Presidential Election 2025

Why 2 votes? Why not 20 votes? Why not just let anybody at all have their name on the ballot?

She obviously thought it was a good idea when she signed the nomination form. Think about it…

Sometimes giving your political opposites a platform to make idiots of themselves is a smart political move. Case in point, Gemma's resulting campaign

Ok i appreciate your reply.

On the semantics of Libel/Slander, i wouldnt debate on that point, i dont think anything hinges on it. When i came here for this thread, and in particular, to follow the steen nomination situation, people were accusing many users, including me, of being undemocratic. While technically not something i would worry about from a legal point of view, i viewed it as a slur, and something akin to name calling. Perhaps referring to it as slander was, as you say, a bit over the top. I think calling someone undemocratic, for supporting a clearly democratic process, is farcical. Perhaps a better word

But il move on, as I said, nothing hinges on it.

Where I think the real source of disagreement lies is in our view of Ireland and its political system.

Il state now that i agree with you. We are VERY lucky to live in Ireland, and its political system has proven robust. Even during the troubles when support for the Provos was present in numbers, that support rarely if ever made it into the halls of power.

Where i think the disagreement lies, is in whether or not this stability and robust system is permanent. I dont believe it is, i think we must fight to keep the stability that we cherish. Especially when looking at how things have destabalized elsewhere. If as you suggested, you sensed fear in my posts yesterday, you would not have been a million miles away. I would say i felt a great deal of apprehension.

We have issues in Ireland, that we have had for generations. The housing crisis isnt new, and we have yet to resolve the issues with the health service. Within the later, i would add a growing mental health crisis in this country, which tends to be discussed, but rarely acted on. This issue has touched my family personally, and while i wont go into details, I think it shocking that huge waiting lists remain for access to proper mental healthcare. Now politically, i am left wing. Certainly I am not radical left, nor would i be labled woke. I dont like FFG, and have deep misgivings about the nature of coalition politics. I dont think junior parties of government have ever fared well at subsequent elections. But while i dont like FFG, i would not consider myself to be afraid of them. I believe in democracy, and so does FFG.

The concern i have, is that the aforementioned underlying issues are being gamed by a growing right wing block in this country. I refer to it as a Neo Right Wing, because its a big tent, and it includes many different groupings, including a growing Christian Right affiliation. It also tends to be Chameleonic, in how it attracts support. Anyone who has anything critical to say about the current government and society, is more than welcome. And this new block seeks to address the underlying issues by blaming societal decay, and secularization, along with, immigration. We have disaffection with politics in this country too, as voter turnout declines, and people begin to 'give up' imagining that anything will be solved after elections. And these disaffected voters, many of whom are enduring hardship, are being successfully lobbied by these right wing groups.

You only have to examine the Gript Platform, for evidence supporting this trend. For quite a while, RTE has been attacked as being 'biased' in favour of liberal policy makers, and for refusing to engage with this Neo Right Wing. Which is ludicrous, RTE has always remained painfyully unbiased, and yet it continues to be attacked. 'Anti Immigration' councillors whip up support for their views, and decry the fact that they are not interviewed on the Six One news. Now regardless of where you stood on Maria Steen, it is a fact at this stage, that the neo right wing in this country were fully prepared to roll in behind her. As i said earlier, these groupings tend to behave chameleonic, in that they are fully capable of attacking the system as being 'undemocratic', while simultaneously attacking actual democratic institutions and mandates, such as the previous referenda on Marriage Equality and Repealling the 8th.

All of these tactics are straight out of the MAGA/Brexit Playbook - attacking RTE, is no different to farage wanting to defund the BBC, or Trump refering to CNN/ABC/NBC et al, as 'Fake News'. The fact that there is no evidence to support any of these claims, is meaningless; When experts point out the invalid nature of the accusations, these are reframed as 'Elites' and the 'Establishment pushing back'. If Maria Steen were simply to stand up and run on a platform of 'Christian Conservatism' that would be one thing. I would be entirely less concerned with that, as I would agree with you; She would be very unlikely to get enough support to make an impact.

But cleverly reframing her candidacy as 'Maverick', 'Anti-Establishment' and 'insurgent', in support of the disaffected population - at best its entirely dishonest. But really, its an attempt to mirror the successes of Trump and Brexit. And down that road lies a severe damaging of our cherished stable political system. While its true that the presidency is a fairly insulated position, a victory for Steen would see those who support her gain publicity and media coverage. And this could easily roll over into the next local and general elections. Even getting on the ballot paper, would be enough for her, and her supporters to gain way more coverage than they otherwise would have.

Id finish by going back to our political system. We both agree that it is stable, and robust at present. I think problems exist, and i am frequently annoyed that they are not dealt with. The HSE is just one part; I think withdrawing the energy credits this year, despite acknowledging the growing cost of fuel in this country, is also a mistake, but thats another topic. The point we disagree on seems to hinge on whether the political system could be jeapordized. I believe it could, and id be interested to hear your thoughts.

With respect

Another day, another batshít crazy Connolly statement. The woman is a crank who would be a disaster as President. Shame on Labour for supporting such a manifestly unsuitable weirdo

That's exactly my point, how she explicitly took the phrase, "the welfare of the people of Ireland" as a segue into talking about Gaza, and making it a primary issue.

It really wont damage him in the slightest as this is how he has always behaved and for anyone who is actually familiar with him knows this is absolutely on form, he is a rude pr1ck of a man who only cares about himself. He is also guaranteed re-election to the senate if he wants it and couldn't care less about how this makes him look because nobody's opinion he cares about will think he did anything wrong here and again would just expect this of him.

The only people surprised or angry by his behaviour and actions are people who mistakenly believed he held conservative views similar to theirs after last years referenda.

Is this what you are referring to:

"McDowell had worked with Steen previously and had a high regard for her abilities. But he had profound political differences with her and did not want to see her as president. He resolved not to nominate her, and did not engage with efforts to persuade him." (Irish Times).

Why on earth should he engage with her - other than to say "No". And also reported in Pat Leahy's article is the grave exception that other independents took to efforts by Steen supporters to intimidate and abuse them into nominating her - and to Steen's failure to clearly call them out for doing so.

I think they didn't nominate her because they were "unconvinced by her suitability" for the office - rather than policy issues.

Nonsensical argument. With the current nominations it would have resulted in:

• Dublin City: 11 of the 62 councillors having a nomination
• Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown: 5 of the 40 councillors having a nomination
• Fingal: 11 of the 40 having a nomination
• Kildare: 5/40
• Laois: 7/19
• Longford: 2/18
• Louth: 7/29
• Meath: 13/40
• Offaly: 4/19
• South Dublin: 13/40
• Westmeath: 3/20
• Wicklow: 11/32
• Cavan: 3/18
• Donegal: 13/37
• Galway City: 5/18
• Galway County: 13/39
• Leitrim: 5/18
• Mayo: 8/30
• Monaghan: 1/18
• Roscommon: 8/18
• Sligo: 4/18
• Carlow: 4/18
• Clare: 3/28
• Cork City: 6/31
• Cork County: 12/55
• Kerry: 12/33
• Kilkenny: 2/24
• Limerick: 9/40
• Tipperary: 15/40
• Waterford: 8/32
• Wexford: 13/34

In every council this would have a minority deciding who to nominate with some laughable situations such as Kilkenny or Longford where it's only 2 people deciding and Monaghan where it's just 1.

Again there's the difference between nominating a candidate to get them on the ballot paper and actually endorsing a candidate. A difference you seem unable to comprehend for some unknown reason

He doesn't give a flying fuk who thinks he is damaged I would say.

I mean who does he have to woo or answer to.

I recall Paul Murphy noted right winger after the last election when all these right wing "indys" were trying to get into government ,saying that this should have been when the penny dropped that a lot of these people are not indy at all and are pretty much at the beck and call of FF/FG and those voting for them to stick it to FF/FG were been tricked, maybe at least this time they may finally understand it.

I don't want to say nice things about Martin, but on reflection lets say he said to FF "endorse Maria, no repercussions" and that got her on the ballot and she somehow won or more likely took away a lot of FF social conservative voters handing the election to CC , he would be a laughing stock , it made political sense to block a candidate who not only has spent the last ten years bashing the establishment which is obviously FF but could have cost his party the election.

Politics is a ruthless business and also it seems water is still wet.

"Do I regret what’s happened in relation to her? Absolutely. Do I support her in any way? Not at all" She goes on to say she doesn’t regret signing O’Doherty’s nomination papers at the time, because her view then was that O’Doherty had “done some good work as an investigative journalist.” And further goes on to say she wouldn’t make the same nomination today.