Presidential Election 2025

What relevance do hypothetical questions like that have? Should Heather Humphreys be asked if Eric was a member of the UVF if she'd have married him? It's a complete waste of time because if the reality was different the response might have been different and you also can't presume a candidate would respond the same way in an imagined scenario compared to reality.

Jim Gavin was amateur hour and the guy he screwed over was on the payroll at the countries biggest print media outlet. No digging required.

Yes, the 'rapist' question in particular was ludicrous. The chances of her being asked to employ a convicted rapist are probably a million to one and yet they were going after her as if she had actually hired one and brought him into the Dáil.

It would be like asking a priest what he would do if a serial killer confessed his crimes to him - these crazy hypotheticals have little relation to anything (and zero connection to the functions of being President).

I can tell there are older FF members horrified at this

Presumably most of those would've been opposed to FF going into government with FG in the first place? Seems a natural move to me to support your coalition partner's presidential candidate when you don't have one of your own, especially when the other candidate is so far out to the left. Half-expected Martin to make it the official party position actually…

“The victim mentality from Connolly’s supporters is quite something.”

It’s just a simple election tactic to curry favour with voters or “thanks” on a social media site; I don’t believe it for a second that they actially believe CC is a “victim”

CC’s election and social media image as a simple football kicking nun-like pensioner who needs defending is the one they want to promote - instead of the actual reality which is one that speaks up for Hamas and terrorism and has no problem associating herself with convicted and suspected terrorists.

The wave of faux outrage when you say one word criticising her on this thread is just getting boring at this stage. CC rightly got called out for her atrocious lack of judgement and they’ve been crying about it ever since - she’s certainly not a fit candidate for presidential office. I can see the tide turning on her before this election is over- her victory is not as iron clad as it might have been last weekend

CC’s election and social media image as a simple football kicking nun-like pensioner who needs defending is the one they want to promote - instead of the actual reality which is one that speaks up for Hamas and terrorism and has no problem associating herself with convicted and suspected terrorists.

Sometime in the future it would be a good subject for a student of politics to write an essay on.

How does someone whose entire career has been about human rights and peace (however misguided you think she is) come to get a sentence like the above written about them?

I suspect a large part of that essay would be about how fearful we have come (or have been made) to be of those who do not take a consensus approach. We constantly get bombarded, even here, with the 'if you are not one of us, you must be one of those' and the sad if not worrying result is a sentence like the above.
Even the lower level sexist stuff, - she should look like a certain model of what most other woman her age looks like - feeds into this.

It used to be cliché that Commies and the left were the 'brainwashed', I think that cliché has been turned completely on it's head tbh.

I did say you were free to think she was misguided, which is your right, but in a true democracy that right is also hers.

That sentence I quoted shows, some are well beyond thinking that. To quote herself, she has 'put her head above the parapet' (consensual thinking) and she is going to be got, one way or another.

“How does someone whose entire career has been about human rights and peace (however misguided you think she is) come to get a sentence like the above written about them?”

Not just one sentence- many of them - by national newspapers and broadcasters no less- this line of a “peacemaker” when on the other hand you hear her preach about Hamas being an integral part of Palestinian society and that they must be part of the new Palestine is just an insult to our collective intelligence -it also shows that she’s not willing to be brave and to insist that Hamas disbands and follows the path of peace- so it’s not us that needs to reflect on why these articles and posts are written - it’s she that needs to do the reflecting

Indeed-.here we go again with the “victim” and “martyr” imagery - sorry but I’m sick of it at this stage - CC is quite simply a very dangerous person to have as our president and she’ll do untold damage not only to NI relations but to world relations - she’s shown she has absolutely no interest in toning down her rhetoric and is likely to be removed from office, that’s if she even gets there

FYI, the media didn't 'destroy' Jim Gavin......

This is absurd hyperbole. You are entitled to your opinion but you are not entitled to decide who is fit or unfit to be 'our' president- you get to cast your 1 vote Friday week and that's it..

The smear thing is one of the best advantages that the Connolly campaign now has and it is all down to the incompetence of FG. The Connolly campaign was lucky with the comment by Ivan Yates. That on its own would not have copper fastened FG as the nasty party in the minds of the electorate. It was the rapist question and Jennifer Carroll MacNeill's comments. Without her comments, the advice from Yates would have faded into the background noise of the election. The consequences for FG and Humphreys are that almost any negative story about Connolly can be framed as a smear. And if that isn't bad enough, Micheal Martin is voting for Humphreys.

That’s a question you need to ask Catherine Connolly - communication is in the interpretation - if she didn’t want her message to land that way she should have phrased it differently - but no, it’s always everybody else’s fault / back to the “victim” imagery Catherine loves so much

Her comments were very ill-advised as they gave the leaders of the main parties backing Connolly, all female, an opportunity to criticise Carroll MacNeill and FG. She is much smarter than Simon Harris but made a bad mistake on this.

well done, that’ll teach her.