Are the Irish fit to be let at the controls?

nachouser

..

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121813657#Comment_121813657

His description of Islam has truth in ever syllable.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121818562#Comment_121818562

The acceptable face of racism raises its ugly head.

Its always ironic when Colonialists frame themselves as the virtuous face of expansionist domination and cry fowl of anyone else doing a very similar thing. Before you cry fowl, ask the millions of Bangladeshi's who starved at the hands of Churchill, or of Boers who died in British concentration camps - or closer to home the millions of Irish who were allowed to starve due to British inaction.

Milominderbender

Anyone who thinks Irish people run Ireland is incredibly naive. Just look at our nation's foreign policy for instance.

Potatoeman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121818991#Comment_121818991

Islam is not a race. Islam spread out of Saudi Arabia on the tip of a sword. They are just as colonial as the British.

Plutarch

There are competent, dedicated people all over this country. They just refuse to work for or in an idiotic state that takes 60% of their wealth and squanders it on shite.

Jim2007

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121811132#Comment_121811132

First of all we did not vote twice on the Lisbon treaty and the only stain is your demonstration of your lack of understanding of how our democracy works, or maybe you just don't understand how a negotiation works....

When the Irish people voted to change the constitution in order to join what was then the EEC and now the EU, they deliberately restricted the role of the government to only negotiate on their behalf only. And that means the people must be consulted on the out come of each round of negotiations and they are perfectly free to reject a proposal and send the government back for another round discussions and continue to repeat this process until they get a solution that is acceptable to them. That is how negotiations works. And as the treaty approval process now involves the approval of 38 regional and national parliaments, plus the peoples of three or on some occasions four states the chances of having to vote several times on the outcome of negotiations is a real thing.

Nothing in our constitution restricts us in any way from reconsider a matter as often as we like and rightly so, times changes, circumstances change, peoples attitudes change and so on. And we'd be very foolish to put any such restriction on ourselves.

The only people coming with this nonsense about voting twice on the same thing either

• Fail to appreciate how our democracy works
• Are seeking an excuse for their failure to convince the voters of their cause
• Are seeking thwart and deny us our democratic rights as set out in the constitution which was enacted by the people.

Ireland and Switzerland (where I now live) have one of the strongest forms of democracy around as they both have a sovereign people. The people, not parliament determine the destination of the nation and unlike most other countries, only the people can change the constitution and parliament is subject to the people.

And you'd do well to education yourself on just how well our democracy works before making such statements.

AMKC

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121806021#Comment_121806021

Na. The IMF will be back in the UK before they are back here. The UK economy will go bust in the next decade sometime.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121822691#Comment_121822691

...plenty of competent and dedicated working for state also, many complete gangster's working for both the state and in the private sector to though, doing everything in their power to extract as much as possible from the state, and maintaining the status quo.....

...childrens hospital.....

....doing everything to maintain elevated property prices...

...the list goes on and on.....

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121822743#Comment_121822743

The two are not mutually exclusive. The UK if it falls over will be due to trying to fund a third world country (NI/Scotland/Wales/Northern england) on the income from the city of london. Our collapse, if it comes, will be if FDI withdraws en masse and we have not replaced the high rate of corporation tax take (in euro, not %) we currently enjoy.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121822781#Comment_121822781

Don't feed the new-reg!

I agree there have been a lot of problems here, which is the point of the thread really, "are the Irish fit to be let at the controls?" I'd suggest NO.

The problem is, who do we go to? The US is a basket case, the UK is eating itself, the Germans (and thus the EU) is in recession.

This content has been removed.

Francis McM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121823180#Comment_121823180

Fair points well said.

You say "everyone and their dog wanting to live here"...well, we have plenty of space, a moderate climate ( not too cold, not too hot ), are a member of the EU, are English speaking ....so have a lot going for us.

"everyone and their dog" wants to live in other western countries too. If you are a poor uneducated person from the third world you certainly will not get in to Australia, America or most developed countries either. Not easily anyway.

Certainly though far away fields are green and property prices are also expensive in most of the developed world, especially in nice areas or big cities.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121822595#Comment_121822595

The joys of pedantry.

People who hate Muslims are racists.

end of the road

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121822595#Comment_121822595

islam is not a race is not a get out clause for racism.

using islam as a way to attack people is racist.

Frank Bullitt

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121819437#Comment_121819437

Anyone who thinks Irish people do not run Ireland are morons.

Real Donald Trump

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121825996#Comment_121825996

Racist this and racist that, Islam is an ideology something that doesn't agree with western liberal values that's for sure.

Potatoeman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121825996#Comment_121825996

By that logic if you don’t like Lisa Smith coming back to Ireland then you are racist, even though she’s ethnically Irish. Islam is a religion and is open to criticism like any other. The same posters pushing this now have no problem criticising the Church, a few years ago it was ‘all religion is poison’ but that was dumped for the lefts love of Islam. Which is frankly bizarre as it’s far more adverse to the ideologies of the left.

end of the road

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121826087#Comment_121826087

same as catholicism or any other religion.

the bare basic stuff you get in a church in ireland is not the full teaching of the church or the religion.

anyway, if you use religion as a way to attack someone because of the color of their skin or their race, then that is racist.

that is just the full and unfeathered fact and reality.

end of the road

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121826809#Comment_121826809

no, simply not liking the fact lisa smith came back to ireland is not racist.

islam is open to criticism yes, but that is not a get out clause for racism.

criticising islam as a way to attack someone is racist.

criticising islam or any religion without using it to attack people is perfectly fine.

Larbre34

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121806021#Comment_121806021

This is the greatest crock of excrement I ever read.

boetstark

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121822743#Comment_121822743

You sure. A country that owes approx 240 billion and not a cent paid off our debt.

Yet throwing millions at white elephants such as 1 billion to NI and god knows how much on every waster from around the globe being welcomed to join us.

Ireland has a very buoyant but small non diversified economy. When the fdi money goes which it will , the old and new irish will be back to eating grass.

Unfortunately it's normal people will suffer, not the architects of this crash.

I take zero pleasure in stating this , hopefully it doesn't happen within next 5 years or I will be on the grass diet also.

Emblematic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121811805#Comment_121811805

Well strictly speaking, the French and the Dutch voted on the European Constitution and rejected it, at which point further referendums were cancelled. What was going to be the European Constitution then morphed into the Lisbon Treaty. So effectively three countries voted on it.

Larbre34

Where are you getting this from you moron??

Ireland's national debt peaked at 133% of GDP 12 years ago.

Its now at 58% of GDP and falling towards a projected 35% of GDP.

The figure in Euros is meaningless! Our economy is one of the most diversified in the western World. FDI is not a sector; biomedical is a sector; Fintech is a sector; microchips is a sector. They don't all fall and rise dependently!

Here's a graph below of the actual burden of debt on the Exchequer, relative to the spending power of that sector.

In the meantime, maybe take an evening class for yourself in Macroeconomics.

smallbeef

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121828303#Comment_121828303

Please explain why the euro amount of our debt doesn't matter?

JPCN1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058337551/are-the-irish-fit-to-be-let-at-the-controls

Yes... and no.

Depends which Irish we are talking about. Our current front bench is the worst I think in the history of the State.

Varadkar, Martin x 2, Ryan, O'Gorman, McEntee, Donnelly, Harris, Foley, McConalogue all sub par. Some first time TD's given senior ministries, seriously? All may indeed be very nice and committed people but I would consider failing in their briefs and the main opposition will be worse which is a very, very bleak vista. Idealism trumping pragmatism. The sound bite over the hard choice. Too eager to be seen as good boys in Europe where again we send sub par politicians imo who don't fight hard enough for the country.

This is/was the golden chance to fix health, education, improve equality, Infrastructure etc. Politicians from the 80's where there was no money and little hope would weep at the waste. The Children's hospital just the latest cherry on the cake. It's slipping through our fingers.

I posted on another thread that some family were paid 130 million since 2020 to house refugees (an issue that has been swept under the carpet until the public decided that had enough of being Gaslit by politicians).

I also posted a link to to a Barnardos study... (Rte not Gript) "which found that 41% of parents have said they had skipped meals or reduced portion sizes to enable their children to have food. Absolutely shameful.

https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2024/0227/1434595-food-survey/

I think a first step would be to halve the number of Politicians and pay them better, But something has to change.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121828625#Comment_121828625

I think a first step would be to halve the number of Politicians and pay them better, But something has to change.

If you halve the number of politicians you will be trying to form a cabinet out of 40-50 people. You think that is going to lead to a better front bench?

joseywhales

Find me a non corrupt government. It's impossible, you can only minimize the corruption by setting good legislation and checks and balances. In a free country it will always look terrible because they can't hide it as easily or indefinitely like they can in an authoritarian state. We should definitely continuously push for more policing of government and corporate power, as much as possible, it's like trimming your hedge, it's a necessary chore, heads must roll on the regular to keep leaders someway straight.

JPCN1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121828794#Comment_121828794

There will be 168 I think in the next Dail. So 80 or more to choose from but hopefully better qualified to manage departments. One Healy Rae instead of two and 30 teachers back in school. No need for so many junior ministries either.

Larbre34

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121828507#Comment_121828507

If you and your partner take home €6,000 a month and get a mortgage on a €350k house, with all else being equal, your repayments will be about €1,300 per month, or 22% of your take home pay.

But if we come back to you in 5 years, and your monthly take-home is, say, €8,500 a month and increased interest rates have pushed your mortgage repayment to €1,700 per month, the overall burden has actually dropped to 20%. And your asset value/equity has probably gone up by 25% in the same period too.

But the Irish economy didn't just increase by 40% in 5 years, like our household above.

It has actually increased by a stonking 175% over 12 years, so even if the Euro value of debt hasn't changed much, the overall burden on us has dropped like a stone, as I demonstrated above.

*Irish sovereign debt issue is the most in-demand and cheapest in Europe. Calls by the Treasury Management Agency to issue new debt/bonds/paper are always WAY oversubscribed by the market.

*The Treasury Management Agency has been able to consistently re-finance our crisis era debt for cheaper rates, so secure is it, even in an era of rising wholesale rates.

*National debt is accrued by the annual Exchequer deficit (more expenditure than income). Ireland doesn't have a budget deficit, we have, in fact, a €10 Billion annual SURPLUS. This means we can pay down debt AND set up several strategic and sovereign wealth funds to insure the economy against knocks in the long term. Ireland had NEVER had the capacity to do that before. In fact, very few Countries ever do.

*Ireland's population is growing. Not as a burden, but actually as one of the most productive in the World. We have high skills and full employment, which means any debt burden is further and further diluted by fundamental growth, not any kind of temporary or artificial returns from any particular sector.

So there you have it. The Euro amount of debt is not important. Not even a bit. Its all about the burden. And we don't actually have one. Not anymore.

Its always made me wonder why the current Government is so reticent to shout all this from the rooftops? Probably because public sector project management is so bad. But thats another story.

Let me leave you with this:

Don't take my word for it. Find Ireland on this graph below, and you may be pleasantly surprised. And this is EU level data, not anything that may have been manipulated here in Dublin. And stop worrying for Christ's sake, go out and make some money for yourself while the good times roll.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121828868#Comment_121828868

You can only chose from those in your majority...