Fianna Fail
Why any near term coalition between FF and SF is unlikely…
Tweet World By Storm has come to the following conclusion... …it is very very unlikely that while the FF party has a heartbeat, so to speak, that it will enter into a unity government with FG. Indeed the very most that might occur would be a sort of reverse ‘Tallaght strategy’. And as demonstrated by [...] more »
Fianna Fail’s ‘new’ leader building for a ‘new era’ Fianna Fail?
Tweet So, beige says Miriam of the Fianna Fail leader’s closing speech to his party’s Ard Fheis. Not wrong, of course. Steady as she goes, the weekend’s national conference was business like and not prone to much in the way of story telling or narrative. More like a business meeting, in fact. If anything the [...] more »
Martin opens the Fianna Fáil Ard Fheis with some hints of the game ahead…
Tweet At the Fianna Fail Ard Fheis, nodding through the officers on the volume of applause from delegates was new to me. Then again, Fianna Fail evidently likes its leaders to lead rather than follow polls or focus groups. But the reality of running a modern political party is rather different. As the Sussex University [...] more »
Micheál Martin: Legacy of 1916 is to build rather than to divide the Irish nation…
Tweet Just out of embargo, here’s today’s speech from the Fianna Fail leader made just now at Arbour Hill church, where the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising were buried. The added emphases are mine: Every state should take time to commemorate and celebrate the people and events of their founding. This commemoration is organised [...] more »
Eighty years later Sinn Fein belatedly attempts Dev’s transformation
Tweet Great piece by Harry McGee in the Irish Times which raises some critical questions that may be exercising Sinn Fein delegates in Castlebar today.. Sinn Féin is not experiencing a New Departure, rather a long drawn-out process of change – mainstreaming, as we inelegantly describe it. As evidenced by the rapid growth of Fianna [...] more »
Micheál Martin in Belfast: “There is nothing inevitable about peace and progress”
Tweet This evening, Micheál Martin gave the following speech to Queens University Politics Society and Ógra Fianna Fáil in the Canada Room that was by all accounts was pretty packed to the gills. It’s long and detailed, and picks out some policy areas (not least north south development) where Martin argues there has been a shortfall [...] more »
Millward Brown Poll: Scary buns for Fine Gael?
Tweet No polls for a while then three or four come along at once. News broke tonight of the Sunday Independent’s Millward Brown poll.. MB have done a few polls on politics for the Sindo, but the last comparative poll that I have figures for was last May… These figures are proportions of voters after [...] more »
Fine Gael drop back towards Ireland’s large political peloton
Tweet Let’s get one thing straight, polls do not increase or decrease the size of a political party. They are nere snapshots of opinion, not predictors of the future. So whilst Sinn Fein was never the second largest party in the state, neither is Fianna Fail currently the largest. Of course both, if trends continue, are [...] more »
Zombie Republic of Ireland (2010-2013)
Tweet Tonight, on #promnight, the winding-up has been announced of the Zombie Republic of Ireland, formed in 2010 when the former sovereign state became a ward of the Bundestag’s finance committee. The end-of-life processes of the former Republic were accompanied by rushed late night decision-making and ill-considered legislation. The death notice, issued from ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet, has never been made public. The zombie successor state was artificially kept in an animated state [...] more »
Micheál Martin – opportunism and cynicism of the very worst kind
Tweet The award for opportunist of the week must surely go to Micheál Martin. His hastily written opinion piece in Wednesdays Irish News was a timely reminder of Fianna Fáil’s cynical approach to both the peace process and to politics. For weeks Belfast city centre has been brought to a standstill by illegal loyalist blockades. [...] more »
Micheál Martin: “If the Executive is not making progress on child poverty, or economic inactivity, or sectarianism”
Tweet Okay, so one of the good things about a political crisis in Northern Ireland that it draws a multiplicity views on our general situation (riots will always divide opinion). Not all of that has been bad by any means. Allan Massie in the Scotsman is generally sanguine about Northern Ireland’s future, if not David [...] more »
Fianna Fail lining up former TDs to run in the next local elections…
Tweet I thought this snippet from the end of last week worth noting… Niall O’Connor reports that Fianna Fail are calling on some of its younger veterans to run in next year’s local elections… Ex-ministers Barry Andrews and Sean Connick are two of the highest-profile names linked with a run at the locals. Former TDs Margaret [...] more »
Red C Poll: The trend lines between FG and FF softly narrowing…
Tweet The most interesting aspect of yesterday’s Red C poll, was the 80 plus per cent in favour of legislating on the circumstances in which an abortion might be legally reformed in the Republic. That would put some pure green (not to mention socially liberal) water between the north and the south on the matter. [...] more »
Fianna Fail slowly clamber back into the southern game…
Tweet I missed the latest Behaviours and Attitudes poll for the Sunday Times at the weekend, but to compensate, here’s Adrian Cavanagh’s tracking post which shows a clear movement in FF’s poll rating: Fine Gael 30% (down 1%), Labour 12% (down 2%), Fianna Fail 22% (up 6%), Sinn Fein 14% (down 4%), Green Party 3% [...] more »
Micheál Martin: “As a Republican I feel an obligation to make my contribution to the debate…”
Tweet Micheál Martin’s interview with Mark Carruthers on The View last night is interesting viewing. Not least at the point (about here) where Carruthers mentions Gerry Adams’ dismissal of the Fianna Fail’s interventions as being driven by a concern for politics in the south. I’ve no doubt that the general thrust of Adams statement is [...] more »
Northern powersharing is faring better than the southern version, says Emerson. Can this be right?
Tweet In the Sunday Times,(£) Newton Emerson, apparently unabashed at being dropped by the BBC, strikes a counterintuitive note by offering a few words of support to the powersharing Executive at the expense of that other coalition in Dublin. Ignoring the recent Kearney-Robinson dingdong, he bounces his critique off Micheal Martin’s Bodenstown speech deploring the southern [...] more »
“The peace process was always intended to be about more than an absence of violence…”
Tweet Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin’s criticism of the Irish Government’s ‘complacency’ over Northern Ireland echoes that of the Labour Party’s Vernon Coaker in regard to the UK Government. And that was more a disagreement on strategy, rather than a difference of opinion on the problems with the NI administration – as outlined in July by former NI [...] more »
“…this DUP attempt to shift responsibility to Dublin, is a fiction too far.”
Tweet Fascinating OpEd in yesterday’s Irish News from Fianna Fail leader Micheál Martin. It’s the first time since I remember that a senior political leader in the Republic has taken the gloves off with anyone in Northern Ireland, let alone the First and deputy First Minister. So what is it that’s got his goat? Nothing [...] more »
Fianna Fail and Sinn Fein battle it out for title of leader of the Irish opposition
Tweet So did anyone see the great Micheal V Gerry fight on PrimeTime last night? RTE billed it as the ‘who truly is the leader of the Opposition?‘ gig. But at the end of the day it turned out to be a bit of a damp squib. As Mary Murphy notes in the pre roll [...] more »
Why rumours of Sinn Fein’s omnipotence may be being greatly exaggerated…
Tweet When Tuesday night’s Prime Time feature on Sinn Fein aired on RTE there was nearly a civil war on Twitter. Sinn Fein supporters were punching the air whilst everyone else was grumping that Miriam (of all people) had gone soft on Donegal North East TD Padraig MacLochlainn. One particular party highlight was the view [...] more »
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Books
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Sunday Supplement
Tweet It being Sunday, we’ve all got time to consider and ponder things at greater length than during the working week, yes? If it’s good enough for the Sunday papers, it’s good enough for this guest blogger. So here’s the review section… Actually, it’s my introduction to a book published last year, Goin’ Down Slow: [...] read our review » -
Roddy Doyle’s Two Pints: An epic tale of modern Ireland in less than 90 pages..
Tweet Less than 90 pages long, Roddy Doyle’s latest book sounds like a must have… I must admit I have never heard three reviewers so obviously break down in laughter over just one book as on Saturday Review (12.02 in) this weekend. This extract from the Irish Times Review section is all I have to [...] read our review »
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Unionists, Loyalists, and Conflict Transformation. A book about how things are changing.
Tweet Unionists, Loyalists, and Conflict Transformation in Northern Ireland is a new academic tome by lecturer and researcher Lee Smithey. In the book the Pennsylvania academic outlines his findings based on 67 interviews over eighteen months with grassroots activists in unionist and loyalist communities and organisations. This is largely a book about men, even though [...] read our review »
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