Election 2020. A quiet break from US Politics at least
01-18-2020, 08:04 AM (This post was last modified: 01-24-2020, 01:25 PM by Dartz.)
01-18-2020, 08:04 AM (This post was last modified: 01-24-2020, 01:25 PM by Dartz.)
So it's election time at last and the government that was never meant to last the year has rumbled on for nearly three.
But it's time to put pencil to paper once more.
The way things stand at the moment.
The Labour Party suffers from being the junior coalition partner too many times and making pledges it has to compromise away.
Soc-Dems are - vibrant among people I know. Never had the chance to fuckup in power.
Greens - may lack a sense of reality. (I'll argue against carbon taxes for one specific reason)
Sinn Fein are just that bit too sinister.
People Before Profit - not enough sanity. Too much screaming.
Fianna Fail - The Party of Landowners and Businessmen.
Fine Gael - The Party of Businessmen and Landowners.
Currently the state of the nation is as follows:
Insurance costs are spiralling out of control forcing many important local businesses such as creches, play centres, activity centres, community centres and the like to close their doors. It's taking the colour and happiness out of life and just adding more and more to the sense of being utterly leeched. Or, for that matter, the majority of the people who can't afford a home near suitable public transport and instead get fleeced for the privelege of owning a car.
Speeking of leeches, rents are through the roof because of an unwillingness to actively tackle shit like AirBnB, or to build social housing.
The Childrens hospital is massively overbudget thanks to the tender process being utterly fucking munged. Awarding a tender based solely on price gets you the contractor with a reputation of bidding 'below cost' and shafting you with every hole in the spec they can find. For billions.
The public health service is turning into an utter omnifuck - they can't even do a managed decline properly.
The government refuses to pay doctors, nurses and other critical public servants a worthy wage, while top-loading departments with useless suits in offices.
The government utterly refuses to pay the military, to the point where both morale, and actual effectiveness is utterly collapsing. This has already caused deaths.
They gloat about a 1 billion surplus for a rainy day - rather than investing it on one-time critical expenditures that might bring value in the future. Okay, I get the idea of rainy day fund given how heavy things are leverages with corporation tax receipts but at the same time it's not good saving money that *must* be spent on fixing critical failures. Those things just end up costing more in the long run.
They recognise the government is overeliant on one source of tax - and are still talking about cutting taxes anyway to make it even more reliant.
On the positives, employment is high and the statistics on paper look good - but that hides a lot of simmering discontent. People have work, but it's costing far more to go to work and wages aren't keeping up with the cost of living.
It's a government that knows the cost of fucking everything, but the value of nothing. Even people.
----
On the other hand, the current Dail as a whole should at least be commended for not turning itself into an utter laughing stock like the neighbours did. A minority government managed to ride through Brexit with the support of the opposition because - inspite of the above - Brexit represented a far bigger danger to the State so they knuckled in and made it work, and got what is possibly the best outcome for the State given the circumstances.
----
Speaking of the date.
An amusing consequence is that the Register of Electors updates on the 15th of February every year. The Election is scheduled for the 8th.
So people who've registered to vote in the last year may not be fully on it - not without re-applying to the draft register. A process which requires photo -ID and a visit to a cop-shop. to get a form signed. And which has to be posted and received by the 22nd of this month.
A cheeky way of excluding everyone who'se turned 18 in the last year?
If this happened in the States there'd be howls of disenfranchisement. It was widely reported on the news but cop-shops aren't that common outside of urban areas anymore.
----
And of course, the first day of campaigning the City Council decides to use an excavator to clear out a homeless man's tent. Without waking him up in the process.
Suffice to say he's suffered 'Life-changing injuries'. News-speak for anything from Feeding Tube to Fuck-Ugly scars. the homeless crisis has dogged the government for the last three years and continues to worsen - not to mention the Taoiseach's attempt to spin the blame to the city mayor and politicise the issue going down like a 737
He's misfired every single day of the campaign so far.
---
But step foreward Paddy Holohan - former MMA fighter and suspended Sinn Fein party member who's been saying naughty things on a podcast
About the Taoiseach not being a family many
And about underage girls.
He's gone into the party disciplinary process.They'll boot him for sure - even if I gurarantee he's only saying what the majority of their voters think, the rest of 'em are smart enough not to say it.
.
Just over three weeks to go and god knows what the fuck'll happen. A hung dail is a possibility - unfortunately not meaning what you might think it does - or some form of coalition between one of the bigger parties and a small party that thinks, this time it'll be different and they won't get fucked over like all the other small parties in coalition. A minority with a confidence and supply agreement is also possible but - it's gotten really hard to call what'll happen.
On paper the economy is doing well and the numbers are good - but the actual results for people aren't materialising. The tide is rising but the boats are sinking. And the government seems more and more out of touch with reality with every passing day.
But it's time to put pencil to paper once more.
The way things stand at the moment.
The Labour Party suffers from being the junior coalition partner too many times and making pledges it has to compromise away.
Soc-Dems are - vibrant among people I know. Never had the chance to fuckup in power.
Greens - may lack a sense of reality. (I'll argue against carbon taxes for one specific reason)
Sinn Fein are just that bit too sinister.
People Before Profit - not enough sanity. Too much screaming.
Fianna Fail - The Party of Landowners and Businessmen.
Fine Gael - The Party of Businessmen and Landowners.
Currently the state of the nation is as follows:
Insurance costs are spiralling out of control forcing many important local businesses such as creches, play centres, activity centres, community centres and the like to close their doors. It's taking the colour and happiness out of life and just adding more and more to the sense of being utterly leeched. Or, for that matter, the majority of the people who can't afford a home near suitable public transport and instead get fleeced for the privelege of owning a car.
Speeking of leeches, rents are through the roof because of an unwillingness to actively tackle shit like AirBnB, or to build social housing.
The Childrens hospital is massively overbudget thanks to the tender process being utterly fucking munged. Awarding a tender based solely on price gets you the contractor with a reputation of bidding 'below cost' and shafting you with every hole in the spec they can find. For billions.
The public health service is turning into an utter omnifuck - they can't even do a managed decline properly.
The government refuses to pay doctors, nurses and other critical public servants a worthy wage, while top-loading departments with useless suits in offices.
The government utterly refuses to pay the military, to the point where both morale, and actual effectiveness is utterly collapsing. This has already caused deaths.
They gloat about a 1 billion surplus for a rainy day - rather than investing it on one-time critical expenditures that might bring value in the future. Okay, I get the idea of rainy day fund given how heavy things are leverages with corporation tax receipts but at the same time it's not good saving money that *must* be spent on fixing critical failures. Those things just end up costing more in the long run.
They recognise the government is overeliant on one source of tax - and are still talking about cutting taxes anyway to make it even more reliant.
On the positives, employment is high and the statistics on paper look good - but that hides a lot of simmering discontent. People have work, but it's costing far more to go to work and wages aren't keeping up with the cost of living.
It's a government that knows the cost of fucking everything, but the value of nothing. Even people.
----
On the other hand, the current Dail as a whole should at least be commended for not turning itself into an utter laughing stock like the neighbours did. A minority government managed to ride through Brexit with the support of the opposition because - inspite of the above - Brexit represented a far bigger danger to the State so they knuckled in and made it work, and got what is possibly the best outcome for the State given the circumstances.
----
Speaking of the date.
An amusing consequence is that the Register of Electors updates on the 15th of February every year. The Election is scheduled for the 8th.
So people who've registered to vote in the last year may not be fully on it - not without re-applying to the draft register. A process which requires photo -ID and a visit to a cop-shop. to get a form signed. And which has to be posted and received by the 22nd of this month.
A cheeky way of excluding everyone who'se turned 18 in the last year?
If this happened in the States there'd be howls of disenfranchisement. It was widely reported on the news but cop-shops aren't that common outside of urban areas anymore.
----
And of course, the first day of campaigning the City Council decides to use an excavator to clear out a homeless man's tent. Without waking him up in the process.
Suffice to say he's suffered 'Life-changing injuries'. News-speak for anything from Feeding Tube to Fuck-Ugly scars. the homeless crisis has dogged the government for the last three years and continues to worsen - not to mention the Taoiseach's attempt to spin the blame to the city mayor and politicise the issue going down like a 737
He's misfired every single day of the campaign so far.
---
But step foreward Paddy Holohan - former MMA fighter and suspended Sinn Fein party member who's been saying naughty things on a podcast
About the Taoiseach not being a family many
And about underage girls.
He's gone into the party disciplinary process.They'll boot him for sure - even if I gurarantee he's only saying what the majority of their voters think, the rest of 'em are smart enough not to say it.
.
Just over three weeks to go and god knows what the fuck'll happen. A hung dail is a possibility - unfortunately not meaning what you might think it does - or some form of coalition between one of the bigger parties and a small party that thinks, this time it'll be different and they won't get fucked over like all the other small parties in coalition. A minority with a confidence and supply agreement is also possible but - it's gotten really hard to call what'll happen.
On paper the economy is doing well and the numbers are good - but the actual results for people aren't materialising. The tide is rising but the boats are sinking. And the government seems more and more out of touch with reality with every passing day.
I love the smell of rotaries in the morning. You know one time, I got to work early, before the rush hour. I walked through the empty carpark, I didn't see one bloody Prius or Golf. And that smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole carpark, smelled like.... ....speed.
One day they're going to ban them.