Hmmm… I see where he’s coming from…
“Twice in a generation, Fianna Fáil has brought this country to ruin. It is never the wealthy or the greedy who are forced to carry the can. For Fianna Fáil now to describe itself as a republican party is almost grotesque.”
But you can see the stick the more socialist Brown is getting from the markets over his PBR:
“The PBR seeks to create a fiscal fiction that the deficit can be resolved solely by tax hikes on a relatively small share of the population – the few, not the many – and without painful public spending cuts. The revenue forecasts again look over-optimistic, and there are no public spending plans after 2010-11 – only vague forecasts.”
Meanwhile Cowen is convinced he’s done enough to keep the bond markets happy. Joaquín Almunia at the EU economic and monetary affairs commission:
“In sticking to the consolidation target for 2010 that was announced in the April supplementary budget, the Irish Government is clearly demonstrating its continued commitment to implementing a sustainable and credible fiscal consolidation strategy in these challenging times,” Mr Almunia said.
“While more remains to be done in the coming years, the Budget is an important step towards first stabilising and then gradually reducing the Irish general government deficit to 3 per cent of GDP by the 2014 deadline set by the commission and endorsed by the [European] council under the excessive deficit procedure.”
Mick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written papers on the impacts of the Internet on politics and the wider media and is a regular guest and speaking events across Ireland, the UK and Europe. Twitter: @MickFealty
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