The year in guff December 23, 2012
Posted by Oireachtas Retort in Uncategorized.trackback
In lieu of the Sunday Independent stupid statement of the week we cast the net beyond Talbot Street. We’ve had fornication, logistical logarithmic progression, Ireland in a hundred tedious letters to the Irish Times, trouble with jam at Dublin airport but thankfully not defaulter written across our forehead. At times even dutiful Politicians were driven to throw pens around committee rooms in frustration at stonewalling bankers, obfuscating HSE Mandarins & slippery RTÉ Execs, god love them.
The voice of the private sector has to a large extent been excluded from the discourse on public service reform
– Ibec prebudget submission
These are ordinary people Joe, he just wanted to buy a bank
– Sean Quinn sympathies on Liveline
We don’t want to turn around in five or 10 years’ time and find that we’ve lost all of these wonderful places and that we’re back almost in the dark ages, where we were before the boom
– Georgina Campbell on the closure of a Waterford restaurant
Thinking about it more, you could say that the anti-begrudgery bandwagon was only really rigged up in earnest after the Queen hit the English Market in Cork City.
– John-Paul McCarthy
More and more human rights are being used to frame the approach to justice in our society. This is a disaster happening before our eyes
– Alive! editorial
We’re not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact-checkers
– Romney pollster Neil Newhouse
Although divorce became legal, marriage still remains very popular
– Michelle Mulherin
The reality is….[generic obfuscation & lies]
– Everyone
O’Broin: IMF policy is of austerity strangling Greece, Portugal, Ireland etc etc
Carvile: Bernard what to you make of Eoin’s central point of the contraction in these policies?
Durkan: It’s the word austerity I object to, it’s bandied about now
Carville: well what would you call it?
Durkan: Good house keeping
– The ever prudent Bernard Durkan on Late debate in October
All those expenses were spent in the economy
– Bernard Durkan on Late Debate in December
If anything I went easier on her because she was a woman
– Leo Varadker dismisses claims he was sexist towards Mary Coughlan
The world is literally global.
– Tainste & foreign affairs Minster on the opportunities available to graduates
The only two certainties are death and taxes
– Brian Dobson speaks to an elderly group during budget coverage
We must make haste slowly
– Mattie McGrath channels Confucius
But the right-wing label attached by some to these deputies is an over-simplification. Some of them certainly have deeply held views on abortion, however, veteran Fine Gael insiders say that far from being ideologues, these newcomers are classic products of Celtic Tiger Ireland, many of whom became politicians by accident and who tend to approach issues on a case-by-case basis, rather than the traditional fault lines.
– Shane Coleman
What kind of country do we want? That represented by the Eucharistic Congress? Or that represented by the Swedish house mafia?
– Obligatory Marc Coleman entry
If you counted all the negatives about Enda Kenny (and there are many), they still could not take away from the reality that he has been a very successful Taoiseach in his first 18 months or so of office.
– Equally difficult to pick just one from Stephen Collins
The mansion tax will bring in revenue when housing prices return to previous levels
– Michael Noonan should perhaps reflect before accusing others of fantasy economics
Nothing is sacred now
– Unnamed TD laments the prospect of Dáil bar bills being subject to FOI
The Irish regulatory system functioned at all times
– Pat Farrell, chief executive of the Irish Banking Federation
Politicians are not immune to duplicity.
– Harry McGee on Chris Andrews’ twitter adventure
I am not opposed to peaceful protest but people do not have the right to occupy a public space and drink tea there
– Fine Gael’s Pádraig Conneely on the removal of occupy Galway
She professes to be a socialist but wanted to destroy the coursing industry
– Mattie on Clare Daly
These people made mistakes…but they’re also human beings. Remember that
– Dennis O’Brien on the last cabinet
Effectively, the broker had been trading with insufficient capital. While client funds were not misused or lost, this is a big no-no as it put the stability of the firm in question, not to mention undermined the integrity of the Irish financial system.
– SBP on Bloxham
What has happened to the fourth estate being objective, but also keeping power accountable? And are we to believe that we are immune to spin and unhealthy wielding of undue influence by the media here in Ireland?
– Breda O’Brien
We would like to have the best quality of reader, the most discerning kind of reader
– Kevin O’Sullivan
Mr Pierse said that after the Queen’s visit to Ireland, sterling had been a very popular destination for people looking for a safe haven for their money.
– Irish Examiner talks to some financial adviser
I am not pro-EU, I’m an academic
– Brigid Laffan’s logic
Standing up and attacking capitalist system while wearing fruits of it
– Paschal Donohoe slams Paul Murphy for eh, owning jeans
First let me say that they’re all fine looking women
– An Taoiseach addresses Sportswoman of the year awards
Was it vital for Mr O’Toole to transcribe verbatim what the Taoiseach said in his Budget-night speech? There are very few speeches or talks made that would stand up to such scrutiny
– Bray Fine Gael hack take Fintain to task for quoting Enda
I’m a hard grafter and, as some of them find out, they shouldn’t tangle with me too often, you know.
– Enda Kenny in wake of the seismic shift
The biggest decision in the history of politics
– Pat Rabbitte in wake of the seismic shift
Thank you, Mr Hasenstab.
– Irish Times ever cautious not to loose the run of itself around speculators
Think Ceaucescu, think Stalin, think that level of democratic subversion because this is what is taking place today and there is no excuse for it.
– Marc McSharry on Seanad abolition
What about Stalin?
– Lucinda Creighton retorts during a discussion on Golden Dawn & political literacy
You know this bullying of entrepreneurs, people like me who have invested tens of millions and employed thousands of people. It’s not good for the UK.
– A4e Emma Harrison’s wonderful Channel4 news interview
Our reason is a gift from God and we must use it to examine our own lives, our faith and our failings . . . if we did that more often, we would not need so many regulations and regulators.
– Chairman of the IFSC John Bruton
and my favourite, for sheer awfulness
Submissions & contributions welcome.
Brilliant post. And what a year it was. “These are ordinary people Joe, he just wanted to buy a bank”… wow. In a way it catches the spirit of the age. Unfortunately.
BTW kudos for keeping these on file. It’s amazing.
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the well is deep
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More and more human rights are being used to frame the approach to justice in our society. This is a disaster happening before our eyes
I’d actually be prepared to defend that proposition, though perhaps not in the term JP intends.
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the terms Alive! intends even
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Brilliant. Moved me to tears 😦
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Listened to Fergal Quinn….. and some people think that through dialogue ….one can bring people around to a ‘synthesis’…….. well there’s your answer
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Almost forgot this one
http://soundcloud.com/oireachtasretort/facepalm-of-the-week
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Precison guided
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That’s really brightened my day. Fair play Doctor Five, I think RTE should cancel all their Review of the Year programmes and replace them with Guff of the Year. The perpetrators could join the presenter in the studio and have their great thoughts played back to them while Miriam or whoever it is said, “You really sounded like a fucking gobshite there, didn’t you? What were you thinking.”
The Padraig Coneely one is my favourite, hard to read that one and not be in high good humour.
Should there be a special Guff of the Year award for the invocation of Jean McConville in relation to Sinn Fein criticism of the government? It was perhaps the outstanding Continuous Guff of 2012. Gilmore smiting Joe Higgins with the misdeeds of Derek Hatton probably deserved honourable mention too.
And I’d have to say that newspapers blaming sinister ‘cyber criticism’ for the death of Shane McEntee when they’ve all, as is their right, had plenty of columns lambasting the government and its TDs to a spectacular extent all year is Guff in excelsis.
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[…] last year’s round up, we turn again to the realm of political blather – and it’s like we never left. A five […]
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