Machine Nation Best Irish Politician of the Year 2008 *** POLLING OPEN NOW

Did you try going into edit post and scrolling down the page?

Time for the 2nd count. See whoever nominated Harney is gone. NDS thinks she's great. He must have cried so much with joy the other night that his keyboard is waterlogged. Are the 2 Brutons married and is the guy with the stupid name a Roma Gypsy or a Nigerian or something

youngdan wrote:

Time for the 2nd count. See whoever nominated Harney is gone. NDS thinks she's great. He must have cried so much with joy the other night that his keyboard is waterlogged. Are the 2 Brutons married and is the guy with the stupid name a Roma Gypsy or a Nigerian or something

How can someone who admires Kemmy, Higgins and Gregory come out with that kind of stuff?

I don't know these new guys

Batt O'Keeffe seems to have backed down. Does anyone want to withdraw his nomination?

youngdan wrote:

I don't know these new guys

Do you watch Questions & Answers, Prime Time, Oireachtas Report or any of them ones ? Leo Varadkar is from Transylvania I believe. He's a Doctor. He's clever and worth watching. Keep an eye on him.

Auditor #9 wrote:

youngdan wrote:

I don't know these new guys

Do you watch Questions & Answers, Prime Time, Oireachtas Report or any of them ones ? Leo Varadkar is from Transylvania I believe. He's a Doctor. He's clever and worth watching. Keep an eye on him.

I think youre dodging the issue here. Last week Batt OKeefe was the best thing since sliced bread because he supposedly had faced the teachers down.
I wonder where he found the money from to pay all those supposed dastardly absent teachers...?

Bertie Ahern unquestionably is the best politician of 2008. I can say that while not being particularly fond of the politics of the man. That is because what it takes to be the best politician is not necessarily what it takes to be good, virtuous, inspirational or whatever.

To be a great politician you must seize opportunities, have an excellent sense of timing, avoid pitfalls, think 3 steps ahead of the Opposition and so on. Bertie Ahern exhibited these this year. He took some brickbats to do with the Mahon Tribunal but left the job of Taoiseach before the pressure became intolerable, he left before the defeat of the Lisbon Treaty and was not associated with its defeat and left before the reality of the recession truly bit and the public finances truly deteriorated.

He has had a great year in retrospect, and his decision to go when he did as a political act far exceeded the political nous of the other people on the list.

As much as I respect, admire and applaud the fine contributions Richard Bruton and Joe Higgins make to the national bodypolitik, I cannot agree that they are better politicians than Bertie Ahern. Richard Bruton is hamstrung by virtue of the fact that he will sit on the opposition benches for the immediately forseeable future and Joe Higgins has been rendered largely ineffectual by his exit from Leinster House. They are fine men, but not fine politicians, which is something altogether different.

Joe Higgins is doing very well, considering he's out of the Dail.

Has Enda been robbed? There was a very eloquent post making the case for him as an excellent shepherd of his party, even if not a strong figurehead/spokesperson.

cactus flower wrote:

Joe Higgins is doing very well, considering he's out of the Dail.

Has Enda been robbed? There was a very eloquent post making the case for him as an excellent shepherd of his party, even if not a strong figurehead/spokesperson.

There is no doubt that he should be an opition and he has been far more succesful then many people on that list, but I would have to give it to Bruton because he has been fanastic as FG's Spokesperson for Finance this year.

Rocky wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

Joe Higgins is doing very well, considering he's out of the Dail.

Has Enda been robbed? There was a very eloquent post making the case for him as an excellent shepherd of his party, even if not a strong figurehead/spokesperson.

There is no doubt that he should be an opition and he has been far more succesful then many people on that list, but I would have to give it to Bruton because he has been fanastic as FG's Spokesperson for Finance this year.

Presentable and visible, when Government seemed to be in hiding, but were the policies any different from the 1980s ?

cactus flower wrote:

Rocky wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

Joe Higgins is doing very well, considering he's out of the Dail.

Has Enda been robbed? There was a very eloquent post making the case for him as an excellent shepherd of his party, even if not a strong figurehead/spokesperson.

There is no doubt that he should be an opition and he has been far more succesful then many people on that list, but I would have to give it to Bruton because he has been fanastic as FG's Spokesperson for Finance this year.

Presentable and visible, when Government seemed to be in hiding, but were the policies any different from the 1980s ?

I think the striking thing about the Fine Gael approach has been that it has been throught through.

- they were the first ones to talk about a cull of quangos. But they suggested a clear thought through approach (cull the unnecessary, merge the duplicates, keep the effective) whereas the FF approach has been bizarre, with unnecessary ones untouched, duplicates untouched but effective ones like the Equality Authority targeted for culling! )

- efficiency audits whereas the government's own attempt at them proved inefficient.

etc

So the Fine Gael approach has been logic based and analysis-based, whereas the FF approach is haphazard, incompetent, and all over the place.

FG clearly have a coherent approach to the crisis, whereas FF has moved from panic measure to panic measure, with no consistency.

Last day of voting!!!