Profile for Mack
Latest posts from Mack (see all)
Mack has posted 207 times (0 in the last month).
Modern life is fragile
Fintan O’Toole - The chance of six specific Irish horses winning at Cheltenham on the same day last week was 1.5 million to one. But it happened. Or.. The probability of the results of the Euro 2012 qualifiers being exactly as they will turn out to be is extremely low. But it will happen. Or.. [...] more »
Ireland and default again
Yves Smith has a thought provoking article on her Naked Capitalism blog that I’ve only just got around to reading. It includes a useful, if cyncial, analysis of the raison d’être of the current stress tests / banking investigation being undertaken by BlackRock. Earth to base, this is a garbage in, garbage out exercise You [...] more »
Not sure how to vote next Friday? They’ve got an app for that…
Votomatic quizes you on a range of policy choices and then scores the parties for compatibility with your views. Give it a try My scores - FG 19, Lab 10, Greens 2, SF 1, FF -3 more »
“We are in some pickle now”
Vincent Browne tracks the history of Ireland’s banking crisis in yesterday’s Sunday Business Post, ending with what must be the biggest understatement of the new millennium (see title). He argues that the EU will not countenance a restructuring / default of debts run up Ireland’s banks. But getting rid of some or all Of the [...] more »
Breaking news: Belfast plane crashes at Cork airport
An RTE news story indicates that they have unconfirmed reports of 8 fatalities after a plane from Belfast crashed at Cork airport. Update - six confirmed fatalities, six people injured. From the report The Manx2 commuter flight, with 10 passengers and two crew, was en route from Belfast when it crashed in heavy fog at [...] more »
Eastern promises
It would appear that our Asian friends have confidence (and an interest) in the survival of the European project. Japan and China will help fund the European Financial Stability Fund that will be used to bailout European banks, sorry, I mean Ireland. With Japan pledging to buy 20% or more of the bonds that will [...] more »
The European view on insolvency
The new proposed European Stability Mechanism looks like it will come into force via a change to The Lisbon Treaty, and will avoid facing public vote by referendum. It provides a process for sharing losses with sovereign creditors in the case of national insolvency. (More details on that below). In yesterday’s FT, Lorenzo Bini Smaghi, [...] more »
Ireland can’t afford to bail out European banks
I think this point is worth highlighting more clearly. Below – Simon Johnson ex-CEO of the IMF – on who is owed money by the Irish banks German banks are owed $139 billion, which is 4.2 percent of German G.D.P. British banks are owed $131 billion, or about 5 percent of Britain’s G.D.P. French banks [...] more »
Euro Crisis : History repeats
The Guardian report that - the Portuguese prime minister José Sócrates insists Portugal is under no pressue from EU states to accept a euro bailout. Meanwhile After Financial Times Deutschland reported eurozone nations and the European Central Bank were urging Portugal to follow Ireland and capitulate to financial aid, the office of the Portuguese prime [...] more »
Europe gets serious. May double the EFSF, may burn bank senior bond holders
The Wall Street Journal are speculating that the size of the EFSF may double to almost €1trn, if German opposition can be overcome. This is an effort to assure markets that Europe can bail out Spain if neccessary. Doubling the EFSF’s capacity to €880 billion would remove any doubt about whether the facility has enough [...] more »
Latest comments from Mack (see all)
Mack has commented 1,119 times (5 in the last month).
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Books
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…if University education were universally available and availed of, the country would collapse in one generation
The words of Brian O’Nolan, variously Brian Ó Nualláin, Myles na gCopaleen, Myles na Gopaleen and, of course, Flann O’Brien. That O’Nolan was referencing his own dissolute student days at UCD only mildly distracts from the prophetic undertone of his words: I paid no attention whatsoever to books or study and regarded lectures as a [...] read our review »
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Spare us a phoney row about racism, we’ve got enough on
A silly media row about racism just had to figure in the riots’ post mortem. Was the Tudor history expert David Starkey racist on Newsnight when he said: The whites have become black. A particular sort of violent, destructive, nihilistic, gangster culture has become the fashion. And black and white, boy and girl, operate in [...] read our review »
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Lessons in Cute Hoorism: “Graft was accepted, for you were taking from the British…”
I’ve been catching up on some reading, recently. Most pleasantly surprised by John Drennan’s latest opus from Gill and Macmillan, Cute Hoors and Pious Protestors… It’s early days yet, but I was struck by this paragraph, part of a dissection of Fianna Fail near the beginning: One of the more fatal consequences of our colonial [...] read our review »
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Comment on Is my education system better than your education system? Finland vs the world.
on 4 January 2012 at 2:13 pm
There is streaming by ability in many schools in the south (not sure if it is universal), beyond ordinary and honours level testing.
If streaming is conducted on a per subject basis it has the advantages highlighted by antamadan above. The same person could be in the top stream in English, but a lower one more appropriate to their abilities in Maths or French.
I’ve noticed some attempts to attack or rollback streaming, on the basis that it is elitist lately (and the argument goes not effective).
I think refining streaming and ensuring fluid mobility between streams (e.g. potential movements every term if an improvement is shown) would be much better.
That’s much less final, and less universal across all subjects than the 11+ exam (which doesn’t even test aptitude in many subjects – or at least didn’t -e.g. languages).
It might be better aggregating schools by age. Rather than a locale having two or more competing schools, have two or more schools that focus on different age groups. That would give economy of scale at each age group. (I.e. more 12/13/14 and 15/16/17/18 year olds per school would mean more classes per subject, more sports teams, more extra curricular activities etc).
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Comment on Is my education system better than your education system? Finland vs the world.
on 3 January 2012 at 12:18 pm
The Atlantic on a similar theme ->
“The Scandinavian country is an education superpower because it values equality more than excellence.”
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/12/what-americans-keep-ignoring-about-finlands-school-success/250564/#.Tv4NA-e7HkY.mailto
Can’t help but think they are drawing the wrong conculsions with that tag line.
Equality of opportunity is itself excellent, but facilitating the pursuit of excellence is also important too.
My bet is that the big improvements you see from enhanced equality of opportunity come from raising the level at the bottom (much the way most of the increase in life expectancy is due to a reduction in infant mortality).
It should be possible to learn from the Scandinavian experience and enhance it.
If you were to consider the application of the same model in school sports, we could improve every child’s fitness and life-time attritude towards physical exercise, but that shouldn’t come at the expense of limiting opportunities for gifted athletes to fully develop their abilities within the system.
I’m not convinced that providing one need exclude the other..
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Comment on Is my education system better than your education system? Finland vs the world.
on 2 January 2012 at 11:02 pm
That’s all true – most of the better kids in that situation will find other ways and activities (while the inverse isn’t true for the weakest kids). The American family being a case in point (looking outside the state school system so their daughter could continue where she was). Ideally it would be good if those needs could be met within the state education system.
Some bright kids might suffer though. E.g. Get bored in class and begin to become disruptive.
If someone was doing an objective analysis of education systems it could still be a potential con (in contrast to very many pros) in the Scandivian model.
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Comment on Is my education system better than your education system? Finland vs the world.
on 2 January 2012 at 8:24 pm
Just one family’s experience of it, moving from a different country whether it’s representative or not is another matter, but I suspect it might be. They certainly thought so.
Btw, what comments ‘against poor people’ ?
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Comment on Is my education system better than your education system? Finland vs the world.
on 1 January 2012 at 10:54 pm
As a potential drawback / something not to import – Janten laki?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jante_Law
To be honest I don’t know much about the Finnish system, working on the presumption that there is some level of similarity to the Swedish education system then the cutting down of ‘tall poppys’ may be an issue.
I know an American family that relocated to Sweden and found their daughter learning maths a couple of years behind where she was in the US. They found support within the public education system for kids with high potential to be poor (i.e. nowhere near what was available in the US).
The Swedes have probably eliminated relative poverty as a drag on educational attainment and in the process pushed the averages way up, but at the expense of (at least anecdotally) providing suitable outlets for more gifted children.
Removing private wealth as a driver of educational attainment (by providing top class facilities for all) is a fine goal. Focusing on the gap between top and lowest achievers as something to be narrowed is barmy. It can be narrowed from both ends. Education systems should provide appropriate support for smart kids (as well as the less gifted) regardless of parental wealth..
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Comment on The underlying difference between Catholics and Protestants is economic…
on 1 November 2011 at 9:55 am
I don’t think those findings can be generalised.
E.g. If they had compared Ireland (Republic) with Sweden, wouldn’t they have found the opposite?
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Comment on #Aras11: How was it for… Fianna Fail?
on 29 October 2011 at 11:27 am
I agree with that FF had a good day. 2 potential future TD’s blooded and performed well.
Prior to envelope-gate most people knew Gallagher was FF background. After it, he was solidly welded to the FF brand, warts and all. Garnering 28.5% of the vote in those circumstances must be seen as a good result for them.
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Comment on Was Gallagher ‘holed above or below the water line’?
on 28 October 2011 at 1:19 pm
“But they didn’t step back from Gallagher the Man after Monday, they stepped back from Gallagher the FF Trojan Horse. “
They didn’t though. With the perception of Gallagher as old school FF having been firmly established by the media (if unfairly) in the last week – it looks like he got around 33% of the vote (current tallies from RTE).
When the dust settles FF hq will be delighted with that.
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Comment on Brian Lenihan RIP.
on 10 June 2011 at 12:54 pm
That is sad news.
That’s more than a little harsh Alias. He was dealing with an absolutely massive crisis. The scale of which was so overwhelming, no matter what policy options were pursued we were in for a f**king awful time.
He took some brave decisions, hard decisions that will ultimately stand us well, he made some bad ones too but no matter what things could have been (and maybe still could be) much worse.
RIP.
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Comment on “What is clear is that Dublin’s perspective will not be the defining one.”
on 6 April 2011 at 1:55 pm
‘moral right’ mis that those who borrow money pay it back on the terms agreed
Hear hear.
They lent it to Fingers and Seanie Fitz, they can get it back of them..
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