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The biggest Irish scandals/chancers ever?

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Comments

  • #62
    porsche959
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,499 ✭✭✭porsche959


    hidinginthebush wrote: »
    Haughey seems like a real piece of work. Can anyone recommend a book on him that shows all this?

    The Boss.

    Only covers a short period (1981/82) but it's enough to indict him.


  • #63
    Annasopra
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 41,236 ✭✭✭✭Annasopra


    kupus wrote: »
    Charlie, bertie, p flynn, lawlor, lowry, albert, ray burke, they are not irish. they are idiots. simple.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_Ireland

    http://bocktherobber.com/2008/07/the-oil-company-the-crooked-politician-and-the-theft-of-irelands-energy-resources/

    They're all FF (apart from Lowry)

    It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.

    Terry Pratchet



  • #64
    Annasopra
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 41,236 ✭✭✭✭Annasopra


    hidinginthebush wrote: »
    Haughey seems like a real piece of work. Can anyone recommend a book on him that shows all this?

    The Boss is quite good but I read it before a lot of the tribunal stuff

    It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.

    Terry Pratchet



  • #65
    RedFormanFITA
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,128 ✭✭✭RedFormanFITA


    SimonQuinlank wrote: »
    Most things Bertie ever touched.

    Liam Lawlor making millions on dodgy land deals for Liffey Valley,then going round to his (many poor) constituents and offering them a bag of coal in exchange for their votes.

    Michael Lowry's shady dealings with Denis O'Brien over the phone operator license

    Then health minister Michael Noonan threathening a dying woman who was infected with Hep C from a contaminated blood transfusion with legal action on her deathbed.

    For me it has to be Michael Noonan, people in this country have a very short memory and why he was re-elected is anyone's guess. http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/noonans-image-tarnished-by-the-hepatitis-c-scandal-26095408.html


  • #66
    Sunglasses Ron
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,180 ✭✭✭Sunglasses Ron


    I did like Ben Dunne on one of the chat shows once admitting how odd it was that an overweight convicted cocaine abuser was on the radio promoting his health and fitness gyms.

    Only in Ireland :pac:


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  • #67
    Savoir.Faire
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 326 ✭✭Savoir.Faire


    While Haughey was a rogue, a blaggard and a scoundrel, there was something eminently likeable about him. He was always wheeling and dealing, coming up with big schemes, flaunting procedure and decorum. He managed the cult of personality thing better than any other politician of his generation. He appealed to the gormless sleeveen from Mayo, the toothless simpleton from West Kerry, the feckless and lazy scrounger from North Dublin. His appeal was broad.

    And he quoted Othello in his final speech to the Dáil as Taoiseach. And, as he said himself, he did do the state some service.


  • #68
    Sunglasses Ron
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,180 ✭✭✭Sunglasses Ron


    Savoir.Faire wrote: »
    While Haughey was a rogue, a blaggard and a scoundrel, there was something eminently likeable about him. He was always wheeling and dealing, coming up with big schemes, flaunting procedure and decorum. .

    Is that about Charlie or Delboy Trotter? :pac: If this constitutes the opinion of a lot of people the resemblance is uncanny!


  • #69
    gobnaitolunacy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,073 ✭✭✭gobnaitolunacy


    All the scandals the RCC was complicit in, with the collusion of the State, and the people turning a blind eye.

    It boggles the mind how they kept a lid on it all until relatively recently.


  • #70
    Sunglasses Ron
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,180 ✭✭✭Sunglasses Ron


    gobnaitolunacy wrote: »
    All the scandals the RCC was complicit in, with the collusion of the State, and the people turning a blind eye.

    It boggles the mind how they kept a lid on it all until relatively recently.

    That is why the revulsion for the average Fr Joe Priest in Ireland sometimes gets me.

    The average priest may have heard rumours, but only that. There are more likely a lot more doctors, nurses, teachers, Gardai and health board employees who had a better and more specific idea what was happening in industrial schools and did nothing.


  • #71
    gobnaitolunacy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,073 ✭✭✭gobnaitolunacy


    Sunglasses Ron wrote: »
    That is why the revulsion for the average Fr Joe Priest in Ireland sometimes gets me.

    The average priest may have heard rumours, but only that. There are more likely a lot more doctors, nurses, teachers, Gardai and health board employees who had a better and more specific idea what was happening in industrial schools and did nothing.

    Yes, many people only saw part of the overall plan. The people that knew all about it, that had been through the system, were either laughed at, not listened to, too afraid or too institutionalised to bring the whole rotten thing crashing down. Only pity it didn't happen sooner.


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  • #72
    Zebra3
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 14,299 ✭✭✭✭Zebra3


    Savoir.Faire wrote: »
    While Haughey was a rogue, a blaggard and a scoundrel, there was something eminently likeable about him. He was always wheeling and dealing, coming up with big schemes, flaunting procedure and decorum. He managed the cult of personality thing better than any other politician of his generation. He appealed to the gormless sleeveen from Mayo, the toothless simpleton from West Kerry, the feckless and lazy scrounger from North Dublin. His appeal was broad.

    And he quoted Othello in his final speech to the Dáil as Taoiseach. And, as he said himself, he did do the state some service.

    Haughey was a criminal, simple as that.

    People were dying on hospital trollies while he was taking bribes.

    Piece of sh*t.


  • #73
    K-9
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 43,305 ✭✭✭✭K-9


    Savoir.Faire wrote: »
    While Haughey was a rogue, a blaggard and a scoundrel, there was something eminently likeable about him.

    I don't know about that, the members of the parliamentary party were never unified behind him, and he never got that overall majority that Lynch got, even Bertie probably came closer to it than Haughey.
    He was always wheeling and dealing, coming up with big schemes, flaunting procedure and decorum. He managed the cult of personality thing better than any other politician of his generation. He appealed to the gormless sleeveen from Mayo, the toothless simpleton from West Kerry, the feckless and lazy scrounger from North Dublin. His appeal was broad.

    The enmity was broad as well! I don't think even his critics would doubt his intellect, just that it was largely wasted on grand visions that he seemed to tire of when it came down to the boring and complicated work of actually implementing them, and the keeping of power no matter what the cost.
    And he quoted Othello in his final speech to the Dáil as Taoiseach. And, as he said himself, he did do the state some service.

    13 years as FF leader, 7 as Taoiseach, 12 as a Minister, that should be taken as a given.

    Mad Men's Don Draper : What you call love was invented by guys like me, to sell nylons.



  • #74
    BuilderPlumber
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,378 ✭✭✭BuilderPlumber


    Zebra3 wrote: »
    Haughey was a criminal, simple as that.

    New Haughey drama called Citizen Charlie coming soon and it further shows the fine line between criminality and politics in this country. Most of the cast of Love/Hate are in it with Aiden Gillen (John Boy himself) playing Charlie Haughey. Meanwhile, Tom Vaughn Lawlor (King Nidge) is playing PJ Mara. Which show will feature the biggest gangsters: Love/Hate or Citizen Charlie? Take your pick!


  • #75
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    hidinginthebush wrote: »
    Haughey seems like a real piece of work. Can anyone recommend a book on him that shows all this?

    There was a four part RTE documentary on him which came out around 2005. It was slightly too favourable to him in my opinion but was absorbing viewing as I remember it. It was just called "Haughey" and is now available on youtube I think.
    K-9 wrote: »
    Bruce Arnold wrote a great book about him, but it was printed in 94/95. Tbh I don't have much interest after that, the doubts about Haugheys wealth, and character were known long before that.

    Indeed, Arnold to his credit, points to it when Haughey eventually got Taoiseach. Haughey didn't introduce his cabinet as would be the norm, instead it was Fitzgerald, the rest of the FG front bench, Labour and the rest of the opposition giving speech after speech about how flawed he was.

    Arnold was a huge critic of him, but even he had to comment about how remarkable it was that the opposition benches were filled vs. nobody on the Governemnt benches barring CJH, political theatre. The cynic in me suggests CJH put himself vs. the opposition, as the sympathy vote, knew exactly what he was doing, but I'd have to feel sorry for his family watching on, even Arnold did.

    Ah I wouldn't recommend Arnold's book. Remember that he was one of the journo's whose phone Haughey had tapped - he couldn't possibly be expected to provide an unbiased account, and he doesn't. Haughey was a total scoundrel who history has correctly judged poorly but Arnold makes no attempt to be balanced and just tears into him from page one.


  • #76
    IvaBigWun
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 5,368 ✭✭✭IvaBigWun


    gaffer91 wrote: »
    There was a four part RTE documentary on him which came out around 2005. It was slightly too favourable to him in my opinion but was absorbing viewing as I remember it. It was just called "Haughey" and is now available on youtube I think.


    It is indeed, think I'll watch this later.

    Here's part one

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQ3ruuiivtM


  • #77
    [-0-]
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,981 ✭✭✭[-0-]


    Bertie "there is no recession coming" Ahern.


  • #78
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 99,580 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    BuilderPlumber wrote: »
    We all thought that Haughey was the king of the corrupt chancers ..... until we got Bertie and Seanie!!
    Seanie was just a decoy. Not part of the real golden circle so was hung out to dry, in as much as someone of that could be.

    Still a complete chancer but the sums caused by the bankers and other developers are much larger


  • #79
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 99,580 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    Savoir.Faire wrote: »
    And he quoted Othello in his final speech to the Dáil as Taoiseach. And, as he said himself, he did do the state some service.
    Yeah he did some stuff re the north but when in opposition he tried to block every piece of legleslation he could, regardless of merit, because he felt the purpose of the opposition was to oppose

    petty point scoring above public service


  • #80
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 99,580 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    Hedgemeister wrote: »
    Charley was among the first to figure out that the Irish electorate were suckers. Throw the common - man a bone and you could get away with anything. Charlie's bone was the free travel.
    And domestic rates

    which is why we will have to pay for bins, water, household charge


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