SOME EDITED responses to yesterday’s article by Helena Kennedy:
CHRIS:Helena Kennedy writes: "The reason for disillusionment with politics is that people feel powerless. They feel their voices are not heard. They see the rich buy access to Downing Street; they watch Rupert Murdoch decide whether there is a referendum on the European Convention; they witness the tabloids dictate policy and they see unregulated markets decimate their savings, their mortgages and their pensions, with parliament appearing supine in the face of these events.
“The disengagement of the British public from politics is not surprising. The expenses scandal, which exposed wholesale fiddling of MPs’ and peers’ allowances on the part of all parties, fed into a pre-existing suspicion that too many politicians were in politics to line their own pockets. The recent exposure of Tony Blair making £20 million since leaving office and some of his ex-ministers jumping ship and hawking their wares to the private sector for incredible sums has added to a public sense of revulsion.”
All this also applies to Ireland. We have a previous taoiseach who peddles his wares to the private sector for incredible sums. The result is the same: revulsion by the public for everything that such a corrupt system stands for. We need an Obama – someone prepared to sacrifice his own political neck in order to bring about change for the greater good. No one with that courage has yet surfaced.
The only ray of hope is this: if Obama managed to buck the trend in the US, his lead will have influence here. The people will watch change occur in the US and will expect change here. The old saying was if America caught a cold, Ireland got the flu! Let’s hope the Obama effect will have a dynamic, positive effect on our little 51st state.
DAITHÍ M:I would like people like Helena Kennedy to put pressure on the Irish Government to accept responsibility for the millions of Irish citizens living in her country. Why is nothing being done for the repatriation of Irish citizens and why have they no representation in our Government?
HIBERNUNCULUS:It is no real surprise that more people belong to the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds in the UK than to all the political parties combined. The political parties could resolve this by appropriating the RSPB on the basis that politics, for many people, has always been "for the birds" anyway.
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