Comments

Is the government off the rails? — 29 Comments

  1. What a fine metaphor for our times.
    Our local council is closing schools but just spent 2.4 million putting in new trees and turf at the approaches to our fair city ‘to attract investment’.
    Dear God.

  2. that annoys me.

    not just the fact that they’re planning on spending a huge amount of money, but that it is /yet again/ going to be spent in Dublin. they already have the Luas, and that huge Dublin Port Tunnel, and now they’re planning this.

    I would love to be able to simply get a bus route in Monaghan.

  3. Welcome, Mike.

    Has the world gone completely mad? I am constantly amazed at the incredibly strange decisions that our politicians come up with. How can anyone justify spending vast sums of money on what are essentially luxuries, when there are vital demands at the most basic level?

  4. Its simple the schools and care facilities for the elderly did not give as much “kick back” money as the construction contractor who will get the bid for the underground.

    The politicians have an insatiable need to stay in power. This takes money to buy votes. So they will do anything to get more money.

    By the way according to my government’s department of homeland security I am now officially a “right wing extremist” who should be treated the same as any other terrorist.

    It was surprisingly easy to become one. All I had to do was have been a military veteran, oppose any of a number of federal policies, and think that local governments should be responsible for local issues.

  5. You see Grandad you’re not thinking it through… Dublin is the only Capital City in Europe without an underground rail system. The fact that Manchester is bigger is immaterial – the Capital is the thing that matters. We have to project a positive image of Dublin (forget the outlying savage areas outside the Pale) and be ready for the financial upturn when (or if) it happens. Why don’t you listen to the FFers? You know it makes sense…

  6. It sounds to me as though the Irish gub’mint is taking a page from Comrade the Messiah’s play book. They are taking the same deadly road. The attitude is, “Fuck whatever makes sense, let’s just spend and spend and spend and tax and tax and tax. Then with our collective heads in the sand everything will be just fine”.
    Something tells me it’s not sand they have their heads stuck in!

  7. Cue a report about how the project has run over time and budget.

    Me thinks the same contractors that made a mint out of the LUAS have a lot to do with this.

  8. Soooo, can we organise to pelt them all with our feces then or what? Being a coward I wont take unilateral poo flinging action, but as part of a crowd ……

  9. Hi Grandad

    I like your anecdote very appropriate. I have just started a Facebook group to protest against the recent childcare supplement withdrawl and the means testing of child benefit. In your story, Mary can’t go back to work because she can’t afford the spiralling cost of childcare.

    It seems young families are targetted in this latest budget for Bank Bailouts or Metros whatever the reason, our children will suffer, our discontent voices need to be heard! We need people to join the group to show their support for a reversal or re-think of this plan.

    If you don’t mind me giving it a plug it is: PACUB Group on Facebook

    Thanks,
    Irish Mammy

  10. Oh and by the way one of our ideas is to stinky nappy-bomb Leinster house…or let toddlers run wild in Dail Eireann, you never know they might just get some potty work done while they are there…

  11. The comment I heard was that the companies involved had spent €50 million on studies so that the Government had now to proceed with the building. Not sure how one follows from the other.

    Did you see the Sunday Turbine? NAMA taking on €90 billion of debt, the bulk of which is from 50 developers – that’s an average of €1 billion each.

  12. That sounds like my place of work… “Sorry we can’t give you a raise this year, money is tight… But have a look at my brand new luxury vehicle that I bought with the bonus I got for cutting costs.”

    On a side note- Traffic was bad enough when I visited a year ago… I can only imagine how bad it will be once they begin construction.

  13. The traffic situation should actually be improving from now on because half of the cars on the road will be reposessed – we have a recession over here you know….

  14. What, Dublin AGAIN? They have trains, Luas, Dart, bus and taxis and that’s not enough, for a city that a healthy adult could almost walk across? Meanwhile out in the West we have none of that: but we do have elderly people living alone in stone-walled tin-roofed houses that a donkey couldn’t be comfortable in, and kids going to school in garden sheds because their schools have no funds.

    I’m with Grow Up: would love to participate in some poo-flinging. And Irish Mammy can just say the word on the Toddler Release at the Dail (hey, mine’s autistic; should be great fun!)

    Seriously, when will we all finally stand up and insist they stand down?

  15. I do agree about the timing Grandad and the cuts elsewhere. Seems a bit excessive what with the current state of the nation.

    On the other hand Dublin could do with a metro. Any trip to a major European leaves me embareassed by our infrastructure.

    Could get it done cheaper now, plenty of idle builders and architects about. Plus it would put a lot of tradesmen back to work and off the dole queue.

    And it would certainly help on the other side of the recession. Just saying like.

  16. I swear your Government is sleeping with our State Government . .he’s doing EXACTLY the same thing. Most people live out in North Western Sydney where there is no railway, just a less than satisfactory bus network and he’s building a Metro system for the CBD where public transport is plentiful. I think it’s to placate the toll road builders . . .if they gave us a decent train route, the revenue for arterial roads to the private owners would plummet! Pelt away but pass on some of the poo for me! I have a good arm!

  17. NaRocRoc – It is true that Ireland is the only major European city without an underground, and on that basis alone I suppose we should build one. After all, it is important that the front windows and doors of the house should be well painted even though the walls are cracked and the floors and roof are caving in?

  18. Q: What is more important? Our children or a fucking underground railway?

    A: Neither. It’s US!!

  19. Bock – Jayzus! We have to look after our children. Who else is going to support us in our old age?

  20. Clarification: I meant that Fianna Fáil takes precedence over everything.

    That’s the danger with irony. Sometimes you fuck it up.

  21. What was that thing Thomas Jefferson said… Oh yea, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”
    We have the Democrats and you have Fianna Fail.

    I’m with Jim C. I am also a veteran. I oppose a large federal gub’mint and I voted against Comrade the Messiah. With all that the current administration has labeled me a ‘right-wing extremist’ and I am to be delt with the same as any taliban terrorist.

    There is an old American saying dealing with politicians, “Throw the Bums out!”.

  22. A lot of Americans are veterans. Its been US internal policy since WWII to make sure to have both a massive prison population and a standing army of over 2 million. It helps to keep unemployment down and justifies the massive defence spending boondoggles for the military defence industry and kickbacks from private contractors to politicians for letting them build more private jails.

    Strange place- billions spent on jails and stuffing foie gras down Gubernatorial necks but it is regarded as communist to build and staff a hospital for those who can’t pay for healthcare for kids and the elderly.

    Land of the Expensive. And don’t bother with the redneck republican response. My brother is also a vet from the US military and my sister in law is currently serving in the Middle East.

  23. Apologies Grandad I got sidetracked by Chip n’ Dale referring to their own President as a Comrade Messiah.

    That would be the chap that came from a food-stamp background, studied and gained a place at university in Chicago where he arrived with so little money that he had to sleep out one night to save paying for a hotel room. The same chap who went on to become President of the Harvard Law Review through his own efforts and the rest is history.

    It would appear that the very epitome of the American Dream is now somehow ‘communist’.

    What part of the services did Chip n Dale serve in I wonder? It was unlikely to have been Military Intelligence. And I wonder when they say ‘Vet’ do they mean they actually served in war zone or a truck depot outside Shikticker, Illinois?

    Don’t really want to start any flames here Grandad so I’ll leave it if either Chip or Dale starts with the Rumsfeld garbage.

  24. Dear Captain Kook,
    I get a chuckle out of your extensive, indepth knowledge of the American situation today. Does it come from the BBC or maybe Sky News?
    I would discuss this with you but I was taught never to fight with an unarmed man.
    🙂

  25. Captain – Please ignore Brianf [Chip n’ Dale. Heh!]. He is quite harmless really and a nice bloke underneath it all. He is just completely misguided about a lot of things, included American politics. I have to be nice to him as a) we are both members of the same gun club [yes – seriously!!] and b) he is my arms dealer.

    Brianf – Behave yourself.

Hosted by Curratech Blog Hosting