If Ireland can't pay, Ireland shouldn't pay
Posted on Sunday, November 28, 2010 at 07:59 AM
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Those self-serving bankers, developers and politicians who treated Ireland like their own private casino have just handed their fellow citizens a 19 century diet of austerity, poverty and heartache (because, they suspect, they'll never fight back).
And if you ever imagined the people responsible for this disaster would share in the losses, or acknowledge their culpability, then today you've had your fingers rubbed on the fiery braille of what's really happening.
Instead of seeing these bankers and developers hoisted on their Louis Copeland designed petards, Fianna Fail stepped in to guarantee the banks’ debts, turning private losses into public obligations.
Let's just consider what that actually means: in Ireland our homegrown golden circle, the men who walk between the raindrops no matter how bad the economic weather, can privatize their profits and socialize their losses.
That's exactly the kind of political trade-off that caused French aristocrats to lose their heads once.
And let's also pause to consider just how hard won Irish independence was. Men and women gave their lives to win our sovereignty - and now we're just going to hand it over the IMF and the EU without a fight because loose banking regulations and government ineptitude created this disaster?
If Ireland can't pay then Ireland must default and follow the example set in Iceland.
Punishing the Irish public for the mistakes of a small and unrepresentative group of rogue bankers is simply unfair and frankly the massive new IMF/EU debt load is much too high to be paid back.
The Irish public's new diet of nettle soup and hard rain is about to come to a boil, I predict.
24 Comments
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tempranillo | Nov 29, 2010, 09:07 PM EST
what about some constructive ideas? how about the 'alternative minimum tax' to put some of the 46% non-taxpaying units back on the tax rolls. Why not nationalise BOI & AIB....restructure them and someday do the ipo. many other ideas, too-------but do not disengage
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tempranillo | Nov 29, 2010, 08:55 PM EST
YOU think the economic crisis is bad today, try defaulting & walking away from your obligations. Let me ask what you willl do when no one will give you import credits--Ireland is THE MOST OPEN ECONOMY IN THE WEST--perhaps you knew that. and, what happens when all those evil companies pull out when they can't do business. You, Mr Doherty, are out of your element and your ignorance of economics appalling.
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hollabackgurl | Nov 29, 2010, 07:09 PM EST
Did the Irish people draft the banking regulations or lend massive international loans to organizations that couldn't repay them? In a word, no. They don't need to carry the can.
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Monsoonman | Nov 29, 2010, 01:22 PM EST
Did someone hold a pistol to the heads of the Irish & the Americans who voted the leaders into office on the platform of free rainbow stew, free bubble up, free paychecks, 100K gummint street sweepers...Whose hand was on that Glock anyway?
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hollabackgurl | Nov 29, 2010, 12:12 PM EST
It is not democracy, it's the negation of everything democracy stands for: the Irish government are surrendering their economy, their mandate to govern and their own sovereignty to unelected international bankers answerable to no one.
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Monsoonman | Nov 29, 2010, 12:06 PM EST
What you are witnessing is democracy in action hollabackgurl. Enough of the population votes for who is going to give them the most goodies for nothing, without voting for what is best for the countries future. The Greeks found it out long ago. We are finding it out now. The handwriting is on the wall for the US, with the voter fraud groups like ACORN, organizing and multiplying the votes of those who do not work, do not produce, but only take, it gave us a socialist controlled government whose only aim is to stay in power, whatever the cost.
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hollabackgurl | Nov 29, 2010, 11:57 AM EST
That's not, as you say, "nuff said." We're witnessing the existential collapse of the Irish economy. It won't be fixed by robbing old people of their pensions or the unemployed of their benefits. Ireland's most vulnerable should not have to pay for the epic incompetence of Ireland's most privileged. The IMF and EU bailout cost is simply unsustainable and frankly stupid and it can not stand.
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Monsoonman | Nov 29, 2010, 11:46 AM EST
You can't play make believe economics forever, sooner or later chickens come home to roost, there has to be an accounting. A bus driver working for the taxpayers is not worth 120K per year plus benefits. A Spanish air traffic controller working for the government is not worth 500K per year plus benefits. The working people of a country do just that, they work. Business people and financiers create jobs, start companies, create wealth and provide jobs. Unions do not create or inspire jobs, they hop on board the dream and rake as much off the top as they can until the host dies, or moves overseas. The hosts are dying. Who voted in your politicians who made the deals with the banks and unions? Nuff said.
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boomerbob | Nov 29, 2010, 10:20 AM EST
The Irish have the brass to stand up to the elite. The U.S. didn't and we'll not recover for many, many years.
Stand up for your rights!!!
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Dublinjas | Nov 29, 2010, 05:40 AM EST
The Irish Peoples voices must be heard, The message they have for the ECB/IMF and their recently concluded agreement with the Rogue non representative body posing as the Government of Ireland is get fcuking stuffed.
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seamusmoore | Nov 29, 2010, 12:05 AM EST
olovely Why was the govt powerless to restrain or contain these wheeler dealers? They didn't want to because govt coffers were being filled with transfer tax revenue. The govt had the revenue to bribe voters with giveaways; BTW, unlike Greece, which spent themselves into default, Ireland's required IMF/EU intervention was not caused by spending(Ireland ran surpluses from 2005 to 2007). As Paul Krugman of the New York Times pointed out, Ireland's financial black hole is due to the govt choosing to make private risk (bondholders and foreign bank lenders) into a public obligation of the Irish taxpayer. You are right that this isn't the working people of Ireland's responsibility, but the blame squarely rest with the govt which signed a blank check payable by the Irish taxpayer. You should have been screaming when they created NAMA and transferred those toxic loans onto the govt's books. If Cowan & company had not done that, the risk of default would still lie with bondholders and foreign lenders, NOT Irish taxpayers. My point remains: government solutions are usually worse than the problems they seek to solve.
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PolinDeB | Nov 28, 2010, 11:14 PM EST
Default Default Default.. as simple as that.
And anyone who think we should be fair to Europe.. all deals are off with the new Empire...
Sin e ar La! - Brian Cowen has no right to make any deals in the name of the Irish people. Let the people speak.
Article 6 of the Irish Constitution.
1. All powers of government, legislative, executive and judicial, derive, under God, from the people, whose right it is to designate the rulers of the State and, in final appeal, to decide all questions of national policy, according to the requirements of the common good.
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maloney | Nov 28, 2010, 10:06 PM EST
If it's not free why bother.
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olovely | Nov 28, 2010, 10:05 PM EST
This isn't the working people of Ireland's responsibility. They didn't write the banking regulations or loan the cash. Ireland's social net has nothing to do with how the country got here. This is the work of crony capitalism. Ireland's problem wasn't caused by joining the Euro, it was caused by a bunch of high flying wheeler-dealers who bit off more than they could chew and a government that was powerless to either restrain or contain them. Spare us all the right wing bullcrap about Regan and responsibility. The Irish people were hoodwinked by a cabal of irresponsible flyboys.
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