If recent polls are to be believed, we will “go down that road again” after the next general election.

I wouldn’t believe them. Have a feeling that that is the media trying to normalise Fianna Fail as a party for us for the election after next, not this one. That would obviously be about 500 years too soon for them still though

If they do get in next time around I’m giving up on democracy.

McCreevey did warn of the dangers coming. he was shafted by Aherne at the famous inchadoney fianna fail gathering and sent off toEurope. his policies kickstarted the country. It was failure to regulate and change tack that got us ino troublei. NOT UNUSUAL IN A BANANA REPUBLIC

Independent researchers design and administer the opinion polls. They may be paid for by the media but no research agency is going to risk it’s reputation by deliberately biasing results.

Many in the media forget about the 2-3% margins of error attached to opinion poll results however and talk about 1% increases and leads like they’re absolutes which is rediculous.

@ Niall…I’d agree. He’s right in what he’s saying. Just because we don’t have to borrow it doesn’t mean it’s there to spend. It should on the other hand mean that as much as anticipated to be taken in tax now doesn’t.

Buttons to that. Leo is likely counting down the days to his non-exec directorship in car insurance

Yes he did! Watch that particular statement on YouTube

Re 2016 Open Market Bond sale : That’s if the ECB don’t turnaround this year and say the Deal was illegal. If that happens, our Central Bank will be forced to sell the bonds immediatley. Then no more accounting tricks….., we will be paying the interest to the new bond holders…… real cash leaving the country. Another Billion to the defecit each year. A great bunch in the Dail we have.

Should it not be “its one billion less we have to tax the people. And we are now not going ahead with the following new taxes we were planning to implement.” But no matter what deal the country gets , this government will make sure the man in the street will never benifit from it.

“Not another cent. Banks will have to tell us how they are going to impose losses on their junior and senior bond holders before they come to us looking for more money”. Leo Varadkar speech. February 2011

The country still needs to borrow approximately 12 billion Martin. The 1 billion “saving” in the promissory note deal is just 1 billion less to borrow. We can’t go on borrowing billions every year to meet the difference between spending and income, taxes will have to rise and spending has to fall.

Bertie, Biffo and McCreevy doubled public spending in a ten year period based on the tax income on money borrowed from abroad and pumped into the economy. There’s a painful few years still to go unfortunately.

Painful for who do Reg? Not for the career politcians that are imposing these cuts not painful for the bankers who caused the crisis or even the developers who are now going to reap millions in rent from new housing policies. Painful only for the ordinary man who had no part in causing this crisis. Every financial deal done by a government should benifit the people whom they serve not themselves or theit banking buddies.

Where’s the ‘good deal’ part of this ‘deal’ and if its only stopping us from borrowing a further billion how can it be hailed as a deal. Swings and round abouts with these moronic government members, sure any idiot knows its not there to spend. What a knob jockey tell us something we don’t know madcar.

It is a deal ryan

Weather it is a good deal or bad deal is yet to be decided

It’s a bad deal jay, call it like it is.

I never said that the pain has been spread evenly or implemented fairly Martin! Personally I’ve taken a 50% hit on my income. Many small business owners could probably claim the same.

Reg,

Most countries run a budget deficit most of the time. The deficit only becomes a serious problem when you are unable to finance it as in Ireland’s case. Ordinarily countries finance their deficits by borrowing the money in the market. Or if they control their own currency and are prepared to accept some inflation, they can simply create new money by buying their own government’s bonds etc (Quantitative easing as the Yanks call it). Even in the depths of the 1980s recession, Ireland was always able to go to the market to fund the budget deficit until Brian Lenihan bailed out the banks in 2008. The markets then realised Ireland would not be able to cover the massive banking losses and pay them back and so the interest rate they demanded rose to an unaffordable level. This pushed us into the tender Troika embrace who now lend us the money and charge interest so that we can pay the banking debt as well as our budget deficit.

The fixation on the budget deficit and the consequent shredding of our social services and escalating taxation is driven by the political agenda to distract attention from the looting of the country to pay for private banking debt. The tax hikes and cutbacks are the mechanism by which the Irish people are being made to pay for this failure of speculative financial capitalism. Having had €20 billion stolen from us in 2012 to pay off the bondholders, we will hand over another €17 billion in 2013 to cover the gambling losses of financial speculators.
This does not take into account the indirect cost of our zombie banks on the budget deficit over the past 5 years. Credit has been denied to viable businesses resulting in multiple closures throwing thousands of people onto the dole where they draw social welfare instead of contributing income tax in a double blow to the exchequer. The bank collapse and bailout is responsible for a large part of our budget deficit in addition to being the reason that we cannot finance that deficit through the normal channels.
We won’t tax and cut our way out of this recession. We need to repudiate all illegitimate banking debt immediately as the first step in our recovery.

Your right Reg its not fair that you took a 50% hit and the governments Career politicians took only 10% when they took power. but maybe you should be a little more angry that this was done to you instead of aiding the unfairness with your apathic comments. They will continue to screw us while the people take your attitude. No offence meant.

@martin- such a man of the people you are. Spare me. And try reading a book, would you?

I think I’m more of a realist than apathetic Martin. Yes the government and politicians should have taken much more of a hit to their salaries and pensions than they took when they started this government. The Taoiseach is still paying himself about 25% more that he should be for a country our size. Emergency legislation should have been introduced to limit the maximum pension from the state to 75k. Would love to see the Bertie’s and Biffo’s of this world try and take a case to fight that one! As someone once said, anger is not a policy. I’m of the age where I try and persuade people by the power of the argument as opposed to wasting energy getting excited. There’s enough “great outraged” around here to more than compensate for my apathy!

Only people calling this a deal so far is finelaborgaelers and FFers, European banking masters have merely noted! Still a very important constitutional challenge in progress to the promnotes.

Its his turn to spread the bullshite. Notice how they pass around the sound bites between the ministers – do they think we will think better of them if they spread out their stupid views between them?
Its mostly because Kenny is hopeless unless its written out for him by his marketing men

Exactly. If he is the poster boy of FG and future leader in waiting. Then ffs give him a minstership without portfolio instead of this nonsense…..But then again common sense and Irish government are hardly good bed fellows

Ciarán, you’re missing out 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012 where the deficit was greater than €12bn. That’s like saying a plane can’t fly because it starts out at 0 altitude in height and finishes at 0 altitude in height.

Ignore land you are missing the point. Why did the deficit increase from 2009-2012? Private banking debt bailout and austerity.

ECB is just embarrassed now that they agreed on this deal too fast. Just wait, soon they will announce that after researching and deep thinking that it is in fact illegal, then what?

The present policy is working….. Maintain TDs salary and allowances at current levels, maintain the salaries of judges, GPs, dentists, solicitors, at current levels. It’s a brilliant system!!

Their is an agenda here to cut everyone’s wages and then a miraculous turnaround. Bigger forces at work other than FG. This is an EU agenda pushed by the big boys.

No John, only the wages of the middle class are being cut.

Frank
You must be raging that in the overall scheme of things you are irrelevant and impotent whether your ideas are whacky or not!

But its not a good deal its a disgrace that they have tied bank debt to the people who didnt benefit in anyway Shame on FF/FG/LAB

We should change the red thumbs to blue for the craic :)

Rodrigo
From whatever garret you make contributions I am convinced there is a fetid stink of under ambition and frustrated self failure as you hurl bile laden insults at any political personage you can. These targets of your venom are everything you cannot be so you slander them in the way a schoolchild online bully would behave.

Richard. I’m beginning to wonder what Fine Gael politician you really are. Why is it you only turn up on the journal when a FG member of the Government is being slated? I absolutely 100% stand over what I say about Leo Varadkar and any other member of this Government. They lied and cheated their way to power, therefore myself and any other member of society are entitled to criticise them anytime they come out and make statements that directly contradict the statements they made while in opposition.

Ah rogers and is it your lack of ambition and self worth that makes you come on here and attack people, do you slander your targets because they are everything you cannot be so you and your brigade resort to personal attacks. Well if that is what you believe personal attacks are about and you always carry out personal attacks on here that must be what is your problem thanks for clearing that up, makes sense. I think the above comment was more directed at the mess up they are continuing to make of the country.

LOL FG ministers trolling TJ. It’s the only public discourse they get……

We want your lying, cheating, stroke pulling, self interested party out!

As you were minister, back to propping up the dail bar….drinks on me.

Let’s reply to both of you. If you believe that it’s wrong of me to challenge either or both of you for the daily spew of libellous venom that you direct at Government politicians who have a Democratic mandate to carry out their work while you attempt to undermine them for your Sinn Fein task masters then you’re wrong. If my defense of legitimacy is simply discarded as ad hominum rebuttal then I don’t know how you live with yourselves.
I responded to you yesterday Julie about your heroes who now take the Queen’s shilling and have nothing to show for forty years of murder and torture and thieving and lying but a bigger majority in favour of remaining with the United Kingdom. Even worse you have surrendered your principles on the Territorial Claim of the Republic to Northern Ireland and the right of people in the North to self determination with our consent.
These heroes of yours are nothing but broken down nags enjoying the grass. They are spent!

Are we living in a sci fi movie where I have heroes and master, who I perform tasks for, have you lost it. All the fake positivity messing with your head. Yes rogers they obtained their votes through their mandate that they have continuously gone against. They have done the complete opposite, they lied total lies, to get into power. You don’t know how I live with myself, I ask myself all the time how do these politicians sleep at night knowing that because of their actions thousands(272,000) children are in poverty look up poverty because it is obvious it is something that has not affected you for a while If ever. As for SF and Northern Ireland, when Ireland voted for it independence 75% voted for the entire island to get its independence but because of Britain wanting to keep a foot hold in Ireland, they left NI too the British, Irish Catholics were stuck while the rest Of us were enjoying independence, now people up north don’t want to be part of the republic I wouldn’t want to either, cost of living high, shoddy hospitals, corruption, massive illegal banking debts, corrupt useless politicians. Can you blame them. No one owns my vote my family voted labour all their lives back to my grandfather. I made up my own mind. SF have my vote and if they go against their mandate like FG did they will not have my vote. Your being made a fool of your government.

Julie
A lot of pent up anger there so I will simply refer you to your accusation that the Government have abandoned their “Mandate” and I think you may be confusing the word with Manifesto as the present Government are quite clearly adhering to the authority granted them by the Electorate at the General Election.
You also seem a little confused about the Northern question and who voted for what so perhaps we will both sidestep that and just leave it that the Troubles have left Sinn Fein sharing power in Belfast but further than ever from a United Ireland. So after thousands of deaths and incalculable damage to the economy of the entire island the reward is a place at the table with good expenses and a pension.
On the one hand we had the stalwart Republican Party in Fianna Fail who couldn’t keep their hands out of the cookie jar and now the Angry Republicans who pretend they know how to manage a cookie jar.
Between the two they have spent their entire existences causing destruction and damage of one sort or another across this island.
God Bless your heroes!

Based on past posts from you please follow your own advice on your most recent comment!

You, sir, are a master debater. That will put him in his place. But the sad thing he is right. The giveaway budgets from Charlie McCreevey are what got us into this mess. No such thing as putting some money away for the rainy day. Well the rainy days are here and we are all suffering due to the arrogance and ignorance of our previous government. As I have said before the biggest problem with the current government is that they seem incapable of sorting out the mess they inherited from FF. Unfortunately the alternative of Sinn Fein (the choice of the economically illiterate) and the ULA does even bear thinking about. That is what is worrying about our current predicament. There doesn’t seem to be any one able to fix it.

Yeah but will Leo shut the fckup for glods sake

He has political Tourette’s can’t keep his trap shut. A star struck eegit anything for a few column inches.

Really Stephen Donnelly, Shane Ross financially illiterate not the case I’m afraid. Compared to Noonan their giants. Noonan pays 1.4Billion for irish life and sells it over a year later with the euro strong again for the same price. Genius

Martin I did not mention Shane Ross or Stephen Donnelly. I was talking about Sinn Fein and the ULA. Shane Ross and Stephen Donnelly are not affiliated to either group.

@ Martin ….poor old Michael Noonan Must never have heard of “Inflation!” …oh hang on a minute …didn’t he buy a house for 3 grand ! …he must have heard of it ….the mind boggles !

@Paul, Shane Ross and Stephen Donnelly are affiliated with the ULA, both men are part of the technical group and meet once a week with the ULA when the dail is sitting and vote with the ULA 99% of the time. You are obviously correct to say they are not members of the ULA of course.

@Martin. You’re right. They are members of the technical group. I was speaking specifically about the ULA but point taken.

By “our debt” …can one presume you work in anglo or any one of the banks that broke the country ….because I don’t and it’s not my debt!

Well Jonny I would have thought it was pretty obvious what I meant when I said, “our actual debt”

well pierce the “saving of 1 billion could have been 28 billion if the promissory note was scrapped! Michael Noonan admitted it was illegal AFTER it was doubled and converted to National debt … And he wrote in powers for a minister for finance that would have made Hitler blush ….the night of the long knives ? …The night of the long LIES ….for those of you who have a mild disposition with the Names hitler and Michael Noonan in the same sentence feel free to substitute any other despotic figure from history ….
And pierce if you accept the “saving” as real then you are adding legitimacy to something that is illegal in my opinion! ……