Sunday and other stupid statements from this week

From the Sunday Independent editorial on the housing crisis:

In short, the report presents a reasonable analysis of the problems and offers some solutions, including setting up a new Housing Delivery Oversight Executive. But we are not convinced. On this much, at least, we agree with Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien.

It is evident that some progress is being made under his tenure, but it is painfully slow.

There is an underlying housing deficit of up to 256,000 homes, which represents, by any stretch, a growing crisis.

 

Nor do we agree with Sinn Féin, to the effect that the crisis is all the Government’s fault. Criticism from the sidelines is one thing, but political ideology never placed brick upon brick.

That doesn’t sound right. 

Lucinda Creighton argues the following:

Ireland has come a long way in terms of its reputation and status in the European Union since the economic implosion in 2010. Our political leaders and diplomats rightly celebrate the diplomatic success of the Northern Ireland protocol and the Windsor framework, the result of several years of careful and skilled negotiation.

However, we cannot ignore the other factor in those days – significant hostility to Britain across all arms of the EU and member states after its decision to leave.

‘Significant hostility’ or weariness at having to pick up the pieces of Brexit including how it hit this island?

From the Examiner we have this trope seen across the media commentariat:

The party has also been accused of floundering and flip-flopping on the thorny issue of migration and open borders.

As president of a party that at it’s core believes that there should be no border on the island of Ireland, McDonald has found herself trying to explain how Sinn Féin is also in “not for open borders”. 

When you are explaining, as the saying goes, you are probably losing, or at the very least causing significant confusion.

There’s this:

So Sinn Féin’s embrace of the Department of Finance shows how fully it is committed to responsible leadership at Stormont, or certainly to conveying that impression. The paradox for republicans of making Northern Ireland work turns out to be resolved once republicans are in charge.

Some ‘paradox’ given most people could see that a mile away.

This unlikely comparison:

But it is in the penultimate song of the set – and his greatest hit – where it is clear that [Tony] O’Reilly and Springsteen understand a similar truth about the world. “You can’t start a fire worrying about your little world falling apart,” Springsteen defiantly sings on his 1984 track Dancing in The Dark. As a thesis statement it is no different from O’Reilly’s final public missive: “If you don’t know how to lose, you don’t know how to live.”

Both are descriptions of a disposition required for a life well lived. But more than that, they are an argument. O’Reilly’s acceptance of wins and losses, the wisdom that one cannot exist without the other, and his courage in the face of criticism (warranted and not) are to be celebrated. Springsteen’s refusal to slow down – and his realisation that without risk there is no chance at victory – is a philosophy that pertains as much to O’Reilly’s boardrooms as it does to Springsteen’s America. Ideological allies can emerge from the most unlikely of places.