Sinn Fein and how do they form a government dilemma

I'm aware of his faux outrage for years.. this morning he just sounded really angry.. even when Ciaran Cuddihy found a €750 million hole in his alternative budget he didn't sound as angry...

They should probably all take a step back and see where the anger is getting them. It must be draining, physically and mentally...

This has all been gone over before.
The numbers were not there to form a stable government. Here is the then leader of the Soc Dems:

Catherine Murphy, co-leader of the Social Democrats, believes Sinn Féin is "serious" about forming a left-wing bloc but acknowledges Dáil arithmetic is against this taking shape.“We are interested in talking about the detail of policy and where there can be a similarity of approach,” she said. “None of us know where this is eventually going to end.”

And this contemporaneous article sums up what was going on fairly well re: options and negotiations.

It is just a tired old jibe now about 'seriousness'. A taunt in other words.

You are absolutely correct.

There was one ingredient needed to form a coalition of the left last time out - leadership. That ingredient was missing from Sinn Fein, PBP, Labour and the Social Democrats. To be fair to PBP, they did publicly get annoyed at the lack of leadership and made their views known, and the other two parties have acknowledged the problem and changed leaders. It is Sinn Fein who think that doing the same thing again will lead to a better result.

Interesting that the opinion polls now have relevance when FF have lost support, but when SF are down 10% and back to their general election performance, they have no meaning.

"Out of ideas.."

The facts dont back that up.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/property/developmentconstruction/arid-41343209.html

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/editorials/2024/03/13/the-irish-times-view-on-housing-supply-some-progress-on-building-new-homes/

It seems that a corner has been turned on this.

To say otherwise is just not factual or credible

Ive been saying it for ages.

Anger got them to ride an anti-establishment, anti-political populist wave from 2020-2023. It worked for them then.

But now, this close to an election, people want to see solutions, hope, competency, and credibility and most of all some humanity.
They are getting none of that, and the polls are reflective of it.

Maybe they cannot deliver that, but if they can't they will get a bit of a shock come election day. We will be hearing about 'powerswaps' and similar lame excuses for another 5 years, instead of doing some inward reflection.

Perhaps, and the electorate will decide.

But again to go back to the point, SF are saying that the government are 'out of ideas', when this is not the case, given that a corner has been turned when it comes to housing. Maybe SF should acknowledge that?

The party that is out of ideas is Sinn Fein.

When the corner has been turned and the public can see that the FF, FG and Greens government has begun to get things moving on housing, the question for Sinn Fein becomes, how can you guarantee that you will do things better and quicker? This is where Sinn Fein are failing.

When it was a case of the government is doing nothing and we should get our chance, the absence of read ideas wasn't a problem. However, when the corner is turned, even if only slowly, the question for the opposition is much more difficult. So far, it looks like Sinn Fein have no answers.

No, not anti-establishment. No is everything crap in Ireland, which you are fond of projecting onto posters who have a criticism to make of how the government is performing.
Anti the current government it most certainly is though.

They have had enough time to 'turn corners' do wheelies or whatever.

The point again is that this will be one of the fault lines on which the GE will be fought.

Record numbers of first-time buyers, Sinn Fein support dropping, FG on the way back up, you don't need to be a rocket scientist to see that a corner is being turned.

'Concede'?

I was not claiming that there has been no progress, in fact I asked specifically, is it enough of a 'turn'.

Elections always have an incredible degree of recency bias in terms of how people vote - They tend not to remember that it was sh!t 2 years ago , they tend to vote based on the here and now.

Polls tend to have 'recency bias' too and there is nothing in the data that suggests what is claimed here. That the government have 'turned a corner' on housing in the eyes of the public. When you see significant support for them then you can claim that.
Do you dispute that housing will be a major factor in a GE? Which is the simple point I made.

SF are the opposition, they have to hold the government to account and question the spin.Again I ask, is the 'turn' going to be enough.
As FG or FF have gotten no significant bounce, as yet I don't think it is enough.

That indeed may change and as I said earlier SF are shifting the focus back on housing and health.

Remains to be seen.

You will have to ask a SF member what the future strategy is, I can only judge it as it is rolled out.

IMO. Labour did the right thing in going into gov with FG at the second last election when nothing else was on . It it probably knew it was suicide and it turned out to be that when it lost a lot of its seats in the next GE. If it did not go into gov then the only option was another GE and that would have more than likely thrown. Up the same combination of TDs ‘ . So Labour honoured its commitment to the prog worked out and stuck with the full term And this was at a time when the country was below rock bottom financially.
did SF make any genuine approaches to Labour during the makeup of the Gov the last time. IMO Labour’s principals would have allowed it to honour any agreement reached with Labour