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Brendan O'Connor's Bertie U-Turn

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Here's what Brendan O'Connor wrote about Bertie in 2008, after he resigned as Taoiseach (I'll highlight the more relevant bits in bold):

So. Happy now? Was that all worth it? With a media that is given to blowing up fits of indignant rage about everything from Kevin Myers to Dustin the Turkey, this was perhaps inevitable. This was the ultimate fit of righteousness. And now it's over and everyone has calmed down a bit. And what have we achieved exactly?
We have forced a change of leadership in Fianna Fail. In fact, in reality all that has happened is that the change in the leadership of Fianna Fail was pushed forward by a few months, maybe a year.
Was that worth suspending the running of the country for a year for? And now, as Eoghan Harris said on the Late Late, they will presumably come for Cowen. Cowen has become a kind of god this last year, the unquestioned, untested messiah who is going to save us all and save Fianna Fail. And who knows, maybe he will.
He is a popular choice as Taoiseach, he was charming and funny taking leaders' questions the other day; he seems like his own man; and Fianna Fail has stayed unified -- on the surface anyway.
But I wouldn't like to be Cowen now, would you? Is he really going to be a better leader than Bertie Ahern? Is he going to be more perfect? Is anything necessarily going to be improved now?

And here's the same Brendan O'Connor, writing in the SINDO today:

Brendan O'Connor wrote:

DON'T like Bertie Ahern. Never did. Never got it. Tried to respect that other people did, even though I found that hard. I had one personal experience with him and I thought it and its fallout revealed him and his people to be a fairly tough crew.

The Mahon tribunal, in so far as we can read between the lines, doesn't reveal a very nice person either -- a liar, and a guy who was clearly unyielding enough in his dealings with the women in his life. The tribunal reckons he lied through his teeth about pretty much everything. He certainly lied to it about some things. And really, it was brazen at times. You have to wonder why he wouldn't just come clean. What was he hiding?...

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Nodin

Continuity Wolfe Tone wrote: »

Shinners! Shinners?! They're Everywhere! And there out to get us and eat our babies!

You'd fit in well at the SINDO.

....need....FLESH....

Fishooks12

Doc Ruby wrote: »

I'm fast reaching the stage where I might even give the shinners a vote, if they
a) ditched the communist nonsense
b) cut all ties with the IRA
c) put a workable economic plan together

So in essence, you'll vote for them if they become a different party ?

steelcityblues

Doc Ruby wrote: »

I'm fast reaching the stage where I might even give the shinners a vote, if they
a) ditched the communist nonsense
b) cut all ties with the IRA
c) put a workable economic plan together

You clearly haven't read up on Communism.

Mint Sauce

Fishooks12 wrote: »

Brendan O Connor is a waste of skin

This is the same lad who said talk of the property bubble bursting was "nonsense!

And the same man who said we all looked forward to Stephen Ireland returning to the national side.

Kinda reminds me of all the FF haters who claimed to have never voted them. Surely some of them must have over the god knows how many last years.

Nodin

Doc Ruby wrote: »

I'm fast reaching the stage where I might even give the shinners a vote, if they
a) ditched the communist nonsense
b) cut all ties with the IRA
c) put a workable economic plan together

a - we never really were. Left wing, but never communist.
b - has disbanded
c - I believe that's what everyones trying to do

Doc Ruby

Fishooks12 wrote: »

So in essence, you'll vote for them if they become a different party ?

I think the IRA thing is really the only defining aspect of SF, that most people would associate it with anyway. I'm sure they'd alienate a lot of their base in the process but they'd gain a far larger base instead.

Cavehill Red

Doc Ruby wrote: »

I'm fast reaching the stage where I might even give the shinners a vote, if they
a) ditched the communist nonsense
b) cut all ties with the IRA
c) put a workable economic plan together

I'll never vote for them because of past experiences in the North (just as I would never ever vote for the Tories in Britain or FF in the Republic). But in fairness to them, their performance, patchy though it is, in Stormont demonstrates they've dumped the Marxist rubbish, and PIRA are effectively an historical entity at this point (RIRA and CIRA aren't, but the Shinners adjure them).
They do badly need some brains in their policy department though, and that has to start with economics. Their policy of tax the rich to pay for everything is simplistic and doesn't add up.

lividduck

Nodin wrote: »

a - we never really were. Left wing, but never communist.
b - has disbanded
c - I believe that's what everyones trying to do

Communist..were (Eire Nua)
Disbanded..only if you believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy
Economic Plan..nobody should pay anything but everyone should have everything.
In short "They hav'nt gone away you know!"

Nodin

lividduck wrote: »

Communist..were (Eire Nua)!"

That's O'Bradaighs idea with RSF.

lividduck wrote: »

Disbanded..only if you believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy
"

You have information that the international monitoring body and a number of Governments don't? Jaysus man, don't waste your important info here - ring the Dail, the US embassy and the Brits one while you're at it.

Doc Ruby

Nodin wrote: »

a - we never really were. Left wing, but never communist.
b - has disbanded
c - I believe that's what everyones trying to do

My impression was there's a spectrum from hard left to mildly left in SF, but to be honest left-leaning economic ideals are not what the country needs at the moment.

Cutting out public sector waste and incompetence, reducing expenses, using the latest technology to streamline services and reduce costs, these are not the hallmarks of the left. I mean for pity's sake did you see that PPARS shambles.

http://www.irishhealth.com/article.html?id=11805

They aren't particularly the hallmarks of the right either, but are a more technocratic ideal. Will SF undertake the neccessary measures to bring spending back from bubble levels and towards sustainable levels? Will it make the public sector at every level accountable? It can be done, and done without wrecking the economy too.

As for the IRA, bluntly Gerry and Martin and company need to take a distant back seat, in the Republic anyway.

Son Of A Vidic

Not only is Brendan O'Connor an absolute first class tool, but I wouldn't wipe my arsé with anything thing he writes.

johngalway

Why waste a thread on him, he's a moron.

Toby Take a Bow

Doc Ruby wrote: »

Cutting out public sector waste and incompetence, reducing expenses, using the latest technology to streamline services and reduce costs, these are not the hallmarks of the left. I mean for pity's sake did you see that PPARS shambles.

http://www.irishhealth.com/article.html?id=11805

The HSE is an example of left-wing ideals now?

And wasn't Ireland being touted as one of the best examples of a 'free' economy some years back?

The choice isn't necessarily between SF left and free-market economics. There are compromises that could be employed.

Nodin

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

The HSE is an example of left-wing ideals now?

And wasn't Ireland being touted as one of the best examples of a 'free' economy some years back?

The choice isn't necessarily between SF left and free-market economics. There are compromises that could be employed.

Indeed. Adopt a model on Scandanavian/French/German lines. This will do nothing to improve the likes of O'Connor, Myers, Harris and Waters "journalism" but society at large will benefit.

Doc Ruby

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

The HSE is an example of left-wing ideals now?

I know people in the HSE that have openly told me their departments could vanish and nobody would ever miss them, or even know what they were doing. If that's not a hugely expensive welfare programme I don't know what is.

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

The choice isn't necessarily between SF left and free-market economics. There are compromises that could be employed.

I'm not even talking about ideologies. I mean firing every idiot associated with PPARS and getting a refund about six months after the costs started to balloon, so that the next people make a decent job of it.

lividduck

Nodin wrote: »

Indeed. Adopt a model on Scandanavian/French/German lines. This will do nothing to improve the likes of O'Connor, Myers, Harris and Waters "journalism" but society at large will benefit.

There is a huge difference betweeen Scandanavian Social Democracy and Germany Corporatism, I suggest that you read Esping Andersons "Three Worlds of Welfare".

Doc Ruby

lividduck wrote: »

There is a huge difference betweeen Scandanavian Social Democracy and Germany Corporatism, I suggest that you read Esping Andersons "Three Worlds of Welfare".

Not to mention that the French wealth tax has cost them some 125 times more than the tax brought in, in capital flight.

Really we need to figure out an Irish solution tailored to our own country. Starting out by cutting the cruft in expenditure is about step 1 to 4 of the 5 step plan.

Toby Take a Bow

Doc Ruby wrote: »

I know people in the HSE that have openly told me their departments could vanish and nobody would ever miss them, or even know what they were doing. If that's not a hugely expensive welfare programme I don't know what is.

No, that's a lack of accountability, which is neither left nor right wing. The HSE, however, was organised around a 'business' ethos of managing the health service. Just because it was a huge failure doesn't mean the whole thing is left wing all of a sudden.

Nodin

lividduck wrote: »

There is a huge difference betweeen Scandanavian Social Democracy and Germany Corporatism.......".

I'd suggest that either would be an improvement on the cute hoorist nepotistic wankfest we've 'enjoyed' for the last number of decades.

AngryBollix

Brendan O'Connor was a waste of a hard on.

The world would be a better placed if his father had just jerked off instead.

Phill Ewinn

He could have been Berties love child, if Bertie had done it a walrus.

Doc Ruby

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

No, that's a lack of accountability, which is neither left nor right wing. The HSE, however, was organised around a 'business' ethos of managing the health service. Just because it was a huge failure doesn't mean the whole thing is left wing all of a sudden.

In this country we've come to associate the left with Labour, which means unions, who are very much responsible for a lot of the shambolic performances.

I mean I'll tell you who needs a job for life and protection along those lines - judges and tenured professors, to protect them from political interference. As far as everyone else goes, when you have vital services provided by people with a job for life, you get rode up the jacksie eventually culminating in your country having to borrow more and more to cover the risk of strikes. And when you go bankrupt, the strikes will happen anyway except you'll have a monstrous public debt overhang to deal with as well. The protections provided to private sector employees against unfair dismissal and a bad work environment should more than cover the huge majority of public workers.

Is SF any different to Labour in that regard? Because their economic policies strike most people as being from the other side of the rainbow, since they are fundamentally incompatible with the problems facing Ireland today.

AngryBollix

Phill Ewinn wrote: »

He could have been Berties love child, if Bertie had done it a walrus.

walrus you say

http://www.98fm.com/wp-content/files/2011/01/Mary-Harney.jpg

Nodin

AngryBollix wrote: »

walrus you say

http://www.98fm.com/wp-content/files/2011/01/Mary-Harney.jpg

....fer jaysus sake man....I was goin to have tay and a hobnob......

Toby Take a Bow

Doc Ruby wrote: »

In this country we've come to associate the left with Labour, which means unions, who are very much responsible for a lot of the shambolic performances.

That's the same Labour that are moving steadily to the right? Regardless of what 'we' have come to associate them with. And the unions (SIPTU anyway) have long since lost any political affiliation, and are more institutions which look after their own.

Doc Ruby wrote: »

I mean I'll tell you who needs a job for life and protection along those lines - judges and tenured professors, to protect them from political interference. As far as everyone else goes, when you have vital services provided by people with a job for life, you get rode up the jacksie eventually culminating in your country having to borrow more and more to cover the risk of strikes. And when you go bankrupt, the strikes will happen anyway except you'll have a monstrous public debt overhang to deal with as well. The protections provided to private sector employees against unfair dismissal and a bad work environment should more than cover the huge majority of public workers./QUOTE]

You seem to be defining the situation and then arguing your point from there. I don't recall any point in Irish history where a right-wing government has not been in majority rule. Could you not say that the vast majority of our problems stem from right-wing practices? The HSE, which you referred to previously was the brain-child of the most right of the minority partnership government.

Doc Ruby wrote: »

Is SF any different to Labour in that regard? Because their economic policies strike most people as being from the other side of the rainbow, since they are fundamentally incompatible with the problems facing Ireland today.

The same problems which were helped by right-wing economics? It sure is a crazy world.

Doc Ruby

Toby Take a Bow wrote: »

You seem to be defining the situation and then arguing your point from there. I don't recall any point in Irish history where a right-wing government has not been in majority rule. Could you not say that the vast majority of our problems stem from right-wing practices? The HSE, which you referred to previously was the brain-child of the most right of the minority partnership government.

You do know there's more to politics than left and right? The big two are centrist parties, neither left nor right, focusing their representatives on the parish pump and never straying too far in either direction. This is why people complain that FG simply followed FFs game plan after they got elected - they are two sides of the same coin.

Then of course FF decided to embrace regulatory capture on an industrial scale and sink the place. Which is just corruption and/or stupidity by the way, neither left nor right. Which is the point I'm tryng to make - as far as I can see you're in favour of leftist policies. I'm in favour of stripping out incompetence, corruption, and pork, and I don't care what colour you paint it.

Don't mistake me for a libertarian, I'm not, taxes buy civilisation, but I demand value for my money. Is this value for my money? I'm not getting value for money, and I'm not likely to without wide and hard reforms.

Will Sinn Féin deal with that?

Terry

Wild Bill wrote: »

If only O'Connor was the only one.

His piece was part of a Sindo campaign against Moriarty in early 2008. You folk really need to stop focusing on personalities/individuals and get the big picture.

You are being manipulated like a collie maneuvers a flock of sheep!

The Establishment needs to ditch Bertie in order to continue his policies via the FG/Labour Regime.

Tweedledum/Tweedledee.

Bertie will stay out of prison and keep his pension so that the establishment of FF/FG/Labour can continue to screw the country.

And the bleating sheep (aka, the Irish majority) will rotate their useless votes between the three. :cool:

You had me until the Sheep thing.

The voting public are not sheep. They're ****ing idiots.
Proof?
Successive corrupt FF governments.
Sheep know how to survive on their own, and don't look to others for basic necessities.
They are also incorruptible.

Nodin wrote: »

a - we never really were. Left wing, but never communist.
b - has disbanded
c - I believe that's what everyones trying to do

A: Fair enough.
B: I'd laugh if they weren't murderous bastards.
C: In my honest opinion 90% of TDs are corrupt cúnts only out to make money for themselves, and don't give a flying **** about their constituents. SF fall into that 90%

Want a prosperous Ireland with jobs for Irish people in Ireland?
We have Trillions (yes, Trillions) of Euros worth of gas, oil and other natural resources in our seas.
Bertie and his cronies sold them off (for the most part) to private companies.
Pass a couple of laws and that's all done with and the natural resources come back to us. Let the ****ers sue us. We can use he defense that those who sold it in the first place were/are corrupt as ****.

Then you have the wind farms.
Just look at the topography of this island.
The West coast is battered.
The reason the entire coast isn't covered in wind farms if because local politicians are not getting brown envelopes, the local 'change nothing' brigade won't allow any building in Ireland and we're apathetic bastards unless we're losing a couple of quid a year for some pointless reason.

I love this country. The vast majority of people in it piss me off though.
Greedy and apathetic *****.

ChunkyLover_53

oppenheimer1 wrote: »

Thats Brendan O'Carroll Picture and we're talking about Brendan O'Connor Picture

After Hours needs a sarcasm/trolling font

Nodin

Terry wrote: »

................
B: I'd laugh if they weren't murderous bastards.
.........*.

Away ye go.....the information you have that the rest of us are ignorant of must be shared......

http://www.inis.gov.ie/en/JELR/Pages/Home

http://www.mydup.com/

http://britishembassyinireland.fco.gov.uk/en/

Doc Ruby

Nodin wrote: »

Away ye go.....the information you have that the rest of us are ignorant of must be shared......

http://www.inis.gov.ie/en/JELR/Pages/Home

http://www.mydup.com/

http://britishembassyinireland.fco.gov.uk/en/

And what does SF have to say about my last post there. And if SF doesn't have an answer, is it going to present one anytime soon.