Ah come lads. It could be worse.
We could be Fine Gael.

Seriously though, we were gone two years ago but the body would'nt stay down.
No exceuses, eh. We were a pretty shite political organisation.
I was involved (active) for the first 4 years and the last four years. It was chaotic in the first four years and it was the same in the last four, too.
I was pretty shocked when I jumped back in 2004. Communications, campaigns, policy groups etc etc were all over the gaff. We were better organised after 2 years in the 80's than we were in 2006/7 and that after 23 years of existance.
I introduced blogging to my compatriots last year. i was getting emails from councilors all over the place looking for a blog.
This simple tool was not available to most of them. emails, internet, blogs, press releases all the tools of the 21st century communications. It was like voodoo to many.

I felt for Cannon but he justified my faith in voting for him last April.
It takes guts to close down a party thats been going since he did his leaving cert. It was a hard decision but he did the right thing. Once Grealish and Harney said they were out, it was pointless.
I think he has a future in politics.

There appears to be pleanty of grave-dancing at the moment
Let them have their day, God love them.

Johnny Keogh wrote:

Ah come lads. It could be worse.
We could be Fine Gael.

Seriously though, we were gone two years ago but the body would'nt stay down.
No exceuses, eh. We were a pretty shite political organisation.
I was involved (active) for the first 4 years and the last four years. It was chaotic in the first four years and it was the same in the last four, too.
I was pretty shocked when I jumped back in 2004. Communications, campaigns, policy groups etc etc were all over the gaff. We were better organised after 2 years in the 80's than we were in 2006/7 and that after 23 years of existance.
I introduced blogging to my compatriots last year. i was getting emails from councilors all over the place looking for a blog.
This simple tool was not available to most of them. emails, internet, blogs, press releases all the tools of the 21st century communications. It was like voodoo to many.

I felt for Cannon but he justified my faith in voting for him last April.
It takes guts to close down a party thats been going since he did his leaving cert. It was a hard decision but he did the right thing. Once Grealish and Harney said they were out, it was pointless.
I think he has a future in politics.

There appears to be pleanty of grave-dancing at the moment
Let them have their day, God love them.

Good to see you Johnny. Perhaps the PDs were just not meant to live in a world in which Boston isn't worth a bean. I hope all your plans are going well. If you can get to Spain the heating bills will be gone anyway and hopefully you'll keep us in touch with the goings on down there.

There are 24 PD councillors around the country Johnny and I'm going to try to get a list of them here. Have you any idea which of them will go where? And could the members decide yet to keep the party alive ? There's another meeting soon isn't there?

Hmmm... that didn't quite work ...

Auditor #9 wrote:

There are 24 PD councillors around the country Johnny and I'm going to try to get a list of them here. Have you any idea which of them will go where? And could the members decide yet to keep the party alive ? There's another meeting soon isn't there?

There is a bit of talk about voting to keep it going at the emergency national conference next month.
It wont happen. I think most of the old hands are happy enough to let it go.
Its the younger lads that have political ambition who want to fight on but their judgement is impaired by emotion at the moment. They will come round in the next few weeks.

I have suggested that the name be protected along with the website, memorabilia, papers etc etc witha view to starting a Progressive Democrats Society. A kind of Liberal think tank. Maybe a Summer School, stuff like that.
I'm not sure if it can be done legally but it seems to me that it might be beneficial to have a debating shop for the Liberals in Ireland. Might work. we'll see how things pan out.

Johnny Keogh wrote:

Auditor #9 wrote:

There are 24 PD councillors around the country Johnny and I'm going to try to get a list of them here. Have you any idea which of them will go where? And could the members decide yet to keep the party alive ? There's another meeting soon isn't there?

There is a bit of talk about voting to keep it going at the emergency national conference next month.
It wont happen. I think most of the old hands are happy enough to let it go.
Its the younger lads that have political ambition who want to fight on but their judgement is impaired by emotion at the moment. They will come round in the next few weeks.

I have suggested that the name be protected along with the website, memorabilia, papers etc etc witha view to starting a Progressive Democrats Society. A kind of Liberal think tank. Maybe a Summer School, stuff like that.
I'm not sure if it can be done legally but it seems to me that it might be beneficial to have a debating shop for the Liberals in Ireland. Might work. we'll see how things pan out.

From my standpoint Johnny I shouldn't be saying this, but it is an excellent idea for a party at that stage. I still think you are/were in the wrong party. Way too nice to be a PD

The PDs I met were actually some of the nicest politically inclined folk, in Trinity at least. During Fresher's Week last year I went around all the different society stalls looking for signatures from students to help the Socialist Party Society get started (not for members). FG were reluctant to sign but eventually did, FF were fairly indifferent to the whole affair and Labour downright refused because we might steal some of their target audience (the Labour-dominated SU also refused to sign to help out a student society, which I thought was disgraceful). The PDs, however, couldn't have been more enthusiastic about it, talking about how plurality and freedom of speech was vital and even how they respected the Socialist Party for sticking to their principles.

cactus flower wrote:

From my standpoint Johnny I shouldn't be saying this, but it is an excellent idea for a party at that stage. I still think you are/were in the wrong party. Way too nice to be a PD

You've said this kind of thing before and appear to have an odd idea as to what a PD or indeed anybody who isn't a leftie is like.

cookiemonster wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

From my standpoint Johnny I shouldn't be saying this, but it is an excellent idea for a party at that stage. I still think you are/were in the wrong party. Way too nice to be a PD

You've said this kind of thing before and appear to have an odd idea as to what a PD or indeed anybody who isn't a leftie is like.

I understand cactus' view on this, CM. With all due respect to Johnny, who seems a decent bloke, I heartily detest the former leader of his party and current occupant of the Ministerial office in Hawkins House. In my opinion, she represents the very worst aspects of Irish politics and was one of the leading factors in my decision to leave the country. If she is, as some people claim, one of our best politicians, then there really is no hope of any kind of improvement in Irish politics in my lifetime. And life is too short to have to tolerate that sort of crass horseshit. (If I ever meet her, I must thank her).

An event like this always makes me wonder about the integrity of the party political system - where will the old PDs go? I feel they should remain as independents and remain true to the PD ideals they professed up to last week, but numbers and electability always appear to be much more pressing concerns and the ideology, such as it was, goes out the window.

I think your idea is a good one, Johnny.

Slim Buddha wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

From my standpoint Johnny I shouldn't be saying this, but it is an excellent idea for a party at that stage. I still think you are/were in the wrong party. Way too nice to be a PD

You've said this kind of thing before and appear to have an odd idea as to what a PD or indeed anybody who isn't a leftie is like.

I understand cactus' view on this, CM. With all due respect to Johnny, who seems a decent bloke, I heartily detest the former leader of his party and current occupant of the Ministerial office in Hawkins House. In my opinion, she represents the very worst aspects of Irish politics and was one of the leading factors in my decision to leave the country. If she is, as some people claim, one of our best politicians, then there really is no hope of any kind of improvement in Irish politics in my lifetime. And life is too short to have to tolerate that sort of crass horseshit. (If I ever meet her, I must thank her).

Actually I toast small kittens in the microwave whenever the PDs lose points in the Red C polls. I'm not that nice after all.

To be honest, 90% on people I have met involved in politics are sound people. They do what they do because they believe in it.
What we also have in politics is the "opportunist" or "careerist" who are professional reps. These guys and gals are the one who inevitably get elected.
We stand by our own "oppurtunists" because they are ours but all the other one's are only w*nkers and users etc etc etc.
If you are going to dedicate your time and energy to politics , to make a living out of it and put food on the table and the kids thru collage, you will become the very thing you most loathe about politicians.
You will have to do things like "work the room" and so on.

There is a lot to be said for the list system like in Germany where you vote for the party. The local rep is decided another way although I'm not sure how.
The way we work it now means that every single TD is practically an independent. Some of them bulk-purchase their posters and print from the FF hq and some from the FG hq and so on.

Quote :

If you are going to dedicate your time and energy to politics , to make a living out of it and put food on the table and the kids thru collage, you will become the very thing you most loathe about politicians.
You will have to do things like "work the room" and so on.

If you've anything left for the kids after 45k worth of working the room...

Johnny Keogh wrote:

Slim Buddha wrote:

cookiemonster wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

From my standpoint Johnny I shouldn't be saying this, but it is an excellent idea for a party at that stage. I still think you are/were in the wrong party. Way too nice to be a PD

You've said this kind of thing before and appear to have an odd idea as to what a PD or indeed anybody who isn't a leftie is like.

I understand cactus' view on this, CM. With all due respect to Johnny, who seems a decent bloke, I heartily detest the former leader of his party and current occupant of the Ministerial office in Hawkins House. In my opinion, she represents the very worst aspects of Irish politics and was one of the leading factors in my decision to leave the country. If she is, as some people claim, one of our best politicians, then there really is no hope of any kind of improvement in Irish politics in my lifetime. And life is too short to have to tolerate that sort of crass horseshit. (If I ever meet her, I must thank her).

Actually I toast small kittens in the microwave whenever the PDs lose points in the Red C polls. I'm not that nice after all.

To be honest, 90% on people I have met involved in politics are sound people. They do what they do because they believe in it.
What we also have in politics is the "opportunist" or "careerist" who are professional reps. These guys and gals are the one who inevitably get elected.
We stand by our own "oppurtunists" because they are ours but all the other one's are only w*nkers and users etc etc etc.
If you are going to dedicate your time and energy to politics , to make a living out of it and put food on the table and the kids thru collage, you will become the very thing you most loathe about politicians.
You will have to do things like "work the room" and so on.

There is a lot to be said for the list system like in Germany where you vote for the party. The local rep is decided another way although I'm not sure how.
The way we work it now means that every single TD is practically an independent. Some of them bulk-purchase their posters and print from the FF hq and some from the FG hq and so on.

Representative democracy means that only the insane, prisoners and the under 18s are not responsible for their own elected politicians. I am sick to death of people who complain about politicians and then go running to the "clinic" to get try and get some unwarranted favour in exchange for their vote, or kick out a good TD because they didn't "get" enough for the parish.

Ironically, one of the reasons the PDs have gone, in my view, is that they were too policy-oriented and not focused on kickbacks for the voters in their constituency. Why vote PD when FF have the same policies and "do favours" as well?

It's funny I don't think that a politician taking care of his/her local constituent's concerns or problems is a bad thing. Rarely would helping one overcome a bureaucratic problem, for example, bar the politician from voting for or against a broad national policy. Surely, there is a happy medium. Imo, far too many politicians have the belief today that they know best, contrary to their own vaguely stated manifestos or worse on no stated manifesto position. I may be a bit anarchistic in this regard. But I loathe cookie-cutter, mass produced political policy which satisfies no one but merely finds the lowest common denominator to quiten the plebs.

If one measures the efficacy of a politician's accomplishments at local level, combined with the shite mass-produced policies generated over the last 10 years, against the greater impact of special policy positions on business sector advantage (tax forebearance, wage labour contraints and on and on), our politicians in the main would score very low on delivering at the parish pump as opposed to delivering for certain business communities. (There are, of course, some notable exception of the parish pump variety but they are quickly dying out imo.)

I'm pro politician rockyracoon, but the parish pump I'm talking about is on the level of queue jumping on the housing list or pushing for bad planning permissions. Also, endless attendance at funerals.

Now you mention it, I would be pushed to think what the government policy has actually been for the last five years.

No harm to Johnny but I am thoroughly delighted that they are gone. I can't recall ever agreeing with anything any of their spokepersons ever said. Their pavlovian response to anything that happened in the six counties showed their ignorance was only matched by their arrogance.

SeathrúnCeitinn wrote:

No harm to Johnny but I am thoroughly delighted that they are gone. I can't recall ever agreeing with anything any of their spokepersons ever said. Their pavlovian response to anything that happened in the six counties showed their ignorance was only matched by their arrogance.

"The National Question" was our strongest arguement in the very early days.
It was the PD who were banging on about dropping articles two and three of the constitution in order to get the Unionists onside. This was long before any talk about a referendum on the subject.
Once the log-jam was broken; let others get on with the job of fixing it.
The main reason the PDs never really got involved in the arguements after that is because there are almost zero nationalists in the party. Plenty of republicans but not the northern Irish kind. More the French kind of republican. Big emphasis on equality fo opportunity for the citizen, not so much on the flags or the routes of marches.

It might just be senility here but did Mc Dowell not say something about a bit of inequality was required......

I seem to remember he said it was inevitable which was then reinterpreted as him saying it was required. Don't quote me on that though.

His comment, if I am accurate in my memory of it, whilst not a very nice observation is of course a perfectly logical observation. It just is not a politically expedient one.

johnfás wrote:

I seem to remember he said it was inevitable which was then reinterpreted as him saying it was required. Don't quote me on that though.

His comment, if I am accurate in my memory of it, whilst not a very nice observation is of course a perfectly logical observation. It just is not a politically expedient one.

Here's a link. Thanks johnfás. The point I was making about his beliefs in equality is still relevent

Well I think he is correct in what he is saying. Inequality is inevitable.

That is not to say that it is something to be strived towards. It is also a politically foolish thing to say as such a comment is frought with the likelihood of it being interpreted in whatever manner people please.

SeathrúnCeitinn wrote:

It might just be senility here but did Mc Dowell not say something about a bit of inequality was required......

We support equality of opportunity...
What you do with it after that is entirely your own business. If two people are given the same opportunities at the start of life and one does well, and the other does not, should that be a matter for the State to get involved in?
I dont think so, nor do many of the voters out there.
When MCdowell talks about there being inequality needed to act as an incentive, he was acknowledging the fact that not all people get that equal opportunity at the start.
This naturally spurs some people on to do better.
The flip side to that, of course, is that without the decent start in life, some people do not have the neccasary tools to catch up on their own. Inequality in those cases cannot work as an incentive.

johnfás wrote:

Well I think he is correct in what he is saying. Inequality is inevitable.

That is not to say that it is something to be strived towards. It is also a politically foolish thing to say as such a comment is frought with the likelihood of it being interpreted in whatever manner people please.

My main problem was that his party's policies would only increase inequality. Particularly co-location

SeathrúnCeitinn wrote:

johnfás wrote:

Well I think he is correct in what he is saying. Inequality is inevitable.

That is not to say that it is something to be strived towards. It is also a politically foolish thing to say as such a comment is frought with the likelihood of it being interpreted in whatever manner people please.

My main problem was that his party's policies would only increase inequality. Particularly co-location

I think one of my main problems was that the policies were ideologically driven towards redistributing wealth upwards, (or as you said increasing it) --as opposed to the strawman argument of removing inequality completely. It didn't matter whether they were inefficient policies either (such as colocation or for-profit health care) in a capitalist sense or any other, once they corresponded to the ideology then they were supported by the PDs.

Of course that's not to say they are the only party pushing and promoting such neoliberal policies, but they were the most transparent exponents of them and had every support within the mainstream media.