Liam Cosgrave RIP

blanch152 wrote: »

What does modernise mean?

I am guilty of using the same language from time to time but in reality when you use the word "modernise", you are attempting to put down the opposite side by portraying them as backwards looking.

Cosgrave would probably say that he was looking for a return to traditional values. Again, that might be a phrase used by an Irish language lobbyist or a traditional republican in another context at a different time and be welcomed by some of the people now criticising Cosgrave.

Language has a power all by itself. Context is everything.

The context was a political party trying to make peoples lives better and free them from enslavement to outdated moral dogma of one church essentially, by giving them choice.

Liam decided he knew better like many Roman Catholic males.

kk.man wrote: »

It's very easy be populist and stand on a soap box these days. I lived in 70s Ireland it was not a revolutionary decade. Mass attendance was at an all time high, seminaries were full and conservative politics were in vogue. So to say regressive and not modernising people's well being is far wide of the mark by voting against contraception.

His party were attempting to modernise society - which is hardly a revolutionary thing to do - Liam went against his party policy and stood for the traditional Roman Catholic stance. That is regressive all day long.

FrancieBrady wrote: »

If he is pandering to people who don't want to move forward ie 'conserve', then he is being regressive, ie, he wants to go back or tread water.

Cosgrove was a conservative who sought to hold back the rights of men and women.

Once again we are seeing the misuse of language.

Regressive is someone who wants to reverse change (note I am calling it change, not modernisation).

Conservative is someone who wants to retain the status quo or only make small changes.

Labelling also depends on a point of view. You could argue that someone who believes Ireland should be united for the first time since Brian Boru is the ultimate regressive or that someone who believes the island should live in peace and harmony under the one flag is the ultimate progressive. Another person might call either of them naive.

All of those are labels from different perspectives.

kk.man wrote: »

There is no factual proof of a 'heavy gang' and certainly no imposition of rights. Regression is imprinted all over Fiinna Fail long history in power under Dev.
You are on a liberal soap box which you are quite entited, however they are others who make up this country which can express their views and opinions. I prefer looking at this debate from a holistic view point.

OK, no factual proof of a 'heavy gang'? I'm out. When you get down to arguing about a word your client is in bother.
Carry on with the canonisation.

kk.man wrote: »

On your last point he would not have been a policitial hero of mine, I simply admired him as he was a man for his time.
I prefer to look objectively on these political/social issues.

You are not looking objectively, you are looking at him through an excusing filter (in bold above)

Is Harvey Weinstein excused because 'he is a man for his time'? You can excuse anyone with that subjective phrase

The truth being told finally.

“any assessment of Liam Cosgrave’s life must also include a discussion of his willingness to indulge in such authoritarian populist rhetoric…and his government’s record regarding civil liberties”.

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/diarmaid-ferriter-cosgrave-s-support-of-the-garda-cast-a-long-shadow-1.3255166

Matt Barrett wrote: »

You misused the term. He was populist by definition and your summation. Populism isn't going with the popular flow, only if the popular flow is liberal.

I'm afraid this is wrong. Populism is a political position which seeks to represent and support the views of ordinary people, regardless of whether those views are liberal or conservative, progressive or regressive, and (the controversial bit) well-though-out or ill-informed and unwise. The point about populism is that it treats the views, wishes, etc of "ordinary people" as authoritative in themselves, regardless of how good or bad they may be when judged against other criteria. Thus a populist will advocate for the popular policy regardless of whether it will produce a good outcome.

Trump, for example, is a populist.

A populist defence of Brexit would be to point out that it has been mandated by referendum, as though this point somehow defuses or answers objections made to its wisdom or practicality.

I wouldn't have said that Cosgrave, or the FG tradition which he emerged from, was particularly populist; if anything, the opposite. His position on security matters (which, for the record, I dislike) may have been popular at the time but, honestly, I don't think he adopted it for populist reasons; he adopted it because he thought it was the right and effective thing to do.

Peregrinus wrote: »

I'm afraid this is wrong. Populism is a political position which seeks to represent and support the views of ordinary people, regardless of whether those views are liberal or conservative, progressive or regressive, and (the controversial bit) well-though-out or ill-informed and unwise. The point about populism is that it treats the views, wishes, etc of "ordinary people" as authoritative in themselves, regardless of how good or bad they may be when judged against other criteria. Thus a populist will advocate for the popular policy regardless of whether it will produce a good outcome.

Trump, for example, is a populist.

A populist defence of Brexit would be to point out that it has been mandated by referendum, as though this point somehow defuses or answers objections made to its wisdom or practicality.

I wouldn't have said that Cosgrave, or the FG tradition which he emerged from, was particularly populist; if anything, the opposite. His position on security matters (which, for the record, I dislike) may have been popular at the time but, honestly, I don't think he adopted it for populist reasons; he adopted it because he thought it was the right and effective thing to do.

Listen to him wind up delegates and I can hear a 'populist' in action. Rabble rouser would also fit the bill.

Obviously, one of the characteristics of democracy is that it tends to incentivise and reward (and therefore promote) populism. Whether that's a desireable or an undesireable feature depends on whether you're a populist yourself, I guess.

But it's certainly a feature, and this has long been recognised. One of the reasons for having a parliamentary democracy, in which the executive is accountable not directly to the people but to a parliament of professional politicians, or for having a strict separation of powers, in including a strong role for an unelected supreme court, or a difficult-to-amend Constitution with strongly entrenched rights and limits on the power of the state, is precisely to provide a check to unrestrained populism.

As to whether Cosgrave, or any particular politician, is a "populist", I don't think it's enough to show that he adopted political positions which were popular. As noted, all politicians do that to some extent in a democracy. Plus, the fact that a politician adopted a position which was popular isn't enough, in itself, to show that he adopted it because it was popular, which I think is what "populist" implies. I think to justify labelling a politician as a populist, you have to point to a pattern of him abandoning positions which prove to be unpopular, and becoming an enthusiastic proponent of the opposing positions. To label his stance on a particular matter a populist stance, I think you need some reason to think that he had adopted it, against his better judgment, because it was popular.

You could fairly clearly make that argument in relation to May and Brexit, for example. But Cosgrave and contraception? I think he genuinely was a socially conservative Catholic on matters of sexual morality from his earliest youth to his dying day. I might not agree with his stance, but I don't think he adopted it on the basis of a cynical assessment of its popularity at the time.