What have we come to

blanch152 wrote: »

I had money on SF/FF at 12/1. Still waiting to see will that pay out.

You lost that money when Michael led his party to parity with SF.

Had he gotten the 50 seats he thought he was getting when he opened the door to SF you'd be quids in.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/election-2020/martin-opens-the-door-to-coalition-with-sinn-fein-38941313.html

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/fianna-f%C3%A1il-reaction-martin-opens-door-to-government-with-fg-or-sf-1.4167246

blanch152 wrote: »

When I placed the bet, they didn't have a SF/FF/Other option, I will still look for payout if that comes to pass. Probably wasting my time.

I'd have potentially agreed with you until Micheal Martin nailed his trousers to the mast by explicitly ruling out doing business with SF. I've been hearing on the grapevine that there's a lot of dissent in FF at the moment about whether or not this was the right move, or if it was horribly premature given how things have developed afterwards. For all the comparisons being made, there's actually a crucial difference between SF saying they would ideally like a government without FF or FG, to FF and FG categorically saying they won't do business with SF. When FF and FG assumed SF wouldn't do well in the election, they repeatedly made remarks about SF's supposed unwillingness to work with anyone else, now that the tables have turned so spectacularly it just looks bad. And from what I'm hearing, there's a not unsizeable faction within FF which is basically saying "if Martin is adamant that he won't do business with SF, maybe it's time we replaced him as leader with someone who might".

Martin can't row back on what he's said after doubling down on it, so I'd say he's on shakier ground than people realise. It's not necessarily that there are a lot of FFers who actually like SF, it's more that apparently, to a lot of FFers, doing business with SF would be less toxic to their brand than doing business with FG, since it would expose the fundamental fallacy of FF and FG pretending to be opposites for so long, when in face they're a Venn Diagram with a massive amount of overlap. And if that faction in the party proves to be the largest, Martin could easily find himself being sidelined as it would be less embarrassing than having the leader of the party publicly do a 180 so soon after doubling down on a position immediately following a bruising election result.

I wonder if they could get around this by doing a confidence and supply with SF and then spending the next five years (or however long such a Dáil would survive) teaming up with FG to undermine their policies at every opportunity? They seem to be very weary of C&S after the last few years (and who could blame them) but they're really between a rock and a hard place in the sense that an arrangement with either SF or FG will alienate one of two large factions of supporters and members. They can't do another C&S with FG, that'll piss too many people off, but they could potentially do the whole "fair enough Mary Lou, we'll vote you for Taoiseach and then you'll have to break all your promises as the FFG bloc in the Dáil make it impossible to pass legislation" thing.

Do you think you'd get a payout if it was FF and SF but purely because of a confidence and supply arrangement in which FF support Mary Lou for Taoiseach, rather than an actual formal coalition? What was the exact wording of the bet?

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

I've never voted for SF before in my life and this time around I gave our local candidate my #2 after Richard Boyd Barrett, specifically because I believes a big enough SF share of seats would allow them to form an exclusively centre to left coalition without including either of the centre to right parties. I suspect many, many people of my generation did the same thing.

How did you come to your belief that this desired coalition would be in anyway possible? Richard Boyd Barrett can't even get a handful of like minded people to coalesce to form one party, instead he is involved in a hodgepodge alliance akin to a grouping of independents.

Over two weeks since the election and so far we've seen no evidence that even the far left parties have come anywhere close to agreeing on anything and the centre left parties have basically ruled that option out.

Voting left, transfer left is complete pointless protest nonsense if none of the parties of the left can come close to agreeing anything.

Bowie wrote: »

You got my comment backwards. I'm quite literally saying I'd rather FG/FF concentrated on why SF got the boost than slagging them off and making arses of themselves, albeit entertaining to a point. You know, for the management of the county like.

I am a former FG voter. This is the problem. They should be looking to do what works not cadge votes and ignore sections of society because they won't get votes anyway. That's the major issue with the ignorance of Fine Gael IMO. If they made a decent go of it I'd vote for them again. It's more comfortable to believe the lies that people are just out to get FG. That's just sad. It's not about teams ffs.
I don't care if it's 90%, don't be so petty, it's about what's best for the country and the public don't seem to think any party is over another. FF/FG need look at that instead of being so bratty, bitter and nasty.

You make some good points Bowie, and indeed Alan Dukes made more or less the same points this morning.

You are correct when you intimate that where FG went ‘wrong’ was not managing and marketing their successes,and they had some, well enough.

What any Govt. should do is concentrate as far as possible on the main bones of contention which would be in my opinion

Housing, Health, Insurance, Child care costs, Climate concerns.

Big mistake to concentrate on Brexit, Joxer doesn’t care about that.

SF in my opinion haven’t a hope of sorting out those issues as they say they can, no experience, very few serious politicians, will be viewed with suspicion by the money people, will have a trust deficit etc

That’s the way it is, not trying to be cynical.

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

It's not necessarily that there are a lot of FFers who actually like SF, it's more that apparently, to a lot of FFers, doing business with SF would be less toxic to their brand than doing business with FG, since it would expose the fundamental fallacy of FF and FG pretending to be opposites for so long, when in face they're a Venn Diagram with a massive amount of overlap. And if that faction in the party proves to be the largest,

If you're going to say that FF And FG are both the same then at least admit that they won the popular vote with twice the number of seats as SF.

Or of the two, which party bumped up public service pay massively to unsustainable levels during the boom, and which party opposed the introduction of water charges?

Seems to me that FF have significantly more in common with SF than FG

I wonder if they could get around this by doing a confidence and supply with SF and then spending the next five years (or however long such a Dáil would survive) teaming up with FG to undermine their policies at every opportunity? They seem to be very weary of C&S after the last few years (and who could blame them) but they're really between a rock and a hard place in the sense that an arrangement with either SF or FG will alienate one of two large factions of supporters and members. They can't do another C&S with FG, that'll piss too many people off, but they could potentially do the whole "fair enough Mary Lou, we'll vote you for Taoiseach and then you'll have to break all your promises as the FFG bloc in the Dáil make it impossible to pass legislation" thing.

A C&S allowing for a SF minister for justice will never happen.

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

The one thing the left can generally agree on is that the neoliberalism of FFG is toxic.

I think that's a fair reflection of the Left's position.


But likewise, the parties of the Centre view SF/IRA as pretty toxic too. Hence the current impasse.

maccored wrote: »

So theres a difference between the two examples.

There are plenty of differences. But that doesn't change how the Left and the centre view eachother. Each views the other as toxic.

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

The one thing the left can generally agree on is that the neoliberalism of FFG is toxic. If they can agree on that, even if nothing else, I could see them putting something together.

But the numbers the numbers the numbers.

Even if you could round up all of the left 'parties' (including one-man bands like Peadar Toibin), you would still require the support of 12 of the 19 independents for a bare majority. And even if we very generously label nine of those as 'left-leaning' (including the likes of Shanahan and Canney), you'd still need to recruit at least three (and in practice five or six) from the FF/FG/PD gene pool to get over the line. Do you think it's feasible for Mary Lou to get the likes of Mattie McGrath or Peter Fitzpatrick to sign up for a socialist revolution?

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

The one thing the left can generally agree on is that the neoliberalism of FFG is toxic. If they can agree on that, even if nothing else, I could see them putting something together.

But there has been no evidence that feeling FF & FG are toxic is close to enough to make them put on their big boy pants and try to form a government.

The left talks a big game but that easy shouting from the sidelines, from forming parties to now forming government their actions don't follow.

A government which gets almost nothing done is better than a government which actively does bad things. A left coalition may not make huge amounts of progress, but FFS Fine Gael are actively making things worse because they ideologically believe that things getting worse for ordinary people is a good thing because it benefits the investment class, and FF... Well, we all know what FF did the last time they were in office.

I'd rather five years of a Dáil hamstrung by disagreements to five years of a government which takes the "let them eat cake" attitude to the housing crisis.

So things would have been better if FG came into power and did nothing to move the country to a financial surplus and unemployment was still at 16%? Was the 11% increased employment 'the investment class'?

It is all fine to claim a left government hamstrung by disagreements for 5 years would be preferable, but would it really be if there was a recession? Do you think an alphabet soup of the left could lead through tough decisions during that period?

Shefwedfan wrote: »

How SF getting on with putting together a government?

They had talks with the Greens yesterday which they both say will be intensified next week.

FF and G are still only at talks about talks stage.