Major blogger in PD endorsement shock
Read more about: Blogging, Labour Party, Parties, Progressive Democrats 
Guido Fawkes has not only endorsed the PDs, but claims to be a member and is planning to canvass. While parts of his post are well-informed, there is this
They [FF-PD] are fighting a strong threat from a rainbow coalition of Socialists, Greens and Gerry Adams’ gangsters.
No mention of FG or the fact that SF are personae non-gratae for the other potential Rainbow partners. Guido, like Slugger, also notes the ideological incongruity of Blair’s endorsement of FF and not Labour.
Do you want to see my membership card? I have been a PD member for years. I don’t think I’ll be knocking on doors and the only canvassing I’ll be doing is of my relatives. Who are mostly FF to the core.
The PDs made modern Ireland. Ask yourself this, are you better off now than you were ten years ago?
what piffle. give me one example of major legislation for which the PDs have been responsible – one that helped to give rise to your “Modern Ireland”.
The PDs were formed out of an internal FF power struggle, and proved their true colurs as early as 1989 when they went into government with someone they knew to be corrupt to the core. I suppose O’Malley spent two years taking it from Haughey for the good of the nation? To help create the modern Ireland by doing, well, what? By reforming Ireland in what way?
the PDs: unhistorical, uninformed, wine bar bores.
So, are we better off? If you were rich to begin with then you’re probably richer now, if you work in the public service you’re not doing too badly. For the rest, it seems they may have more money but it’s worth less what with huge increase in the cost of living (and the cost of doing business), inflation running at over 5%, plus a massive, massive (so big I have to say it twice) increase in household debt. Couple this with the failure of public services and infrastructure to keep up in any way with the needs of the country and the consequent deterioration of quality of life and I would have to say no, we’re not better off then we were ten years ago.
Personally, I look back on 1997 with a wistful eye. Back then I had the naive notion that as we started to solve our economic problems we would go on to build a country we could be proud of. As I said, how naive I was.
In fairness you can’t blame the PD’s much for household debt they are not making people use credit cards?
also I don’t like looking back at 1997. Maybe 2004 but not 1997
YES Mark Waters!
People are using credit cards because thing s COST more… look at the price of housing! No, I am not better off than I was 10 years ago. Labour and FG gave us the Celtic Tiger but they had it on leash… FF/PDs took it off that leash, it ran wild and now it’s fat and lazy of the money it’s devoured.
10 more years of corruption, mismanagement, and broken promises? NO THANKS!
Ah Guido I look forward to the reports from the canvass, which dying wasp which you will you be propping up over the weekend? And don’t forget to pack your climbing gear!
Simon, were you still in short pants in 1997? I guess my age is showing. For me 1987 is recent history.
On household debt, a huge amount of household debt is mortgages. FF-PD reluctance to take on the vested interests in the housing market drove up house prices. In fact FF-PD were cheerleaders for the housing boom as it was a boon to government coffers and masked the fact that economic growth in the non-construction area was tiny. Now we have the crazy situation where 1 in 5 men is employed in construction-related industry, an area that is starting to take a serious hit now the interest rate hikes are starting to bite.
FF-PD have ridden on the coat-tails of the housing boom and that has masked alot of their failings in relation to the management of the economy.
Interesting though to finally meet one of the citizens who make up the tiny minority that support the PD’s being in power…
If you’re judging quality of life based on earnings then I’m happy for you, personally its not my only sole priority at the moment, and what I am concerned about I don’t expect that arragont baffoon McDowell to care very much for.
Also…if youre going to hold onto that membership card…please tell your leader to get over his obsession with the IRA and Sinn Fein….its distracting from his duties as minister of justice, it stinks of a personal vendetta and its just planly uncomfortable to watch him swell up, go red in the face and sweat like a pig when he gets started on the topic….
People are using credit cards because thing s COST more… look at the price of housing!
People buy houses on credit cards now do they? People buy designer clothes, plasma TV’s, SUV’s that is what is driving debt and nobody is making people buy this crap. They just are. That has nothing to do things costing more. In our parents day they got their house and moved in most often without it being furnished often before it has electricity installed. And they saved and slowly furnished the house with hand me downs and what every they can afford slowly. They were happy with having 4 walls People now wounld’nt move in untill the surround sound system is in place.
That is one of the reasons personnal debt has increased people in Ireland have forgotten how to spend prudnetly.
On household debt, a huge amount of household debt is mortgages.
Yes Mortgages are increasing but a lot of personal debt is unwarranted spending.
Also…if youre going to hold onto that membership card…please tell your leader to get over his obsession with the IRA and Sinn Fein….its distracting from his duties as minister of justice
In fairness if a political party has links to a terrorist organization that gets funded by FARC I certainly think that is relevant to the minister of justice.
Guido don’t canvass in Ireland a brit accent would go down like a lead ballon. (think campaigning in a French Accent for the Lib Dem’s in hard line Conservative heart land)
Simon, in your parent’s day, a house cost about three to four times the average industrial wage. It is now ten to thirteen times the average industrial wage.
In your parent’s day, entire communities did not live 40 to 50 miles from their place of work.
Land speculators, protected by Parlon and the rest of the PDs, have made billions on the back of the Irish people. Billions. They continue to do so, and with the help of the PDs have devoured Ireland with their fat, bloated, mastubatory principles.
Irish community life is getting the shit kicked out of it, and all the PDs can offer as a sop is fucking FARC rebels?
And you are wrong to say that people use Credit cards to buy consumer goods alone. That staement only goes to show that you are completely out of touch with the economic realities of the majority of Irish people.
As are the PDs.
And you are wrong to say that people use Credit cards to buy consumer goods alone. Are you saying that the masses of private debt in this country and the massive boom in retail shopping and consumer shopping is all down to people buy essentials. Seriously?
Guido, I’m inclined to believe my being better off that 10 years ago is down to me not the PDs. Also, FF/PDs cut taxes once the economy was showing a surplus (something FG/Lab/DL achieved), not as a means of creating a thriving economy. Income tax cuts came after the success, they are not the cause of it.
Only a blue shirt could argue that the scandalous Rainbow year ( remember Michael Lowry )
could have contributed to the Irish economy. Judge the blueshirts and Democratic Left ( oops I think they now call themselves the labour party) by their achievements the last time they spent a term in Government together. – 20% unemployment, 60% Income Tax, 40,000 emigrating each year, every penny collected in income tax used to pay the National debt,shit road etc. The country was a laughing stock.
If people have maxed out their dredit cards tough. They should cop on and learn to be more responsible.
Simon, appreciate that Credit Cards are not simply used to buy goods. They are also used for money transfers into current accounts. Often this cash is used to pay off loans early, or as part of the deposit for a house. Credit card limits of up to 30,000 are not uncommon. Having worked in the credit card sector I can tell you that the people with large debts aren’t just the people who use their credit to buy plasma screen tvs. There are many people who used the credit cards because the have not alternative. And of course in Ireland, a major problem is that the credit card companies absolutley destroy everybody with payment protection cover that is next to useless.
Are you saying that the masses of private debt in this country and the massive boom in retail shopping and consumer shopping is all down to people buy essentials. Seriously?
There is no doubt that the continuing high levels of employment sustained over the last 10 years have aided consumer confidence. People will buy more if they have more disposable income aavailable. But why do people spend money they don’t have on stuff that they may or may not need? The only reason is because they know they can’t afford it now, but they might in future. But have they really thought about the future, or is their ignorance of the recent past as dumb as their presumption about the future.
Our current endebted culture is based on the false premise that the good times will last forever. They don’t understand that the reason they can’t afford these goods is because the cost of utilities: rent, incredibly high mortgage repayments, gas, and electricity are forcing the cost of living higher and the money they might use for luxury goods has become reduced. Yet still they spend? Why, because they still have jobs, the economy still seems to be ticking over nicely. But what they do not know is that if the going gets rough the Government has not provided anything to protect them.
As has been mentioned here before, the only thing that is keeping the economy going is low corporation tax keeping companies willing to use Ireland as an effective tax shelter sweet – should they find it better elsewhere they’re outta here – and the construction industry, which is already prey to the rising interests rates in the European Central Bank.
Exports are down, the cost of doing business is up and there is no notion about how reignite the economy should it suffer a shock either through major corporates taking their business elsewhere, or a downturn in the world economy.
And yet, after ten years of relative prosperity we have very little to show for it. We are still battling for an adaquate health service, we are still battling for small class sizes and and the idea of investing in the earlier stages of education (pre-school and primary)is almost completely ignored although it has been proved to be the biggest contributor toward developing a ‘knowledge economy’ in the future. Other long term progressive ideas such as the National Spacial Stategy, having been bypassed by decentralization and the lack of planning to accommodate the expansion of the population in suburban towns around the major cities is proof that this government has only its own short term interests in mind.
“And you are wrong to say that people use Credit cards to buy consumer goods alone. Are you saying that the masses of private debt in this country and the massive boom in retail shopping and consumer shopping is all down to people buy essentials. Seriously?”
No, Simon. I’m saying that people do not use credit cards to buy consumer good alone. The hint is in the text, particularly “do not use credit cards to buy consumer good alone.” Come back when you have an argument against what I say, not what you hear.
oh, Dermot, where are the facts that during the last FG/LAB gov. “every penny collected in income tax used to pay the National debt,shit road etc penny”. That is just unresearched pap. and the 20% unemployment? in 1997? 40,000 emigrating? in 1997?
you know nothing about this. your ignorance may keep you in bliss, but it makes for silly reading.
No, Simon. I’m saying that people do not use credit cards to buy consumer good alone. The hint is in the text, particularly “do not use credit cards to buy consumer good alone.” Come back when you have an argument against what I say, not what you hear.
Well Ben perhaps next time if you had read my actually text and argued against what I actually said we wouldn’t have come to this in past.
What I said.
much for household debt they are not making people use credit cards
Note word “much for” (should have been much of but I think you would have guessed what i wrote if you read my text.)
Ben,
I think you should pay more attention .
I wasn’t referring to the so called rainbow coalition in 1997.FG DL and Labour weren’t in power together long enough to be judged and were merely implementing the policies of the outgoing FF administration. I judge FG and Labour by their record in government the last time the spent a full term in government together between 1982-87. If you bother to check the facts you will see that they are all true. Hard to beleive i know but nevertheless absolutely true. Why do you think that the people of Ireland have chosen to leave Fine Gael in opposition for the last twenty years ?
That’s just nuts. The last time FG/LAG were in gov was 1997, not 1987. Stick to the facts. also, Labour had been in power since 1992. Listen, I grew up in the 1970s, I well remember the 1980s. The fuckup was the FF government of 1977 which QUADRUPLED the national debt. By the time Garett Fitzgerald took over as Taoiseach, the country was ready to be declared bankrupt.
and as for economic policy – the 1987 and 1989 FF-led government merely continued the policies of the FG/LAB government, not the other way arounf. check out the Tallaght dstrategy. If we had continued the policies of FF from 1977 to 1981 we would have done a Mexico.
Again, stick to the facts. 1997 was the last FG/LAB government – the one that brought in the now so famous corporation tax? I know you don’t like it, but I’m not too bothered by that.
none of what went on in this country in the 1980s is hard for me to believe because I lived through it, looked for work through it, signed on and contemplated moving to England through it. That shower in FF – the ones who laughed and slapped each other on the back while Charlie flew slik shirts in from Paris – they are the ones who crippled this country. and O’Malley, unable to climb up charlie’s slippery pole, went off and formed his own little fiefdom – only to return as charlie’s saviour in 1989.
charlie called an election in 1989 – even though he hd been given minority rule by Dukes – because Pee Flynn, Ray Burke, and the rest of that slimy little gang, wanted to raise some money and could only do it during an election campaign.
An unnecessary general election, staged with taxpayer’s money, all to raise some shillings for the mohair suits. There’s your fucking FF economic policy.
and O’Malley bailed them out. Pathetic.
The economic policies of FF carried on by FG/LAB? Other way around, Dermot, other way around.
but, you see, most people don’t study history, only shoot off about how they want to distort time a la Star Trek and make it look like the last FG/LAB government was in 1987 – and that somehow it was them to got us into the mess.
Ray Mcsharry carried on the FG/LAB economic policies in 1987 – that’s why Dukes backed the FF minority government.
But hey, you know, fuck all of that. why bother with facts?
Ben,
You seem bothered to me…Beleive your own bullshit if you want.
FG stand for nothing, are as useless and unconvincing. In opposition for 20 years and rightly so.
As for Pat Rabbitte and the Labour party. Ask yourself how many parties has Pat Rabbitte intends to join.WP, DL, New Agenda, Official Sein Fein , Labour( only FF and The PDs to go and he will have a clean Sweep).
Enda and Pat- what a bunch of losers
listen, this is just silly. you obviously know nothing about modern Irish history. This is just ridiculous!
where am I wrong? About Ray McSharry carrying on FG/LAB policies?
About the economic pocilies of the 1977 FF government which saw a massive increase in the civil service – tens of thousands of unnecessary appointments, wages we are still paying?
All appointed by FF to win votes – it crippled the country, quadrupled the national debt, left us in hock to the world bank and a hair’s breath away from being declared bankrupt.
you know nothing about this. Furthermore, you seem proud of your complete lack of understanding of the past – this complete lack of any historical context does not bother you at all. 1997 becomes 1987, and the sins of FF become the sins of labour and FG under Garret Fitzgerald.
Mind you, you have called enda and Pat a bunch of losers. Who needs facts when you have such rhetorical weapons to hand?
Change is whats required simple as… Daft dave’s monkey could run the economy at this stage and it wouldnt be effected
its what and how the money is spent thats most important and FF/PDs have more then proven over the last 10 years that they are incapable of spending the money properly. People are finally seeing the truth it took long enough but hopfully by end of next Thursday we will be rid of the Laurel and Hardy show that is FF/PD
Agreeing with most of what you are saying now. (note word most) Save for FG/Lab bring in the low corporation tax rate. THey spoke of doing it but did not actually do it. From the 1997 budget.
http://www.budget.gov.ie/1997/
Also Des O’Malley was the person to reduce manufacturing tax to 10% back in the early 80’s.
Anyway carry on