Irish Election - Coverage of Irish Politics, News and Current Affairs

Last Saturday Tayto Ahern laid it on the line for those who would seek to oust Fianna Fáil from government. Do so at your peril, he warned, for there be cash-eating monsters in the opposition. Vicious creatures with snarly teeth and bad monster breath who seek to return Ireland to the bad, bad borrowing days [...]

You know what, I’m finally starting to understand how to speak “politicianese.”
When it comes to election time, and you hear a candidate say, “All I’m hearing on the doorsteps is… blah,” what they really mean is, “All my party wants to talk about is… blah.” While you’re at it, throw a few more blahs in [...]

I thought I’d wrap up the coverage of Bertiegate here with a rather interesting item I stumbled across on the RTÉ news site earlier today: Swedish minister resigns over TV licence fee.

Apologies to Wagger and Simon for covering some of the same ground. Originally posted on the Cedar Lounge Revolution.
The reason neither Labour nor Fine Gael went for the metaphorical jugular with Bertie Ahern has today become clear. This was because they must have tested the water and realised the issue was pure poison for them [...]

Geraldine Kennedy (aka Madam, for those not up on the parlance of Irish journalism), writing in her Editorial in The Irish Times (subs required) today lets her exasperance get the better of her.
Obviously annoyed with the electorate for not punishing An Taoiseach in the polls following Bertiegate, Madam went on a rant about how the [...]

There has been a lukewarm reaction to the announcement of today’s visit by An Taoiseach Bertie Ahern visit to the region.
The Taoiseach, who has gotten himself caught up in several “scandals”, will have fifteen engagements in both the Limerick and Clare region.

While Bertie Ahern holes himself up in the tidal wave of controversy surrounding the revelation that he took “loans” from friends to finance the costs of his legal seperation, the news has not been good for the Government either in this part of the country.
Newcastle West was dealt another blow after 260 jobs were put [...]

Why did Mary Harney resign as leader of the Progressive Democrats a couple of weeks ago, after fighting over the job just a couple of months earlier? I can’t help but wonder that perhaps she knew something bad about Ahern was in the offing, and one of the reasons that she chose not to continue [...]

Bertie Ahern has now admitted to receiving “gifts” of €50,000 in the early 1990s. It remains now to be seen if the group of people named by Ahern and described by him as his personal friends, benefitted in any way as a result of giving Ahern money. What we do know is that Ahern did [...]

Walk carefully lads, the women of Ireland are only putting away their tissues after that performance. Not a dry eye in the house and sure wasn’t he only great not having his own bank account for years, and I bet the knives come out for Miriam putting poor Bertie through the wringer. Ah C. [...]

The Irish are exceptionally generous people, and as such are particularly forgiving of their politicians. They often boast about who has been talking more brown envelopes than another, down at the Pub. I can only think that the general public here expect that taking bribes and “wink and a handshake” deals are the norm for [...]

If you haven’t noticed, the government has been busy lowering expectations on the value of their, and the Irish publics 80% share in the privatization’s efforts of Aer Lingus. They have been so busy that “Mr Ahern has taken a defamation action against Mr O’Brien arising from his claim that he had given the Fianna [...]

“Nothing New” says Bertie (Google News collection of articles on the story), is everyone inclined to believe him?