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What you want to say – 15 January 2020 January 15, 2020

Posted by WorldbyStorm in Uncategorized.
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As always, following on Dr. X’s suggestion, it’s all yours, “announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose”, feel free.

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1. pettyburgess - January 15, 2020

https://www.thesun.ie/news/4988148/sinn-fein-blasted-bizarre-insulting-remarks-taoiseach/

Unbelievable stuff from a Sinn Fein councillor in Dublin South West. Just grim. What are Sinn Fein going to do about it?

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NFB - January 15, 2020

I’m going to guess nothing. Despicable comments all the same. “His grand-grandfather is not part of the history of this country” – So fucking what?

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Paul Culloty - January 15, 2020

Indeed – Dev, James Connolly, Tom Johnson and Erskine Childers spring to mind immediately.

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sonofstan - January 15, 2020

Seán Mac Stíofáin to pick someone closer to the councillors tradition.

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sonofstan - January 15, 2020

That is unbelievable.

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WorldbyStorm - January 15, 2020

It’s one of those instances where from start to finish it’s just wrong. Abysmal. He better apologise and make some kind of amends quick sharp and it raises questions like for those of us born in say London like myself (and indeed a fair few SFers of my acquaintance) oR those with an English parent (snap and snap) does he feel the same? As to the parenting stuff what a crock. LVs problematic aspects are nothing to do with his background or not being a parent.

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tafkaGW - January 15, 2020

Well they should do something about it. i.e. stand Holohan down. If they are serious about broadening their electoral appeal in the direction of people who oppose homophobia and ‘little Irelandism’. The man is clearly a liability.

“My stories from my grandfather would have been of ancient Ireland…” indeed.

That way lies ethnicist nationalism.

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WorldbyStorm - January 15, 2020

Yep, they have to do something about it

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WorldbyStorm - January 15, 2020

Btw presumably LV had two sets of grandparents so who is PH to say he didn’t hear precisely those stories – not that that makes a blind bit of difference either way.

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CL - January 15, 2020

Parnell’s mother was American.

Padraig Pearse’s father was English, as was the mother of Terence MacSwiney.

Sean MacStiophain….

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Joe - January 15, 2020

Look, it’s abysmal. Abysmal. Up to SF to sort it and send him to re-education camp or whatever.
And to put the tin hat on it – he wants ‘a solicitor’ to run the country?

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CL - January 15, 2020

Let’s see how long it takes Mary Lou to make a decision on this one.

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CL - January 15, 2020

I just read a piece by John McGuirk where he calls Varadkar an ‘ immigrant’.

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pettyburgess - January 15, 2020

So far no comment from Sinn Fein, no repudiation, no disavowal, nothing. Are they hoping it won’t be picked up more widely by the media?

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WorldbyStorm - January 15, 2020

It’s bound to be mentioned tmrw

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pettyburgess - January 15, 2020

Yeah, you are right. The online churnalism sites have picked up on it now as have FG activists on social media. It’s a stupid gift for the latter on an otherwise bad media day. Presumably that means the papers will be pushing it tomorrow. It will be interesting to see how SF deal with it.

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WorldbyStorm - January 15, 2020

TBH given the day that is in it suspect this may not have a huge effect – which is not to say SF shouldn’t come down hard on this sort of rhetoric. The other incidents today in the campaign are so grimly weirdly lacking in empathy. Not a great start to it.

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roddy - January 15, 2020

When I first heard of Holohon,I expected him to be a no nothing clown.I’m sure action will be taken but I can tell you SF has no case to answer about “broadening their electoral appeal in the direction of people who oppose homophobia and little Irelandism”.They instigated the demand for equal marriage in Stormont years ago while others at the time including a number of SDLP MLAs hid from the issue.SF had the only councillor from an African background elected in Ireland in the 2015 elections and Martin Kenny TD payed the price for standing up for refugees.They have no “broadening “to do.

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pettyburgess - January 15, 2020

I actually agree that SF don’t usually go in for either homophobia or xenophobic dogwhistles roddy. If an SF rep was going to go rogue and say something grossly offensive or backwards on a social issue it would (at least up until recently) have been abortion and even that is much less likely now. I honestly can’t remember one of them coming out with this kind of thing before. So I’m not going to suggest that it’s some kind of new strategy. I do however very much hope that they aren’t tempted to stay silent until the election is over and deal with it quietly afterwards. When it’s a party representative talking like this, silence is complicity.

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WorldbyStorm - January 15, 2020

Yeah, I think there’s no question that SF has actually been very good on these issues over the years – there’s a fair bit of political studies research suggesting their stance has blunted precisely that xenophobic/etc sentiment taking wider root. I don[t think there’s any question of them trying this out as a strategy. If they’d wanted to go that route in the past there was plenty of opportunity, and it would make no sense in the context of their very clear allegiance to various causes internationally. That’s why it’s so surprising to hear him coming out with this guff. And it certainly sounds like a solo run by H. That said something has to be said about it from SF more widely.

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Tomboktu - January 15, 2020

“Yeah, I think there’s no question that SF has actually been very good on these issues over the years”

SF developed its first LGB equality policy in 1995.

A young researcher came down from Belfast to get my advice (along the advice of other LGB activists and organisations). I didn’t speak to him for years until he knocked on my door in the 2016 general election asking for my vote: Eoin Ó Broin.

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2. pettyburgess - January 15, 2020

A depressing morning. First it’s a SF councillor giving the old racism and homophobia dogwhistles a full blast. Then I see that sections of the socialist left have roundly ignored calls from the saner elements among them to stand a united slate or even just avoid stupid clashes.

The SP are standing where Paul Murphy and John Lyons are likely to be in battles for seats. The WP are doing likewise for Mick Barry and Gino Kenny. For good measure PBP are also standing in DBN. There are some other clashes, but they are in constituencies where no left candidate is in the running, so it isn’t a problem for multiple candidates to stand.

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Jolly Red Giant - January 15, 2020

Let’s be perfectly clear about this – Paul Murphy was elected as a AAA/Solidarity TD. Paul Murphy chose to leave the Socialist Party and Solidarity – nobody forced him, or the handful of others who left with him, out.

Sandra Fay is a sitting Solidarity councillor in Dublin SW. Sandra Fay was also a Solidarity candidate in the last general election – securing 3,241 votes.

Solidarity has a right – in fact, a responsibility – to stand a candidate in the upcoming election given that, among many other reasons, it has a significant base of support in the constituency, the previous incumbent was elected on a Solidarity ticket, and the Solidarity candidate previously stood in the previous general election for Solidarity.

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pettyburgess - January 15, 2020

So speaks someone who has never once considered the possibility that the narrow interests of the SP may not at all times represent the highest of all goods. If the SP started kicking toddlers tomorrow, this guy would be posting ten minutes later that not only is kicking toddlers perfectly acceptable but in fact we have a positive duty to do it. He does serve the useful function of clearly showing the kind of sect mentality that the more rational bits of the left are up against when they argue for cooperation.

The SP doesn’t have a responsibility to do something destructive. It chooses to do so, because it thinks doing so is in its interests and it doesn’t care about any picture bigger than that. If they really thought that they had a “responsibility” to stand anywhere they’ve previously got a vote, they’d be standing in places like Fingal and Limerick. And what’s John Lyons crime supposed to be? What substantial base do the SP supposedly have a responsibility to there? And we are supposed to swallow that it would be irresponsible to encourage people to vote for their partners in Sol-PBP?

When PBP stood against an SP incumbent in the Euros, the SP went absolutely nuts about it. Including of course Mr Party Line here. So did lots of people on the left with no particular love for the SP, because it was a destructive thing to do. When the SP pull the same move, then suddenly we are expected to swallow bluster about how they don’t just have a right to do it, they have a responsibility. For sectarians the issue isn’t what’s the best thing to do from the point of view of the wider movement, all that matters is which end of the stick their group is on. I hope that any damage in DBN and DSW can be limited by transfer pacts.

Joe, Lyons is definitely standing. He was late to announce though.

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WorldbyStorm - January 15, 2020

It’s odd that JRG of all people would be rolling out to make the case he does given it is 180 degrees the opposite of that argued by himself re Paul Murphy then SP MEP. There’s a incontrovertibly a case to be made everyone has a right to stand but in some instances something like well solidarity suggests exercising that right is not the best tactic for broader interests of the left.

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tafkaGW - January 15, 2020

Agreed. Depressing. But splitting a party and splitting the left vote is easily achieved, a broad front is much more difficult. The easier success clearly delivers some kind of libidinal payment.

And look at the US where some liberal feminists see it necessary to pick a fight with a social democrat.

To who’s benefit?: the old neoliberal militarist patriarch.

Ho hum.

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Joe - January 15, 2020

I’ve just heard that the word is that John Lyons is not going to stand in DBN. Anyone else heard anything on that?
(Things might be a bit fluid out there at the moment. McGrath not running might make some people think. Damian Farrell for one. When do nominations close?)

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Tomboktu - January 15, 2020

“ When do nominations close?”
nominations close at noon on 22 Jan

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CMK - January 15, 2020

Entirely predictable. The SP will consider it a win if PM loses his seat and I think that is the objective in running Sandra Fay.

The idea, canvassed below, that PM was not forced out of the SP is utter baloney and completely untrue and every SP member knows it.

I would have thought that SP members who adhered to the leadership post-split would take a vow of silence and undergo a period of reflection given that they had to sell their souls to stand over the methods of the leadership.

If PM does lose his seat let’s hope he is not in a vengeful mood…..

He won’t be, though, he operates at a far higher political level than the SP, which is why he, and many others, were forced out.

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Pasionario - January 15, 2020

At this rate, I wonder whether any of the PBP/Sol/Rise TDs will be returned. Gino Kenny looks a goner. And the local election results were a bad portent for all of them.

My hunch is Coppinger and Boyd-Barrett will make it, but that could be all. Will PBP and Solidarity even stand down in each other’s constituencies?

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WorldbyStorm - January 15, 2020

You don’t think Cork too would return one Sol? I’d have thought the on the ground there developments might assist them there? Or am I way off?

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Pasionario - January 16, 2020

Since they scraped a single seat in the locals and bombed in the by-election in November, I would say no.

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Jolly Red Giant - January 15, 2020

A petty and vindictive comment CMK – particularly given the fact that your grouplet were quite vicious in internal SP documents towards Paul Murphy after your grouplet split from his.

The ideal outcome in DSW is for Paul Murphy and Sandra Fay to both win seats. The objective of the SP in DSW is to win the seat for Solidarity with Sandra Fay and if that doesn’t happen we still want Paul Murphy to retain his seat. Paul Murphy is still part of the Solidarity/PBP parliamentary grouping.

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Colm B - January 15, 2020

The question we should ask in these situations is what is in interests of the working class not whats in the interests of this or that party or TD.
Of course the SP has every right to stand where they wish but it would be fair to expect them and other left parties to consider the consequences. Given the current circumstances two things are clear: all left TDs, including PM, will struggle to hold their seats and, secondly, there isn’t the slightest possibility of the SP candidate beating PM or winning an additional seat. So the only chance of keeping a left seat is to back PM as the sole Sol/PBP candidate. Equally one would think this principle should apply in all constituencies with a radical left TD.
To be fair, the SP has no monopoly on splitting the vote, it’s endemic on the left. Problem is that a coordinated approach could ensure the survival of a few Left TDs as opposed to total wipeout. Which brings me back to the interests of the working class – who will give voice to those interests if there’s no radical left TDs?
I would add that denouncing the SP exclusively rather than urging all left orgs to adopt a coordinated approach is counterproductive. In that spirit I would ask JRG if there is any possibility at this stage of the SP reviewing it’s decision to stand against PM? Maybe as part of a broader appeal by the SP for an agreement on candidates.

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WorldbyStorm - January 16, 2020

+1 Colm.

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3. Alibaba - January 15, 2020

Regarding election results it looks like a roll of the dices to me. I think it’s truly hard to call it though only one thing is certain: Coalition is the first item on the agenda once the electoral numbers come in. The centre-left (Sinn Féin, Labour, Green Party) are up for going into coalition and killing off any prospect for class-based oppositional politics and this despite bargain-basement gains and the inevitable rightward drifts.

The rest of the left have failed, yes once again, to put together an agreed electoral slate with the aim of producing a vote transfer pact (excusing the honourable efforts of some like Paul Murphy) and there is no broad-based platform who will commit to refuse entry into or support for a Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil led government. So the prospects are bleak but hopefully not as bad as being predicted. 

No matter how the election pans out, the left will still need to unite and fight around the issues of the moment and get its act together. To shun this essential task and to learn nothing from experience would be to become irredeemable losers and deservedly so.

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4. Joe - January 15, 2020

God almighty. Events. That man who suffered life changing injuries when the tent he was staying in by the canal was lifted by some kind of mechanical digger. Jesus Christ. And Varadkar says all the right things and then says Paul McAuliffe, the Lord Mayor, is politically responsible and should make a statement.
Jesus Christ, Leo, that’s just very, very bad form.

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WorldbyStorm - January 15, 2020

Almost panicky, shifting responsibility where it wasn’t necessary to do so.

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CMK - January 16, 2020

‘Petty and vindictive’ is running Sandra Fay as a no-hoper to cut the legs off Paul Murphy. That’s textbook vindictiveness and pettiness. No one outside the SP is deluded enough to believe there are two Left seats in DSW in this election.

Interesting to see key members of DSW SP out canvassing tonight for Ruth Coppinger and not getting Sandra Fay’s campaign on the road. It is obviously not a priority.

Looking forward to seeing who the Sol-PBP candidate will be in Limerick. Cian Prendiville came within a couple of hundred votes of winning a seat last time round? Where did he go?

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sonofstan - January 15, 2020

Yep.
There’s a weird empathy gap there sometimes, or, worse, an inability to know when not to score the point.

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tafkaGW - January 16, 2020

Saw that. Appalling. Who on earth would order the clearing of tents, sleeping bag, bender etc. with a digger, without checking that there was someone in there?

I’d hazard a guess that Varadkar and those around him have never known a homeless person.

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5. Tomboktu - January 16, 2020

Over on the Dublin Review of Books, Andy Storey has a scathing essay on John Walsh’s biography, The Globalist: Peter Sutherland: His Life and Legacy.

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CL - January 16, 2020

Andy Storey’s review of John Walsh’s book is essential reading for anyone trying to understand the economic and political philosophy of Fine Gael.
Ireland’s privileged, class-based educational system enabled Sutherland to emerge and become ‘Ireland’s most distinguished international statesman’
He went on to further enrich himself and his class, as he faithfully served parasitical, predatory capitalism.

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WorldbyStorm - January 17, 2020

That is a fantastic review by Storey. A real pleasure to read.

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6. Liberius - January 16, 2020

Now the question here is will SF actually take any serious action against this guy (as in expulsion), a non-apology apology followed directly by “I have been misinterpreted” really isn’t good.

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pettyburgess - January 16, 2020

Sinn Fein put out a two sentence statement: “Paddy Holohan has made comments on his podcast that have caused offence, and are quite obviously not the views of Sinn Féin.

“He should apologise and withdraw these remarks.”

Very very weak stuff. The mildest possible verbal disavowal, no mention of things like bigotry, homophobia or racism, just a call for an apology. Then he puts out an apology that simultaneously claims that he was misinterpreted all along, implying that the apology isn’t really necessary. And it seems that’s it as far as SF are concerned.

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Liberius - January 16, 2020

Sinn Féin President Mary Lou Donald has said she is satisfied that Cllr Holohan has apologised.

She said the party had insisted he apologised for the comments, he had done that, and the apology was the right thing to do.

Ms McDonald said she believed Mr Holohan was misinterpreted because he was probably frustrated that the remarks gave the impression he held views different to the ones he is associated with.

“I think Paddy is probably frustrated at the fact that’s he known for being very approachable, a very open minded and a very kind person.

“Unfortunately the remarks that he has made have given the impression that he holds other views and I imagine that what he meant, although I can’t speak for him, what he means in terms of interpretation.”

So no further action, though interesting that Varadkar accepted the apology.

The Fine Gael leader said he accepted the apology.

“In terms of the wider issue I think anyone in Ireland who’s from a minority background, whether mixed race or gay or lesbian, has experienced some form or racism or homophobia in their lives,” he added

“I’m fortunate in that I haven’t received too much of that, I know it’s been a lot worse for a lot many other people.

https://www.rte.ie/news/election-2020/2020/0116/1107829-sinn-fein-holohan/

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WorldbyStorm - January 16, 2020

My take is that FG don’t particularly want/need to train their guns on SF, indeed they’re probably more than happy if SF takes out some FFers. So why bother expending political capital at this point when LV can appear magnanimous?

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Liberius - January 16, 2020

Yeah that makes sense, also to judge by the comments below Holohan’s tweet the public don’t need help in seeing the problems with Holohan’s reaction.

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Daniel Rayner O'Connor - January 16, 2020

How the blazes were his comments supposed to be interpreted?

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7. Stan - January 16, 2020

1-0 to Leo. He looks like he’s rising above it, and SF are stuck with explaining why they don’t kick the eejit out.

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8. tafkaGW - January 17, 2020

We note that fiscal love for Northern Ireland lasted for precisely as long as the DUPers were of use to the Tories. Now Stormont is going to be systematically underfunded from London.

As Conor Murphy, Stormont Finance Minister notes:

“My officials are in the process of fully costing what is required but, against the request of the First Minister and deputy First Minister, the British Government has gone ahead and made this announcement.

“The financial package claims to provide £2bn.

“£1bn of this was already coming to the Executive.

“A further £240m was already promised as part of the Confidence and Supply agreement.

“The bottom line is with this proposed package, our public services face a shortfall of at least £1 billion next year alone.

“This will make it extremely difficult to fund public services.

Perhaps the Tories want shot of the place.

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EWI - January 17, 2020

Perhaps the Tories want shot of the place.

It’s greed. ‘Starve the beast’ (and privatisation of monopoly public services) are two heads of Thatcherism.

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9. Joe - January 17, 2020

Em. Facebook ads from politicians. On my FB feed I’ve currently got ads from a business entrepreneur indo Kerrigan from Dub SC; Keogan an indo from Meath; and Donnelly of SF from Dub MidWest or wherever. None of whom I can vote for as my vote is in Dub Central. So how much are these people paying FB to appear on my FB?

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10. pettyburgess - January 17, 2020

https://www.joe.ie/politics/sinn-fein-distances-paddy-holohan-councillor-suggested-underage-girls-making-false-rape-claims-blackmailing-men-691115

This guy is the gift that just keeps giving. I am impressed in a bleak kind of way that he actually managed to top his homophobic comments. And Sinn Fein again putting out a brief bland comment that his views aren’t those of the party! What does he have to do for them to take action?

I note that Seán Crowe, the SF TD who represents this councillors area has so maintained complete silence, which is cowardly and unprincipled.

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pettyburgess - January 17, 2020

Mary Lou McD said yesterday that he’d apologised and could stay as an SF councillor. She says today that he will face disciplinary action. Not a squeak from Sean Crowe.

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11. roddy - January 17, 2020

Holohan has been suspended from SF .

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pettyburgess - January 17, 2020

Yes, just announced. Good. McDonald should have known yesterday that they weren’t going to get away with saying he’s apologised let’s all move on. The moron has a podcast, there was always going to be more coming now that journalists had reason to listen back.

I note that the TD whose campaign he would have been working on, Crowe, still hasn’t said a thing.

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tafkaGW - January 17, 2020

Right thing to do.

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12. Paul Culloty - January 17, 2020

Has Sammy Wilson hacked Paul Mason’s Twitter a/c?

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tafkaGW - January 17, 2020

Just what is Mason referring to? Some Catholic lobby group in the BLP? Does anyone know?

Of course the knives are out for Mason for backing Starmer.

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WorldbyStorm - January 17, 2020
Paul Culloty - January 17, 2020

Apparently, there were claims that Long-Bailey was less than unequivocal about abortion, but she has since denied this:

All started with a website called the Red Roar:

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13. Joe - January 17, 2020

In-depth Constituency analysis Number 5 – Cork South West.
Adrian Kavanagh has the following confirmed candidates:
Cork South-West (3 seats): Senator Tim Lombard (Fine Gael), Cllr. Karen Coakley (Fine Gael), Deputy Margaret Murphy O’Mahony (Fianna Fail), Cllr. Christopher O’Sullivan (Fianna Fáil), Cllr. Paul Hayes (Sinn Féin), Cllr. Holly Cairns (Social Democrats), Mairéad Ruane (Aontú), Deputy Michael Collins (Independent).

Currently it’s I FG 1 FF 1 Ind. But the FG TD decided not to run again. (West Cork is a great place for rumours. You can have any lurid rumour you want about the real reason for him dropping out). So FG have two new candidates – Lombard is Simon Coveney’s man from the far east of the Constituency, Coakley is in the west. Reports today in the papers of an effort by some local FGers to get a third candidate added – Noel O’Donovan, a former councillor, now a Garda, from Clonakilty. He left his Council seat to join the Guards, then let it be known that he’d leave the Guards if he was added to the ticket (There’s a story – and nobody seems to have batted an eyelid). Anyway the efforts failed – Coveney said no. Will this affect the FG vote? Maybe. Disgruntled members/supporters are unlikely to defect to FF though so the probable beneficiary will be Collins the dodgy Ireland-first independent.
FF’s Murphy O’Mahony has Bandon all to herself. She’ll sail in. Don’t know much about their second candidate O’Sullivan. He’s from the west of the constituency. To add to the romance of it all he’s going out with the Soc Dem candidate. She described him being added to the FF ticket as like the script of a bad rom com.
But the other candidates will be also rans.
Hard to see this as anything else but staying as is: 1 FF, 1FG, 1Ind. Slight chance for FF, if they got their vote management right (which they won’t, they haven’t got the discipline) to make it 2FF 1Ind, if the FG infighting leads to a collapse. But no, 111 as is.

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road bowling correspondent - January 17, 2020

O’Sullivan’s father Christy was a Fianna Fail TD in the past. At one election when he wasn’t selected for FF he ran as an independent and won around five thousand votes. The family have a big personal following and the young lad probably got added to the ticket in case he pulled a similar stunt.
He topped the poll with a huge vote in the local elections, despite his political career in the past including moving to Australia while still a councillor and hanging on to the seat. If there’s one FF seat it’ll be him and he may well top the poll.
Collins’ seat is the traditional one held by someone representing the far west of the constituency, a non party one to some extent which in the past was held for long stints by Paddy Sheehan (FG) and Michael Pat Murphy (Lab). He’ll be OK. Works very hard locally and I’m not sure his nutty comments in support of Grealish even registered so when he does get in no need to worry that fascism is on the march in Schill and Ballydehob.
FG not winning a seat would once have been in the realms of science fiction as this was for years their strongest constituency. However they are a bit all over the place. Coakley polled around 40% of the votes in the last local elections that O’Donovan did in the one before that.
However as Joe, whose local knowledge is impressive, pointed out O’Donovan left the council and joined the guards. In Wexford. And showed no interest in running at the local elections. But with Jim Daly dropping out unexpectedly it looks like a FG seat is up for grabs so he obviously fancied it. To complicate things Coakley won her council seat while living in Kerry, (like O’Donovan she said she’d move back home if she got elected and in fairness did.) Lombard will probably get seat number 3 but both FFers are much stronger candidates than the FG one.
Paul Hayes of SF once looked a likely lad but only scraped in at the local elections. Holly Cairns got in at the local elections after many recounts by two votes and is one for the future though she seems a bit like a Green candidate in SD clothing and might do better for the former.
Joe’s verdict, and alternative verdict, seems right.

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Joe - January 17, 2020

Thanks rbc. “If there’s one FF seat it’ll be him and he may well top the poll.” Where’s his base? Murphy O’Mahony is based in Bandon and afaik she has a clear run there, no other candidate from that area. She got in with plenty to spare the last time. Can’t see her not getting back again. But if O’Sullivan gets a big enough vote out of the west, they could be in with a chance of two.
And that would be earth shattering, as you intimated. No FGer elected in the home constituency of Mick Collins? By gor.

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road bowling correspondent - January 18, 2020

He’s based in Clonakilty, from which Jim Daly was able to top the poll and has a clear run there too, with the exception of Hayes who’s nearby. Also has family connections in Bantry and near Skibbereen, where he’ll go well.
Lombard is in Kinsale which cuts in to the hinterland of Bandon where Murphy O’Mahony is. She sailed in last time but was the only FF candidate standing.
There is a kind of mystical belief locally in the power of the O’Sullivan brand. Christy senior topped the poll in 2007 when he was the only candidate ever to get more than 10,000 on the first count in Cork SW. In doing so he ousted party colleague Denis O’Donovan who was viewed as absolutely safe beforehand. History might repeat there.
The constituency perpetually divides into Bandon 1 Clon 1 and West 1, so if Murphy O’Mahony does make it, she’ll probably have to beat Lombard. I do know that the FFers fancy their chances of two.

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road bowling correspondent - January 18, 2020

Christy Senior did lose out in 2011 but that was an a freak year for FF. Strange to think Labour won a seat that year through Michael McCarthy. Not even sure they have a candidate this time, and if they did they’d be lucky to garner 2,000 votes.

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Joe - January 18, 2020

One in Clon and one in Bandon. Certainly looks like FF have got their candidates and strategy bang on this time. Whereas FG seem to have made a bit of a hames of it. Whether FG will make enough of a hames of it to actually end up with zero seats – for them that would be an apalling vista. Wouldn’t be any good for Coveney’s rep either, come to think of it.

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14. Starkadder - January 18, 2020

Good essay here about how film critics’ obsession with assessing films through a superficial filter of “importance” is harming their ability to assess the aesthetic merit of said films.

Exhibit A: You must see the new film about rich people by the tiresome Greta Gerwig , because by doing so, you “support women”.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/13/little-women-joker-stop-seeing-important-mediocre-films

An quitr revealing comment about how politically nonthreatening the Marvel “Black Panther” movie really is. Can you imagine the Saudis showing “Peterloo” or “Sorry to Bother You?”

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15. Jim Monaghan - January 18, 2020

A cpongestion charge is a passion of mine. On eof many benefits being better air quality. https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/david-mcwilliams-introduce-a-congestion-charge-and-make-public-transport-free-1.4141971

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16. Joe - January 18, 2020

Some additions to the runners in Dublin Central. Adrian Kavanagh has Gillian Brien of PbP, some chap from Aontú and a totally barmy, climate change denying, racist independent all confirmed. And I saw one, just one, poster for Rita Harrold of SP on my walk with the dog today.
A sub-plot for saddos will be the race between WP, SP and PbP.

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road bowling correspondent - January 18, 2020

“A sub-plot for saddos,” sounds like the name of a book, possible subtitle “left-wing parties in the 2020 general election”.
Awful thought I know. Might turn out a lot better than it looks at the moment. Met the local SD candidate today and her optimism would do you good.

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road bowling correspondent - January 18, 2020

Apologies, possible subtitle “left-wing parties in the 2020 Irish general election.”

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17. Tomboktu - January 19, 2020

Worth a watch

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18. Paul Culloty - January 19, 2020

The Sunday Times associate editor is milking the first opinion poll of the GE:

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19. Starkadder - January 19, 2020

I found this interesting item while looking through a list of board Games:

Colonial Twilight: The French-Algerian War, 1954-62

It is a wargame that allows you to play the FLN or the French during the Algerian war. While it is open to the charge of tastelessness, this article calls it ” a superb representation of the complexities of the French-Algerian war.”.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/vb9gd9/a-cancelled-board-game-revealed-how-colonialism-inspires-and-haunts-games

I wonder will they make a game about the 1798 Rising, or the Tan War?

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20. GearóidGaillimh - January 19, 2020

A trans author was forced to delete her inaugural short story from a science fiction website/magazine because the title referenced a transphobic online meme. I feel a lot of sympathy for the author, Twitter doesn’t really do nuance though does it. Reminded me of James Tiptee Jr’s ‘The Girl Who Was Plugged In’. https://www.wired.com/story/attack-helicopter-meme-sci-fi-story/

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WorldbyStorm - January 19, 2020

Yeah, that’s true re James Tiptree Jr.s story. Agree re sympathy, and I love it when negative stuff is repurposed for positive ends.

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