Category: Government

O'Donoghue: Stupid, angry and embittered

According to RTE reporter David-Davin Power, John O’Donoghue gave a fine speech. The Nine News described the speech as a spirited defence.

I disagree; it was nothing more than an angry, dishonest and embittered rant. O’Donoghue blamed civil servants, the media, the system, administrative errors and the Opposition while heaping praise upon himself.

His pathetic excuse for releasing details of his expenses incurred during his time as Ceann Comhairle on the same day as the referendum is an insult to all intelligent Irish citizens.

Given the massive publicity and media frenzy that had attended the disclosure of my expenses as minister I assumed the same would occur in relation to the costs incurred as Ceann Comhairle.

I believed this would have been a distraction to the Irish public when matters of profound importance to the future of this country were the subject of a referendum.

In my view it was best to have that referendum decided on its individual political merits and that’s why I waited until Friday 2nd October.

I did not attempt to bury the information in other events as some have suggested.

This bizarre excuse is an indication of O’Donoghue’s stupidity. He is, in effect, saying that he buried the information so that voters wouldn’t be distracted while at the same time denying he buried the information.

O'Donoghue: The political class still don't get it

Willie O’Dea’s reaction to John O’Donoghue’s forced resignation was exactly what we have come to expect from this hypocritical Fianna Fail backwoodsman.

I detest people who talk out of both sides of their mouths.

Fianna Fail Senator Ned O’Sullivan was no better. He predictably attacked the media for their ‘lurid’ reporting on O’Donoghue and called on politicians, who are now living in fear of the media, to fight back (Today with Pat Kenny, Thursday).

Fine Gael TD Leo Varadkar also attacked the media and petulantly reminded the nation that he could have made more money by remaining in medicine (Prime Time).

Varadkar’s comments are a reminder that the expenses scam involves all political parties.

Brian Lenihan angrily attacked Eamon Gilmore for his unacceptable actions in bringing down the Ceann Combhairle.

I don’t think it was a good day for Irish politics.

What all these politicians have in common is arrogance and denial. The expenses scam that they put in place results in millions being robbed from taxpayer’s every year either through legal corruption or legal fraud.

The Taxes Consolidation Act 1997 permits TDs to legally defraud the State. An accountant quoted in the Irish Independent gives the following example of how this scam might operate.

A politician can take a train from, say, the Ceann Comhairle’s constituency of South Kerry that costs €72 and make an unvouched claim for three one-way road journeys to Dublin and collect €531, leaving a tax-free profit of €441.

I wonder does Minister Lenihan think that it was a good day for Irish politics when this banana republic legislation was introduced by his party?

Gilmore – Impossible to be principled within a corrupt system

The only way to understand political events in Ireland is to be aware that the entire system is intrinsically corrupt. Once that understanding is in place everything falls into place, once that fact is understood and accepted, puzzlement disappears. The O’Donoghue scandal is a case in point.

O’Donoghue was doing what practically every politician has been doing for decades – working a system set up by politicians for the benefit of politicians and faithfully operated by loyal civil servants. The corrupt expenses system is part of the corrupt political system and the corrupt political system is part of a national corruption that has diseased every level of Irish society.

That’s why opposition politicians ignored the O’Donoghue scandal for so long; they’re part of the system. When the pressure became too much one of them, Eamon Gilmore, broke ranks in an attempt to distance himself and his party from the fallout and, at the same time, earn some brownie points.

Only the politically ignorant will be fooled by Gilmore’s stunt. If he genuinely had the interests of citizens at heart he would have acted to end the expenses scam years ago. Instead, he and his party colleagues work the system with the same gusto as most other political parties.

For so long as everyone operating the corrupt system plays by the rules there’s no problem. But if an honest politician appears on the scene (to date, this has never happened) or a crisis triggers a panic as happened in this case then things begin to fall apart.

This was clear on Today with Pat Kenny (Wed) when Conor Lenihan, in an attempt to hang Eamon Gilmore, effectively admitted that the system is rotten.

Lenihan put an end to Gilmore’s high sounding (fake) words by simply asking him why Pat Rabbitte, Labour’s representative on the Oireachtas Commission, never objected to O’Donoghue’s expenses or the appointment of a political advisor to the Ceann Comhairle.

Gilmore spluttered and waffled but was unable to provide an explanation.

When politicians, who happily and without scruples operate all their working lives within a corrupt system, suddenly become principled, their hypocrisy is inevitably going to be exposed by their former co-conspirators.

Good riddence O'Donoghue

John O’Donoghue is gone and good riddance. No doubt we’re now going to be subjected to a tidal wave of hypocritical cant from the usual elements of the body politic and media.

He was a good man, he served his country well, we must think of his family, he was brought down by the mob; the media were out to get him blah, blah, blah.

And of course there will be at least one journalist who will make the nonsensical, but by now standard, accusation that – we’re all to blame.

The truth is always simple – John O’Donoghue has joined a long list of Fianna Fail politicians, including Bertie Ahern, who have betrayed their country for their own greedy ends.

Lenihan and Fianna Fail have all the answers

Some recent comments by Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan.

On the Rody Molly scandal:

Salaries paid to public officials are unsustainable; they are overpriced arrangements which are being reviewed.

The Minister didn’t say if his own salary or that of his party leader would be part of the review.

On public anger and the media:

People had to get over their anger to make progress. I despair at times at the standard of public discourse about our current difficulties.
The reluctance of some commentators to grapple with the arguments, to go beyond the loaded cliché and the populist jibe, does a real disservice to the public.

Clearly the Minister is unhappy about the standards of intelligence and responsibility outside of the body politic.

On the referendum result:

What I saw in this debate is a growing realisation among the people that junk economics and junk politics from far-left politicians are not going to solve any of our problems.

It’s reasonable to assume the Minister thinks that his corrupt, greedy, arrogant and unaccountable party holds the answer to all our problems.

Predictable result – consequences later

As I predicted last November the referendum was passed by a large majority.

Of course, it didn’t take genius to make such a prediction as people will understandably take the safe option when immediate danger presents itself.

The consequence of the decision will only become evident years into the future when, for example, our politicians are casually sending Irish citizens off to war with the words ‘but you voted yes’ ringing in their ears.

Corruption, ignorance and political naivity will see Fitzpatrick off the hook

Green Party leader and Minister for the Environment, John Gormley was crystal clear on how the Government is going to deal with Sean Fitzpatrick (Six One News, 6th report).

He will be pursued for every penny and I’m very confident that the Minister for Finance will do that. He will not spare Mr. Fitzpatrick and I don’t think the Irish people would accept that.

These are not the words of a clear minded politician with the best interests of his country at heart.

They’re the words of a man who operates within a corrupt system of government saying what he has to say because he foolishly believes that the implementation of his party’s agenda is more important than the rooting out of the disease of corruption.

As in all previous cases of a similar kind the corrupt political and administrative system will make arrangements to ensure that Sean Fitzpatrick suffers little or no loss.

The Irish taxpayer will be forced to pay most if not all of his liabilities and, despite what Gormley says, they will accept it because the great bulk of Irish citizens ignorantly labour under the delusion that power comes from above rather than from below.

Copy to:
John Gormley

Government, judiciary and corruption

Section four of the Transparency International Ireland debate entitled ‘Restoring trust in Ireland Inc’ focused on possible corrupt links between the judiciary and government.

Journalist Justine McCarthy didn’t mince her words.

I think corruption of the law in this country is at the root of most of our problems.

She went on to give just a few examples of how the law ‘operates’ in Ireland including how lawyers regularly lie in court, how legal firms like Arthur Cox become involved in conflicts of interest. For example, advising the Government on NAMA while at the same time advising the banks.

There was some discussion about RTEs habit of caving in to government (legal) pressure on a whole range of issues. Host, Karen Coleman, suggested there should be an investigation into this matter.

Ms. Coleman is right but who could be trusted to conduct such an investigation into the two most powerful information (propaganda) outlets in the country – the judiciary?

Sean Fitzpatrick will never be charged

Brian Lenihan was asked on Prime Time why it was taking so long to see results from investigations into Anglo Irish Bank when the US authorities could charge, convict and send Bernie Madoff in six months.

He said he was frustrated that bankers haven’t been jailed yet, that there was a massive ongoing police investigation and he was confident that investigation would yield results.

The Minister is talking total, absolute, undiluted waffle. Let me repeat once again – nobody will be charged never mind face a jail sentence as a result of what went on at Anglo Irish Bank.

The so called ‘investigation’ is nothing more than the by now well established state strategy of delaying matters until the whole case can be quietly dropped.

The so called financial regulatory system that has long facilitated and protected the scumbags who infest the Irish banking sector is still in place.

The same attitudes, the same strategies, the same secrecy laws are still there and will be used to protect Fitzpatrick and his cronies.

Only a complete clean out of personnel and a revolutionary reform of the system will see standards come anywhere close to international norms. There is not the slightest indication that such reform is in the pipeline.

We can see that nothing has changed by simply analysing a recent report in the Sunday Independent on the Anglo Irish Bank investigation.

The many anonymous ‘sources’ quoted in the article are obviously government sources.

Sources (Garda) say they will not be in a position to make arrests and seek charges until next year at the earliest, because of the complexities of the case.

Sources say there’s a massive amount of paper and electronic documents to be examined so don’t expect any developments this side of Christmas.

So, very complex, mountains of documents to examine. The source didn’t specify which Christmas.

Gardai rejected comparisons with the Bernie Madoff case which saw him in jail after only six months. They point out that Madoff had been intermittently under investigation since the mid 1990s.

This is a pathetic attempt to convince that there’s nothing odd about Irish state and police investigations; that our standards are on a par with any country.

This is rubbish and the Madoff comparison is ridiculous. There had been a number of probes into the activities of Madoff which went nowhere but as soon as substantial evidence became available the police acted immediately and Madoff was put under immediate arrest.

There was immediate and clear evidence of wrong doing in the Anglo Irish case but instead of arrest Fitzpatrick was allowed to head off for a month on a golfing holiday in South Africa. Nearly a year later and we’re still waiting for the Gardai to bring him, or anybody, in for questioning.

The thrust of the Garda investigation is to gather sufficient proof to convince the Director of Public Prosecutions that there was “intent” on the part of Anglo Irish staff to commit offences and not, as they would argue, that there was simple incompetence.

Translation: It’s going to be extremely difficult to convince the Director of Public Prosecutions that anything illegal occurred. The DPP is answerable to nobody, his decisions cannot be questioned and he usually takes a number of years to decide in cases like this.

This is usually the point where all possibility of criminal charges is abandoned and the case is handed over to the safe house of Office of Corporate Enforcement where it will be allowed to harmlessly enter history.

With a total of only 65 investigators in the Fraud Bureau and the emphasis on the Anglo Irish investigation, sources say the bureau is under pressure to complete other high-profile fraud investigations.

They are also “completely snowed under” with credit card and other equally complex computer and internet frauds. The amount of fraud under investigation is so great that cases involving less than €200,000 have been temporarily sidelined, according to one source.

Translation: We would really love to press charges in the Anglo Irish case but unfortunately we just don’t have the resources.

A legal source told the Sunday Independent that the public’s expectation that those identified as being involved in alleged illegality in Anglo Irish should be arrested quickly was “unrealistic”.

He pointed out that fraud cases were notoriously complicated and the Gardai would only move to arrests when they had completed their case, proved intent and already had guidance from the Director of Public Prosecutions.

Translation: The public are stupid and don’t understand that fraud investigations can be very complicated. The public are asked to ignore the fact that most other jurisdictions regularly prosecute fraudsters quickly and efficiently.

There is also relatively little experience here in investigating large-scale share manipulation. The largest case involving alleged share fixing to come before the courts was that of the DCC disposal of shares in Fyffes in 2000.

In fact, there is no experience whatsoever of investigating large-scale or even small-scale share manipulation in Ireland. The Irish Stock Exchange has never in its entire history prosecuted anybody.

We don’t even know if the ISE has ever investigated anybody because, like the Financial Regulator, it operates under an iron curtain of secrecy laws.

The Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement never prosecuted, sources say, because the case would have had no certainty of success and would have “swallowed up all their resources” and would have faced a well-financed legal defence.

Prosecutions in the Fyffes/DCC case should have been taken by the Financial Regulator, the ISE and the Gardai – they did nothing. The case was left with the ODCE because his office has virtually no powers and operates on a pathetic budget of €5.5 million.

As I’ve said before the ODCE is nothing more than a safe house for dodgy people like Flavin where their cases are practically guaranteed to gather dust for years.

Gardai say they expect that well-resourced legal defences will be mounted in any cases arising from Anglo Irish.

Again, this is a standard marker that concern for taxpayer’s money may be used as an excuse for doing nothing.

Let me state once again – Neither Sean Fitzpatrick nor any of his cronies will ever be prosecuted; they will never be sent to jail.

Copy to:
Minister for Finance
Financial Regulator
ODCE
ISE

Refusing to talk

Aer Lingus has refused to say if disgraced banker, Sean Fitzpatrick, availed of free flights on the airline (Irish Independent).

Aer Lingus has refused to give details of other directors who may have availed of the perk.

Aer Lingus has refused to give details about a Gold Circle club which allows members to relax in exclusive airport lounges while waiting for flights. (Bizarre isn’t it – An official golden circle does actually exist)

Transport Minister Noel Dempsey has refused to defend the taxpayer’s interests in Aer Lingus only managing to limply mouth that he was “sure” the perks were under review.

Fitzpatrick, who has refused to answer questions on the Anglo Irish Bank scandal, and is also refusing to make any comment on this matter contemptuously informed the nation.

I don’t talk to the media.