Anglo Tapes

tayto lover wrote: »

Ah FFS ??

1. The Government control the courts because they appoint the judges.
2. The Government control the Garda because they appoint the Commissioners.
3. The Government control the media because their backers own most of the media.

Shatter had plenty to say about that little scroat Wallace after his chat with the Commissioner over Wallace using a phone while driving.

Scoffaw, you must really be on another planet if you think that the Govt do not control things....

For me this is the crux of the problem. Too much corruption combined with vested interests in government in seeing that the truth doesn't get out, because our authorities stand to lose more face than anyone for their part in the shambles. Anglo and the rest of the banks were criminally greedy and reckless, certainly, but there will always be greedy reckless criminals. It's a fact of life. Its crime on an unprecedented scale, certainly, but it is just crime, and criminals can be guarded against. That's why we put measures in place to ensure we are protected from their actions.

The real failure here was by our asleep at the wheel officials and public institutions. When you get past the staggering reckless greed of Anglo and the like, it becomes clear that it was just that: greed, by a bunch of private sector, out for themselves criminals, and our only line of defence against it was so inept, negligent, and underresourced as to be completely ineffective. That's bad enough, but now our government which along with our civil service is culpable up to their necks in it can use its extensive corrupt influence (as described above) surpress information and control the outcome of any kind of investigation to slow the pace of justice to a crawl and cover their tracks, and in the process allow those complicit to evade justice with ease.

We as taxpayers have borne the entire cost of this shambles so far. It is going to rob our country of its quality of life for generations. We DESERVE the truth, and the whole truth of the matter at the very least for what we have paid, and yet we as a nation are still nonchalant, even defeatist about it. The old "ah shure what can you do, best not to think about it, it would only make you angry" crap.

Our politicians are talking about parliamentary enquiries and trading political snipes across the floor of Leinster house. They've been doing it for a week, since the story broke, and before that they did it for years after the events in our banks became evident. Meanwhile, I guarantee you, somebody somewhere is spending their nights shredding files, wiping hard drives, and covering their tracks and those of their friends.

This endless debate is the modern equivalent of Nero fiddling while Rome burned. We need action, we have had enough talk.

I firmly believe that our political system in Ireland is broken beyond repair. Corruption is now so endemic throughout our key public institutions that the term "separation of powers" is nothing but a joke. I believe the only way to fix this system of corruption that has been a hundred years in the making is to tear it down and rebuild. I believe that nothing less than the complete renewal of our outdated constitution, possibly to coincide with the centenary of our independence, is needed.

That, and only that would give me hope for real meaningful change in Ireland. Without starting over after a major period of consecutive systemic failures, and rebuilding with the benefit of what we have learned from past mistakes, i believe that all we will get is more of the same corruption, revelations, slow responses, failure of oversight, retrospective anger, whitewashes, toothless parliamentary enquiries, widespread political apathy, and no real change.

Unless we demand more from how our state operates, and hold hose who fail or transgress against us to account, We will always be ripe for somebody somewhere who is sharper, more callous, more agile, and better resourced than we are to come and steal the family silver, and all we will ever be able to do about it is shut the door after the horse has bolted, and fail to see the next threat coming into the stable until its too late.