Labour Party: The unvarnished truth

Prior to 2016 election
After the 2016 election

By Anthony Sheridan

Writing in the Irish Times recently about the continuing decline of the Labour Party, historian Diarmaid Ferriter asks:

Is there really much difference between the Labour Party and the Social Democrats and would it not make sense for them to coalesce?

The same question has been asked many times by journalists and politicians since the people effectively rejected the party in the 2016 election.  The question is always advanced as a possible strategy for rescuing Labour from extinction.

That mainstream journalists and politicians would scramble around looking for strategies to save the party is not surprising but it is disappointing to witness a prominent historian engaging in the same hopeless delusion when he really should know the answer.

So, for Mr. Ferriter’s benefit and other’s hoping that, by some miracle, the Labour Party can be saved – here’s the unvarnished truth.

The Labour Party is heading for extinction because it is, first and foremost, a loyal member of the ruling political class.  A large and increasing number of voters have come to realise that the party does not represent their interests and vote accordingly.  Election results do not lie, the brutal political reality is out there for everybody to see. 

Also, in recent years, particularly since the economic catastrophe of 2008, more and more voters have come to realise that the political establishment itself is rotten to the core.

The people have delivered the same message in every recent election – a demand for radical political change.  Labour, instead of answering that call, has doggedly remained loyal to the corrupt political regime that the electorate is rejecting in their droves.

And this is where the difference between the Labour Party and the Social Democrats crystalises, this is what Mr. Ferriter should know. 

The Social Democrats are anti-establishment, they were created as a direct result of political corruption within the establishment.  The party’s raison d’être is to rid the state of the disease of political corruption that has infected the body politic for decades.

If the Social Democrats was to merge with Labour they would almost certainly suffer the same fate as the Progressive Democrats.  They too came into existence in protest against political corruption, principally under the corrupt politician Haughey.  But over the years and particularly under the leadership of Mary Harney, the party returned to its rotten Fianna Fail roots.  That betrayal of hope and trust signed the party’s death warrant. 

In the run-up to the 1992 election Labour Party leader, Dick Spring convinced many, including myself, that the party was determined to represent the people rather than powerful interests. 

I was particularly impressed when Spring, most unusually, revealed the truth about a fellow ruling elite party when he accurately described Haughey and Fianna Fail’s influence on politics as ‘a cancer in the body politic’.

Shortly afterwards, Spring cravingly led Labour into coalition with the ‘cancerous’ Fianna Fail exposing the naked truth that his true loyalties lay with the power and privileges of the ruling political class and not with the people.

Mr. Ferriter, in common with all mainstream commentators is unaware of or refuses to acknowledge the truth behind the rapidly changing political landscape.  Instead of facing reality, he clutches at straws of hope for the doomed party.

Perhaps, he suggests, Labour may regain momentum if Sinn Fein suffers as a consequence of making hard decisions in government. 

That a negative performance by one party might help save Labour is as ridiculous as the idea that a positive performance of another [Social Democrats] might do the same.

The choice facing Labour is simple – remain loyal to the current dying political regime or respond to the demands of the people for radical political change by becoming a genuinely radical left wing party.

No prizes for guessing which road Ivana Bacik will take.

Humanity: Zero chance of survival

By Anthony Sheridan

Just over a century ago Europe and the world was ravaged by war [1914-1918] [Casualties: About 20 million] When the killing was done disease took its turn in the form of the Spanish flu [Casualties: 25 to 50 million]

Today, war and disease are still ravaging Europe and the world [Casualties are in the millions and mounting]

During the week the IPCC issued yet another stark truth concerning human behaviour:

The scientific evidence is unequivocal: climate change is a threat to human well-being and the health of the planet. Any further delay in concerted global action will miss a brief and rapidly closing window to secure a liveable future.

The critical words here are ‘brief and rapidly closing window’. 

So, if over a century, humans failed to end war and prevent disease, what are the chances of keeping that rapidly closing [extinction] window open?

The answer is brutally obvious – Zero.

RTE gives balance – accidentally?

By Anthony Sheridan

Irish Examiner columnist Alison O’Connor found herself all alone on Valentine’s night last. Claire Byrne/RTE had invited her to participate in a discussion on the dramatic rise in Sinn Fein’s popularity. 

As a favourite of the establishment media and strident anti-Sinn Fein commentator Ms. O’Connor probably expected that she would be joining the usual RTE anti-Sinn Fein panel.

But, amazingly, that didn’t happen, the panel was balanced and fair.  O’Connor seemed to be genuinely confused with the situation.  She began by telling the nation that, given how bad things are, even an opposition of chimpanzees would find it easy to pick it [the Government] off.

This crude and insulting political analysis was followed up with the usual tired guff about Sinn Fein being a ‘strange, cultish party’ that could cause a lot of offence if it got into power.

But then, O’Connor ran out of words. It was as if she suddenly realised that nobody was really listening to her, that they had heard it all before, and, of course they had, ad infinitum

So, in desperation, she did something that no establishment journalist has ever done before – she criticised RTE for imbalanced broadcasting.

I would say about some of the debate I heard tonight…that there was some imbalance there.  Listening to some of it you’d think we live in a banana republic and that’s not true… I think balance is important.

O’Connor was confused because by the time she joined the panel, the anti-Sinn Fein side had been routed.

Passionate, articulate Sinn Fein members backed up by others such as Martin Ward and Tony Groves dismantled every argument put by supporters of the political establishment. 

Property developer Michael Flynn’s condescending claim that people were being ‘over simplistic’ on the housing crisis, and Fine Gael TD Jennifer Carroll MacNeil’s defence of the private sector’s role in solving the crisis was torn to shreds by a well-informed opposition.

The opinions expressed by the eccentric financial advisor and failed politician Eddie Hobbes provided some light relief.  Anybody tempted to take Hobbes seriously has only to recall that after co-founding the far-right party Renua Ireland, he refused to stand for election because he was too busy with other stuff.

And then there was the Fianna Fail politician, Cllr. Briege Mac Oscar who said parties should be judged on their record.  Let’s just repeat that – a Fianna Fail politician thinks that parties should be judged on their record.  Surely, if that was true, Fianna Fail would be struggling for its very survival…oh, wait.

So what happened in that RTE studio on Valentine’s night when Ms. O’Connor, at one point, found herself all alone in her titanic struggle against the evils of Sinn Fein?

Could it be that RTE was testing out a new producer who was unaware of the station’s long-established policy of packing discussion panels with anti-Sinn Fein commentators?

Or…could it be that the national broadcaster has finally conceded that Sinn Fein is a legitimate political party and the 500,000 plus citizens who voted for the party deserve a fair hearing?

Copy to:

Alison O’Connor

Claire Byrne Live/RTE

Fintan’s pain

By Anthony Sheridan

It appears from a number of recent articles by Irish Times columnist Fintan O’Toole that he is suffering from a very special form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder [PTSD]. 

His PTSD is special because it is, apparently, only triggered by flashbacks to republican violence during the Northern Ireland conflict which ended 24 years ago. 

Fortunately, Fintan is not burdened with memories of the violence carried out by unionists and agents of the British government.

He recently expressed his anguish to Irish Times colleague Deirdre Falvey.

I can’t vote for Sinn Féin, because I remember too much stuff, that was so cruel, so inhuman. Planting bombs in cafes and pubs just to kill as many young people randomly as you possibly could. I just can’t deal with it, until they’ve dealt with it.

It seems that PTSD has also affected Fintan’s memory because, to my knowledge, the IRA never pursued a policy of blowing up as many young people as they could. The IRA did, in common with Unionists and British government agents, carry out acts of violence but the age of victims was never a specific policy.    

Cynics might say that Fintan was engaging in a strategy practiced by other less sensitive journalists of portraying Sinn Fein as evil incarnate to young voters in the hope of halting the ongoing decline in support for Fine Gael and Fianna Fail. 

Of course that just couldn’t be true because, according to Fintan, the Irish Times is the most unbiased newspaper in the entire world.  In an astonishing revelation he says:

I don’t think there’s any other journalist in the world who can say what I can say now. I’ve worked for 34 years for a newspaper, and nobody’s ever told me what to write, or what I couldn’t write. The lawyers might get involved. But an editor has never said to me, stay away from that, or we don’t agree with that, so you’re not allowed to say it. Never, ever, ever. That’s really precious. l don’t know of any of my colleagues in America or Britain who could say that, even people working for really good respectable newspapers

So, you see, nobody can accuse Fintan’s Irish Times of political manipulation because, as he says, it’s the most perfect newspaper in the whole world, a newspaper that would never, ever, ever tell a journalist what to write.

In another article Fintan again revealed the absolute torment he continues to suffer as a result of the war that ended 24 years ago when he strongly suggested that Sinn Fein TD David Cullinane shouting ‘up the Ra’ after the 2020 election could lead to renewed slaughter on the streets of Northern Ireland.

Shouting “Up the ‘Ra” is not a performance by historical re-enactors – it is a live device, primed to explode into contemporary reality.

Surely there’s no better argument for outlawing Sinn Fein, introducing internment and tearing up the Good Friday Agreement.

Ok, that would probably have the side effect of saving Fine Gael/Fianna Fail from political extinction but that would not be Fintan’s intention.  His only wish is to recover from the trauma he has suffered throughout the decades.

He wants to be in the same place as the countless thousands of actual victims who have accepted that the war is over, that Sinn Fein is not planning a return to war, that it’s ok to vote for the party. 

He longs to join with the United States of America, the United Nations, the European Union, the vast majority of citizens of the Republic, the United Kingdom, including Northern Ireland and even the British Royal family, who were direct victims of the conflict, in accepting Sinn Fein as a legitimate political party.

But Fintan can’t deal with the pain, not even after 24 years of peace, not yet – he remembers too much.

Copy to:

Fintan

RTE: Don’t mention the police investigation

By Anthony Sheridan

One of the most memorable clips from the hilarious BBC comedy Fawlty Towers involved Basil [John Cleese] upsetting a group of German diners by constantly making references to the war.

Blissfully unaware of the upset he was causing he warned staff member Polly:

Listen, don’t mention the war! I mentioned it once, but I think I got away with it.

‘Don’t mention the war’ has since become a byword for those wishing to avoid discussing embarrassing issues.

But, it seems, RTEs London correspondent Sean Whelan has never heard of it. 

Reporting on the scandal surrounding Boris Johnson, he had this to say on RTEs News at One:

He’s the only Prime minister in Europe as far as I’m aware that’s being investigated by the police and that’s just not a good look.

Here you have somebody who is making the rules for the rest of the country and the police force, the people who investigate crime, are now going to be investigating him and his immediate staff and that just looks dreadful, doesn’t it?

Bryan Dobson, immediately realising that Whelan was blissfully unaware of the embarrassing parallels between the UK prime minister under police investigation and our soon to be Taoiseach, Varadkar, also under police investigation, studiously avoided responding to such a dangerous question.

I suspect that somebody from RTE/Fianna Fail/Fine Gael has since had a word in Whelan’s ear to castigate him for being the only journalist to breach the mainstream media bias protecting Varadkar.

Copy to:

RTE News and Current Affairs

Sean Whelan

Irish media mote in the eye

By Anthony Sheridan

Here’s a quote from today’s editorial in the Irish Examiner criticising ethical standards in UK politics:

The sane, sensible and, at times, sedate manner in which politics is generally conducted in Ireland makes us ill-prepared to understand how otherwise civilised nations can tolerate the most outrageous shenanigans of their political leaders.

Here’s a reality check for this publication:

Leo Varadkar is due to become Taoiseach again within months.  He is still the subject of a criminal investigation.  There has been practically no recognition, analysis or outrage from mainstream media to this impending disgrace on our country.

In the UK, the ‘outrageous shenanigans’ of political leaders are mercilessly scrutinised and condemned.  In Ireland, mainstream media is ultra-selective about which political parties are to be condemned.

King Hammurabi: Builders law

By Anthony Sheridan

Nearly 4,000 years ago Hammurabi, king of Babylon, wrote a code of laws. 

Here’s one of his laws for builders:

If a builder constructs a house for a man but does not make it conform to specifications so that a wall then buckles, that builder shall make that wall sound using his own silver. (233)

If our government adopted this law the estimated €3.2 bn cost of the Mica redress scheme would fall on the builders responsible and not on the taxpayer.

But for that to happen the government would also have to adopt Hammurabi’s principle motive for writing his code of laws.

To prevent the strong from oppressing the weak and to see that justice is done to widows and orphans.

For so long as the current political class remain in power the weak will never receive protection from the strong.

Michael Clifford: low standards in journalism

By Anthony Sheridan

‘Please note, although this controversy occurred over a month ago and was the subject of an excellent article by Vanessa Foran, I believe the hostile reaction by mainstream media to Paddy Cosgrave’s anti-corruption campaigning deserves as much coverage as possible.’

On November 6 last, Irish Examiner journalist Michael Clifford wrote an article that can only be described as gutter journalism at its very worst.

The target of Clifford’s attack was entrepreneur and anti-corruption campaigner Paddy Cosgrave. 

Cosgrave is co-founder of the hugely successful Web Summit and used that platform at this year’s event to highlight very serious allegations of corruption against then Taoiseach Leo Varadkar. 

The allegations, published by Village Magazine, claims that Varadkar illegally leaked a confidential document related to negotiations for a new General Practitioner contract.  The allegations are so serious that Varadkar is now the subject of a criminal investigation.

Cosgrave brilliantly used the event, attended by 43,000 people from 128 countries, to expose to the world the rot that lies at the heart of Ireland’s governance. 

After projecting a giant image of the Village Magazine cover that described Mr. Varadkar as a ‘law breaker’, Cosgrave invited the whistleblower, Chay Bowes and the editor of the magazine, Michael Smith, onto the stage. 

Clifford focused his attack on Cosgrave and whistleblower Bowes.  He openly questioned Bowes integrity by comparing his courage to the guest of honour at the event, Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen.

To present the whole farrago as an introduction to Ms Haugen, a genuine, courageous whistleblower, was arguably insulting to her.

Clearly, Clifford does not believe that Bowes is a genuine whistleblower despite the fact that his revelations triggered a criminal investigation into the then prime minister of our country.  

The journalist then attacked Cosgrave by inaccurately claiming he linked the notorious activities of Weinstein and Epstein with Varadkar’s alleged crime.

Clifford wrote:

To leave open the possibility to an uninformed audience that whatever he did could be bracketed in notoriety with the activities of Weinstein and Epstein is contemptible.

Clifford then, hypocritically,  did exactly what he had just [falsely] condemned Cosgrave of doing.  He linked the notorious journalist, Gemma O’Doherty with Cosgrave’s actions.

Once upon a time, Gemma O’Doherty held a similar role in the public square before she took a sharp turn to the right. There is no reason in the world to believe that Paddy would follow her but you have to wonder what exactly he will do next.

So why the hypocrisy, why would Clifford insult and condemn one whistleblower and his supporter and praise another?

The answer, I believe, depends on who the whistleblower is and who they are exposing. 

Ms. Haugen is an American citizen, she’s an outsider.  Her whistleblowing poses no threat to those who rule the roost in Irish politics. 

But, in the eyes of an establishment journalist like Clifford, Cosgrave’s relentless and effective anti-corruption campaigning is a direct threat to the power of the ruling political class that he and his newspaper so strongly support.

And Clifford himself, helpfully, provides the evidence for the truth of this claim.

In defence of Varadkar he writes:

He [Varadkar] was stupid rather than corrupt and he may have broken the law but there was no personal gain in it for him. 

If it was just a case of stupidity on Varadkar’s part then surely we can expect the Gardai to drop their criminal investigation now that this journalist has delivered his judgement on the case? 

It also appears that Clifford does not believe that political corruption is a crime.  How else can we reconcile his view that ‘Varadkar may have broken the law but he’s not corrupt’? 

Even more bizarre, particularly for a journalist, is Clifford’s suggestion that there should be no accountability if there was no personal gain in the crime.

But Clifford doesn’t operate alone in the establishment media bubble. His boss, political editor of the Examiner, Daniel McConnell expressed similar views in defence of that other stalwart of the political establishment, Simon Coveney, during the Zappone cronyism scandal.

Coveney is not a crooked politician, McConnell told the nation adding –

The true scandal here has been Coveney and Fine Gael’s utter failure to kill this off long before now. 

Here we have a journalist, the political editor of one of the most influential newspapers in the country suggesting that the ‘killing off’ of a serious scandal involving cronyism and possible law breaking should take precedence over political accountability.

I wrote before about the disturbing malaise that’s eating away at standards in Irish journalism.  Clifford’s intemperate and biased rant is a particularly nasty example of that malaise.

Copy to:

Michael Clifford

Paddy Cosgrave

Chay Bowes

Michael Smith

Daniel McConnell

Are the wheels of justice creaking into action?

By Anthony Sheridan

On September 23 last I submitted a complaint to Cobh Gardai regarding the alleged criminal leaking of information at Cabinet table discussions.  Over the years I have submitted a number of similar complaints regarding alleged political corruption. 

I do not submit these complaints with the expectation that those suspected of corruption/criminality will face charges or even be investigated.   

Irish citizens will be painfully aware that when it comes to political corruption the wheels of justice remain rusted to the tracks.

The principal reason for submitting the complaints is to substantiate my belief that we live in a dysfunctional democracy where the rich and powerful are allowed to operate outside the law.

I was therefore surprised and delighted to get a telephone call from Cobh Gardai requesting my presence in the station to make a statement regarding the complaint. 

It would appear that somebody in Garda Headquarters has decided that the matter warrants investigation.  

Could it be that those rusty wheels are beginning to move?

Middle class revolution

By Anthony Sheridan

You’re talking absolute bullshit, journalist Larissa Nolan told economist Dan O’Brien on RTEs Brendan O’Connor Show. 

The issue was housing and O’Brien was telling the nation that house prices and rents were declining and that people should stop catastrophising everything. 

It’s astonishing that O’Brien, the chief economist with the Institute of International & European Affairs, is so ignorant of the extent and causes of the housing crisis. 

Ms. Nolan also admitted that she didn’t fully understand the underlying reasons but during the discussion she uttered two words that come into common use when a political system becomes hopelessly corrupt – treason and revolution.

Government policy on housing is tantamount to treason

Why treason, O’Connor asked in surprise?

Her reply [paraphrased]: 

Because the government has betrayed the people by ignoring their needs in favour of facilitating profit for private landlords.

She’s not the only person to hold this opinion.  Here’s Dr. Rory Hearne, Assistant Professor of Social Policy at Maynooth University:

Rising rents is Government policy, and has been since 2011, in order to attract the vulture and real estate investor funds and raise property values to benefit banks.

Ms. Nolan outlined her personal position in stark terms:

I’m in the professions, I work 52 weeks of the year and I am nowhere near to being able to buy a one bedroom apartment for me and my son, and that is wrong.  There will be a revolution on this soon if it isn’t fixed.

O’Brien, in a further demonstration of his ignorance, asked Ms. Nolan:

Why would any government who wants to win votes have a policy to make housing more expensive?

Nolan admitted she didn’t know but then, unwittingly, provided the answer:

They wanted the rents to go higher and it is now out of control and everybody’s being affected.  It didn’t matter so much when it was a certain class being affected, that’s not my view but I notice that socially…and now that it’s moving up the ladder, it’s affecting middle class people with good wages.

As Ms. Nolan says, things have got out of control.  The disease of corruption has debased the political system to such an extent that there is now only one policy – ensure that house prices and rents continue to soar in order to feed the greed of the rich few.  That policy, long inflicted on the poor, is now beginning to destroy the wealth of the middle class.

All corrupt regimes exploit and abuse the powerless poor at the bottom of the pile principally by denying basic rights and inflicting oppressive taxes. 

European aristocracies engaged in this despotism for centuries until an emerging merchant/middle class found it necessary to begin cutting off heads in order to gain power and respect.

Ms. Nolan describes herself as being ‘in the professions’.  In other words, she [accurately] sees herself as middle class.  And it is the middle class that invariably leads the people in destroying corrupt political regimes. 

When the middle class begin to [correctly] describe government as treasonous and suggest revolution as a possibility then a bout of head rolling cannot be far away.

Copy to;

Larissa Nolan

Dan O’Brien