Fianna Fáil has always resonated with Irish society because it is the party most closely associated with “cute hoorism” and “stroke-pulling”, which are much admired by many people. This is also the reason why it has the worst record of any party on corruption.
But do people care? Clearly a large minority of Irish people don’t, because they vote for Fianna Fáil every time.
As for Independents, leaving aside the occasional candidate such as Joe Higgins, who has a distinct political ideology, most are only out to get what they can for their own constituency. Is it any wonder, then, that we get a banana republic as the outcome?
Maybe now those who vote this way will realise that you won’t improve the nation’s education or health system by voting for someone who will spend time looking after individual requests from voters.
Madam, – The outrage being expressed by many of the electorate is understandable, but one question I would put to those who voted Fianna Fáil or Independent in the last election is: “What did you expect to happen?”
Perhaps a 10 per cent levy on people who voted Fianna Fáil in the last election would help to hammer the message home and restore order to the public finances. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Observing the recent responses to our unfolding economic meltdown, I was reminded of the Kübler-Ross model – otherwise known as the the five stages of grief.
I suspect that this analogy, originally designed to describe people’s reaction to terminal illness, is applicable to our collective “grief” at the loss of the economic gains to which we had begun to feel entirely entitled in recent years.
The first stage is denial. While we may have been in that state initially, it appears that most of us have accepted the diagnosis — even if we’re not keen on the medicine.
Anger, of course, is much in evidence – especially that directed at bankers, developers and politicians.
Bargaining is well under way – hence the marches and protests which aim to somehow divert the pain on to someone else.
Depression is already at hand for some (if you’ve lost your job or are under threat) and no doubt this will affect more people as time goes on.
Finally, we will come to acceptance – maybe in a year, or two, or five – but eventually we will find that life goes on. The economy will recover, though perhaps never again to the heady heights of the past decade.
My point is simply that some day – and it may be several years hence – this current malaise will pass. At least that’s what I tell myself – or maybe I’m still at stage one. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – In your edition of February 11th, Brendan Landers debunked the misty-eyed myth of Ireland as a nirvana for returning emigrants. Last Tuesday Frances O’Rourke, your deputy property editor, issued a riposte in which she flippantly advised us to see the recession as an opportunity to “indulge our taste for misery to the max”.
While Ms O’Rourke joins in the chorus of national self-exculpation which attributes our current economic woes to global factors, the property journalism sector bears a modest but real share of the blame for the difficulties in which cash-strapped negative equity victims find themselves.
We expect the constructionocracy and estate agents to act in their own short-term self-interest; that is the nature of their business. We’re not that surprised when politicians do the same. However, we do, perhaps naively, expect more from serious newspapers.
The owners of The Irish Times and other papers allowed their property sections to act as uncritical cheerleaders for the property sector, allowing short- term gain (in their case mushrooming property advertising revenue) to blind them to the social consequences of a bubble that they themselves were blowing into like clowns at a childrens party.
When it came to property journalism, the watchdogs of the people truly turned into Bichons. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Thank God for the utter balance and common sense expressed by Frances O’Rourke. When will we ever learn that it rains elsewhere than in Limerick; that we are not the only country (800 years and counting) to be invaded by a rampant, marauding neighbour; not the only country to ever experience famine (160 years ago) or mass emigration and poverty.
We see other countries constantly experiencing these appalling tragedies every day.
One of the characteristics that makes me proud to be Irish is our capacity for compassion. We understand misery and injustice because it is hard-wired in our genes. But we do not have a monopoly on misery.
What we do have is a longer life expectancy than previous generations, a greater capacity to generate wealth and educate our young than even our parents could have dreamed of, an ability to punch above our weight on the world stage and a growing tolerance and openness for how individuals and communities live their daily lives.
Every nation on earth is experiencing a grave economic crisis with colossal, unknown implications. Questions are being asked of big and small countries and Ireland is no different. Can we generate solutions in partnership at home and abroad? Can we provide a life at home for our young, because no other countries can offer us escape hatches? Equally, can we value the contribution which new arrivals of recent years can make to the blend of being be Irish in the years to come?
There is only one answer. We owe it to our ancestors, we owe it to our children, we owe it to ourselves; that answer is yes, we can! – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Liam Meehan’s “quotation” from Karl Marx (February 19th) is a well-circulated internet hoax and is not to be found in Marx’s writings. Indeed, the quotation is at odds with the central idea in Das Kapital, which holds that the immiseration of the working classes will come about due to ever-declining wages, and not due to the extension of personal credit or ruinous home loans. The very notion that the working classes would come to have access to personal credit in the manner our society currently facilitates would most likely have been unthinkable for Marx.
The prevalence of this hoax quotation raises questions as to who propagated it and why. Some have suggested a possible right-wing source aiming to tainting the current moves towards bank nationalisations, and the likely re-regulation of the financial sector, by association with a revolutionary figure such as Marx – a philosopher and historian, usually characterised, however ignorantly and erroneously, as a malevolent proponent of authoritarianism and an architect of many of the 20th century’s ills and tragedies. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Last week I watched an international foreign TV station which specialises in international financial reportage announcing the resignation of Denis Casey, former chief executive of Irish Life Permanent, and citing a €7 billion transaction between ILP and AIB (sic). How unfortunate that Allied Irish Banks and Anglo Irish Bank have the same initials. And what is the possible damage to AIB? – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Last Monday The Irish Times contained full-page advertisements from AIB and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions. The contrast between the two could not be greater.
The former comprised patronising guff about commitment (mentioned five times) which was undoubtedly generated by an advertising agency. The Ictu contribution was a measured document which addressed many of the problems confronting the State. Although far from perfect, it was close to being the type of comprehensive plan that the Government should have produced months ago.
The bank’s advertisement stated that AIB is regulated by the Financial Regulator. Thankfully, the Ictu ad contained no such endorsement. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – I concur with the sentiments expressed by Larry Broderick, general secretary of the IBOA (February 19th). I am an employee of one of our main banks and, while I don’t deal directly with the public, I have heard from colleagues of instances where people have held branch staff responsible for the banking crisis. Staff have been insulted and abused and I have also heard of a case where one was spat at.
It is totally unjustifiable for anyone to hold ordinary bank officials responsible for the reckless and renegade behaviour of the senior bankers who bear a great responsibility for the predicament we all find ourselves in. Some have acknowledged that they may have made incorrect decisions and have agreed to take considerable pay cuts (so would I if I was on their salaries), but they have failed to apologise for their part in this debacle.
While apologies won’t do anything to get us out of this financial mire, it might help to stop the unjustified attacks on bank staff. I can assure you there is much anger, distaste and sadness among the ordinary foot soldiers of the banks at the way in which senior bankers have behaved and sometimes still are behaving. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Current economic policy is forcing fearful consumers to retain their money rather than spend it to support Irish jobs. Take myself, for example – a public sector worker who had been contemplating changing my car. But the Government, to paraphrase Don McLean, took the levy to my Chevy so there goes that plan. Apologies to those in the hard-pressed motor trade. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – When referring to the illegal Irish in the US, sympathetic commentators tend to use the euphemism “the undocumented”. What comparable term might we use to describe those Oireachtas members who can (and do!) claim generous travel and accommodation expenses without having to present any receipts? “The unvouched”? – Yours, etc,
Madam, – I think there should be a moratorium on articles and letters explaining how everything went wrong for the Celtic Tiger. Most of them belong to the category referred to by Basil Fawlty as “the bleeding obvious”. (Obvious now, that is, after the crash has happened. I wish some of those sages had shared their thoughts with us before the crash; five years ago I couldn’t find anyone who believed house prices would fall.)
What we need to do is find a way out of the mess. As a start, couldn’t the lowest-paid public service workers, whose salaries are very modest, be exempted from the pension levy? – Yours, etc,