violated, Pestalozza said. The plaintiffs can’t show that they are directly and individually affected by the aid to Greece, he said.

The suit argues that the court said in earlier cases that citizens may sue if the EU oversteps the powers it was granted under the treaties. Since EU stability rules, including the no bailout-clause, were violated by the Greek aid, the court needs to step in, the lawsuit says.

In addition to the EU arguments, the group says that the German constitutional right to the protection of property covers currency stability.

“Economic stability is a paramount value under our constitution, the court has said that many times,” Schachtschneider said. In a previous decision on the EU treaties “the court said that Germany needs to leave the EU if the stability policies are undermined.”

The difficulty here for the plaintiffs is that they need to show that they have personally been affected in order for them to have standing in the case, and then they need to show that Article 125 can be held to bind the member states when they're acting through something other than the EU, as well as defeating the legal obstacle presented by the arrangement of gaurantees.

The involvement of Schachtschneider, I have to say, makes it appear to me as likely to be largely a nuisance case, but we'll see.

Avgas wrote: »

I found this on the web which puts across a different view (please convince me its all wrong).

"the German think-tank Centrum für Europäische Politik has now also produced a very interesting study on the topic. In the study, the CEP trashes the legality of the €60 billion credit facility, agreed in May (as part of the €500 billion bailout package). This facility, as we set out here, involves the European Commission borrowing on the markets, using the EU budget as collateral. The legal base for the fund is Article 122 of the EU Treaties, intended to provide assistance to EU states in the event of natural disasters or sudden energy blackouts, ("exceptional circumstances" beyond a member state's control, as the text states).

The study is all over the German press - and it certainly provides ammunition to the legal challenges against the bailout, currently making their way through the German Constitutional Court. The study claims that the public has been deceived on several points, arguing that the aid scheme will not be limited to three years, as the Commission claims, but would be “installed indefinitely”.

http://openeuropeblog.blogspot.com/2010/07/is-eurozone-bailout-legal.html


I'm not familiar with this German think-tank. Of course its possible its partisan and reflecting more the fringes of CSU/FDP type rhetoric of the issue. Moreover since then it may have been defused as an 'expert view'....but I for one am far from convinced a neat argument can be made that the German legal challenge is without any foundation or chance of success.....if it wasn't such a threat why all the supposedly limited Treaty changes that nobody says they want?

The German think-tank in question is an 'ordoliberal' think tank - which is to say liberalism within a state-regulated framework. That's a pretty mainstream view in Germany, as far as I know, having been the foundation of their immediately post-war growth.

The study in question does challenge the legality of the fund, but does so largely on the same basis as the current case - again, as a result, it's likely to run into the same issue that nothing in the Treaties can automatically be held to exclude aid between member states other than through the EU.

Open Europe's analysis of it, though...is not something I'd give any more weight to than I would to Schnachtschneider's opinion, I have to say. Both have a very strong track record of making extremely tendentious interpretations of EU-related matters. Schnachtschneider's claim during Lisbon that the Treaty reinstated the death penalty was utter rubbish, and when a law professor comes out with utter rubbish one is relatively certain that it's not through innocence of the law, while Open Europe would quite happily publish "research" showing Lady Di had been killed by the EU if they thought that would be believed.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Scofflaw

It's perhaps worth pointing out that the Germans see economics and politics as inter-dependent to a far higher degree than most other nations - the economic failure of Weimar is seen as largely responsible for the rise of National Socialism and the disasters that followed from Hitler's regime.

The majority of European states see a stable and strong economy as the foundation for a strong state on the world stage, whereas the Germans see it as the foundation of the stability of the state itself. Ireland, by contrast, seems to see the economy as simply a money pot out of which one can hope to pull more than other people.

cordially,
Scofflaw