Hard Choices

Centaur

Enda Kenny said in one of the debates that in the coming years everyone will suffer. He was wrong. Suffering is the privilege of the poor. I am sure that at some stage in the near future I will hear an account of misery that with make me shake my head with despair. The harder the measures imposed, the more people will fall through the cracks. The room for manoeuvre for the next government is limited as we are now essentially run by the IMF. However for many people the terms of the repayments is not a trivial matter. Stretching it from 4 to 6 six years will help ameliorate the worst of the conditions for some, as will reducing the interest payments. How we structure our tax system also matters. Stealth taxes and cuts disproportionally affect those who spend all of their disposable income i.e. the unemployed and the working poor.
As a nation we are known for our generosity (known by ourselves anyway). We give handsomely to charities but at the same time we don’t question why these charities exist. It is often trotted out from time to time, that the measure of a society is how they treat their most vulnerable. This is hardest to do in hard times. I could paraphrase JFK here and say we should do it not because it is easy but because it is hard. There is a choice to be made when you cast your vote on Friday. It should not be quick economic recovery at all costs.

Permabear

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Centaur

Permabear wrote: »

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It's not about me. I know there is a strata of society who generally speaking do not have a voice in these forums. I heard Justine McCarthy on the radio a few days ago saying that some doors to canvassers have been opened by people wearing coats because they can't afford to pay for heating. Personally speaking I would prefer to pay higher taxes if it meant a fairer deal for all.
As for the beneficiaries of excessive borrowing it was obviously the banks and bond holders. The Labour Party, as most people know, was the only party that opposed the bank guarantee.

thebaldsoprano

Centaur wrote: »

The Labour Party, as most people know, was the only party that opposed the bank guarantee.

No they didn't. They proposed 12 amendments which didn't get accepted and they voted against it because of that, but not out of opposition to the guarantee itself. If they could demonstrate how one of their amendments would have considerably eased the burden we now face that'd be fair enough, but playing "we opposed the guarantee" card is very disingenuous.

Permabear

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rodento

Part of the problem is how much we give to the so called poor

Jesus H, if you have a young family your nearly better off on our welfare state:mad:

We given so much to them that we have nearly bankrupt the state, its a case that you'll never win cause there is nearly always some sad case and 100's of other's milking the situation because of it

How much more do you want to give away

Free housing
Health Care
Cash

If we don't hit em hard, they'll never want to leave the so called welfare trap

Centaur

thebaldsoprano wrote: »

No they didn't. They proposed 12 amendments which didn't get accepted and they voted against it because of that, but not out of opposition to the guarantee itself. If they could demonstrate how one of their amendments would have considerably eased the burden we now face that'd be fair enough, but playing "we opposed the guarantee" card is very disingenuous.

12 amendments is not insignificant. The fact is they did vote against it and it is disingenuous of you to to suggest I'm being disengenuous.

Centaur

Permabear wrote: »

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So we all benefited before we went completely broke. That sounds like it came from the Fianna Fail press office.

Centaur

rodento wrote: »

Part of the problem is how much we give to the so called poor

Jesus H, if you have a young family your nearly better off on our welfare state:mad:

We given so much to them that we have nearly bankrupt the state, its a case that you'll never win cause there is nearly always some sad case and 100's of other's milking the situation because of it

How much more do you want to give away

Free housing
Health Care
Cash

If we don't hit em hard, they'll never want to leave the so called welfare trap

No need to ask where abouts on the political spectrum you are then.

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

thebaldsoprano

Centaur wrote: »

12 amendments is not insignificant. The fact is they did vote against it and it is disingenuous of you to to suggest I'm being disengenuous.

I was aiming that at Labour rather than yourself, I probably could've been a little clearer. To quote Burton:

We stood alone in opposing the original guarantee in September 2008 and we have been more than vindicated by developments since.

Centaur

Centaur wrote: »

So we all benefited before we went completely broke. That sounds like it came from the Fianna Fail press office.

It's easy to dismiss it as Fianna Fáil PR, but the reality is that almost everyone got something out of the boom. People are deluding themselves if they think otherwise - and that's not surprising. We're all down money because of the recession, and we all want to find someone else to blame and to say that they should foot the bill.

im invisible

ill just throw this in here, because why not?
Hard choices? Micheál Martin said FF were getting voted out of government, because they made the hard decisions, really?
i know f-all about economics, or politics for that matter (it annoys my head thinking about it), but i do know that banks giving 100% mortages to anybody is a bad idea, so on monday i looked up when the first 100% mortgage was in ireland, (i was lying in bed thinking about it, and it annoyed me so much, it kept me awake, so i got up and looked it up)

2005, 14th of june IIRC, 100% mortgages in Ireland.

now theres a sign, if ever there was one, that the economy is heating up too fast, someone in a position to do something about it, should have taken the hard decisions. thats what we elect them for. where was the financial regulator for the last five years, that he couldnt see what was going on? unless he was being told to do nothing...

And another thing, while im at it.
Bertie said nobody told him, nobody said anything? who were all these people cribbin' and moanin' then?

rodento

Its so easy to look back in anger, but the people leading the country, those in the main opposition and the loony left where all calling for more social spending and if anyone tried to put on the brakes, the system would have crashed, abet a little earlier

:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

No one would have made that choice

im invisible

well, not so much as putting on the brakes, as taking your foot off the accelerator. but i agree that no-one would have made the decisions then, no matter who was in power, i dont remember FG or LAB calling for cuts four years ago, or whatever.

i mean you elect someone to do a job, you think they'll be able to do it