Irish politics discussion thread

thing about old people, they tend to be replaced in their age group by old people

im not sure that will stay true as successive generations experience a lower quality of life, youd think/hope not, but as an electorate i also think we tend to weight up any putative alternative option quite warily also?

Surely same factors at home as over here? But ia, civil war politics is a hell of a drug. I always laugh at people here who call themselves “politically homeless” but then if I did move home I don’t know who I’d ever vote for.

Also, I can’t stop thinking about John Finucane.

FG in 5th place with 'the kids' is interesting, but presumably incumbency counts for some of that?

(a bad paddy asks) What caused the drop off in independent support in 2016? Specific issues, or "I was able to picture myself giving them my first preference, and burst out in giggles"? Or was it just that it crystallised out into Renua / Social Democrats / Solidarity?

idk, i mean over there brexit just got into everything

theres some trepidation here about the place, but i really dont get the impression that most ppl would have it in mind as voting approaches. key that whatever happens or doesn't wont be any party's fault on this side, really.

other than that, there's about three different countries voting- comfortable/not, homeowner/not, rural/dub.

theres not a majority out of any of them, and yeah civil war or not the central two are the vehicles we have one way or the other, which is why i think green/lab key and might actually have their pick

fg unpopular, have been ruling to not-great results on the things key to the left, bit can still point to hand they were dealt, referendums were nice werent they, stability, yadda yadda

ff a more natural ally on the spectrum, have facilitated stability while not being to blame for anything as such, but eesh its ff yknow

the range of quite-likely results is quite energising tbh

(xp)

I caught a discussion between the main parties on Brexit when I was over in October - it was very civil, which was nice.

Yeah, I'd kill to have a graph that looked like that in the UK, even with most of them bowsies.

andrew, if i had to guess (cause i sure dont remember actual events) id cynically say that independents are an easy bunch to threaten to vote for between elections (and particularly in those few years) and that threat shrivelled back to normal-or-thereabouts vote spread for them when an actual election happened

id be surprised if the independents propping up this govt didnt see a fall again from the 2016 result.

people will go back to parties, but possibly not the bigger ones

FG in 5th place with 'the kids' is interesting, but presumably incumbency counts for some of that?

(a bad paddy asks) What caused the drop off in independent support in 2016? Specific issues, or "I was able to picture myself giving them my first preference, and burst out in giggles"? Or was it just that it crystallised out into Renua / Social Democrats / Solidarity?

this is pretty much it

pleasantly surprised how quickly its been visited on him, tbf

ahhhhhhhhh

mary lou, paschal, joe are in my constituency

isnt that a foine range of headliners anyway

Paschal is a classic Irish name. I know it’s not one of ours but I’ve never met a non-Irish one. Same as Jarlath.

fuck what dyou mean not ours

shook

ah chrisht the walls are falling in and i come in here for a bit of comfort and youve set the floor alight on me now

french!

quick guirt sez jarlath is still solid tho?

Yeah Jarlath (Iarlaith!) is rock solid Irish.

ok phew i thought yr "same with" covered origin as opposed to never meeting etc

my middle name is Paschal lol

The word "paschal" is the equivalent of Greek "pascha" and is derived from Aramaic "pasḥā" and Hebrew "pesaḥ", meaning "the passing over" (cf. Ex 12:13.23.27; cf. Is 31,5). The origin is not known. Some scholars refer to Assyrian "pasah" – appease or Egyptian "pa-sh" – remembrance or "pē-sah" – the blow. The Bible links "pesaḥ" with "pāsaḥ" – two literal meanings are: to limp and to perform a ritual dance around a sacrifice (1 K 18:21.26). Figuratively it may be understood, "to jump", "to pass", "to spare". It refers to the passage of God on the Passover night, when the Israelites left Egypt. God struck the houses of Egyptians and left the Israelites untouched, i.e. passed over.

jaysus all the way back ha?

lads

ive a very good mate, sound socialist working man now not like meself, but hes badly afflicted

his brothers mot is running for the ... bad guys

which ones

srsly now, the very bad ones, yknow

I didn’t know Renua were still going

worse!

_oh_

I was looking at their list of candidates and it's striking seeing the varied realms of madness behind their eyes that they all describe themselves as "a first-time Dáil candidate for the N4tional P4rty" - I'm not sure that'll go as high on your CVs as you think, folks.

hes appalled obv but hes staying informed for the stories

he got a manifesto to spellcheck a while back i shit u not

Christ. What is it, make Ireland 99% white again?

give or take

dont be stupid, be a smarty, come and join the National Party!

I’m sure we’ve discussed this site before but this crowd are doing God’s work imo

Some great archive stuff of Dev, Bertie and others, but ofc I see this cunt up first
https://irishelectionliterature.files.wordpress.com/2020/01/paul-mcweeney-a.jpg

https://irishelectionliterature.files.wordpress.com/2020/01/paul-mcweeney-b.jpg

I mean, this emigrant would like to return, but something about this guy makes me think he wouldn’t be welcoming my husband.

shit theres a big possibility i work with a sister of his and all

sad lol

Know that thing where you're trying to climb down from calling someone autistic, so you start randomly saying the n-word, on record, to The Times? pic.twitter.com/v3KUlB77CV

— Séamas It Ever Was (@shockproofbeats) January 28, 2020

The parents seem to think FG will be out after this election. Who would FF go in with? The Brits are in for a rude shock if they celebrate Leo going.

Lol Eilis O Hanlon, how the fuck is she still alive

By stoking toxic Anglophobia, Leo Varadkar is digging his own political grave | Eilis O'Hanlon https://t.co/4QvJGLSHCs

— Telegraph Politics (@TelePolitics) January 29, 2020

People in the Irish Republic always liked to boast that they were above the tribal hostilities of the North

ah thats a northern/shinner trope for a large part, with various currents of truth running through it at different times or in different contexts maybe

who should or who will ff go in with?

have to say theyre bullish enough towards everyone atm, not sure theyre even making noises about making fg sit second bench in a reversal scenario

i think ff/ind is too much a stretch, but even if lab/greens could make up the numbers without the more Impossible independents (whose numbers id think should fall hard in the event of a voter return to lab/ff) could a programme for govt arise from suchba coalition, and would the last ff/l/g govt not yknow remain in the memory?

*shrug*

right

not to say things is perfect, obv

but

notwithstanding eh tbh bias in reporting and/or bias in what one chooses to read of what's available and reported inherent

irelands good compared to some of the larger ilx brand countries

dont @ me pls i live there, and anyway we need to get over that to get to the next rather simple point

two big fuckin homogeneous-abouts lumps of central parties are a good thing if they continue to rotate about each other without forming one sun and the electorate can flavour the options for forming coherent govt effectively

discuss

just the small questions then

this seems to include -

realistically what's the best you can hope for from government?

is there an optimal size of nation state if we must have such things, and aren't there serious economic advantages to nation states that aren't saddled with delusions of imperial grandeur?

yr two "central" parties well i don't think anybody's come to a broad agreement about where the centre is but given the general point aren't you close to describing the advantages of a one-party state with a shifting cast of aparatchiks?

Are you basically saying a bigger Sinn Fein, for example, is a threat to a strong and stable middle?

good scoping question ty

will be back in a wee while

aren't you close to describing the advantages of a one-party state with a shifting cast of aparatchiks?

NV otm

i'm not saying there *aren't* advantages to that

right

realistically what's the best you can hope for from government?

any govt?

an irish govt in the irish political context generally?

this next govt specifically?

"realistically" vs "hope for" not duelling there?

and then we can get on to whether or not the question is being asked of an adjudicator already provided with an agreed universal logbook of "best" or whether it's being asked of a given interested party, in which case lol

is there an optimal size of nation state if we must have such things, and aren't there serious economic advantages to nation states that aren't saddled with delusions of imperial grandeur?

overall, are you asking ireland to admit its non-imperial privilege? (!)

yr two "central" parties well i don't think anybody's come to a broad agreement about where the centre is but given the general point aren't you close to describing the advantages of a one-party state with a shifting cast of aparatchiks?

woof!

the question interests me specifically (and probably very obviously) because of current uk/us ilx politically noseholding of *any* nominal centre. it doesn't seem to me that it matters what or where that is for the purposes of the question tbh.

specific to context, the centre is not a moral judgement value (horror!) but can be fairly roughly defined and agreed i think, even if you look in from outside. FF are centre left, FG are centre right-right, Lab are centre-left-left, SF are centre-left-left, PBP are hard left, Aontú, National Party are hard right, etc

the social democrats are a young, small sample but I think I'd call em centre enough?

I am specifically *not* describing a one-party state. I am *maybe* asking about, in no particular order, the advantages of:

- large stable centre (stable has crashed the country obv, so again thats descriptive of amorphous mass of electoral power and not a valus judgement of effect)

- that nonetheless crucially incorporates an option of 'throw the bums out!" while keeping the option of a non-extreme protest vote alternative (electoral DC power supply nest pas)

- that nonetheless offers additionally (as recently trialled) an option to have the bums in together (be that a hard or soft coalition) and additionally

- can offer an option of which bums lord it over the other bums in the above scenario and to what degree

- as well as one set of bums, but flavoured with the varying sprinklings of further-spectrum heavy metals as may appeal

separately, apparatchiks: i dont know fully as a descriptor what may be inherent and implicit here but you may find my sympathies for faceless bureaucrats as the hand on the levers of strategic movement in a given political system somewhat softer than most, given that i am one etc

Are you basically saying a bigger Sinn Fein, for example, is a threat to a strong and stable middle?

i. everything is a threat to a strong and stable middle, the universe is entropic

ii.im not sure our system, building in the options for change as laid out briefly above, is the most "stable" as may be meant in the loaded mayesian term offered but i can roll with it if we dont get fussy

iii. yes, in short, and ofc we can not presume that its a bad thing at all at all, depending on whether we are the posited auditor of a known/agreed "good/bad" book nest pas