Ireland becoming the 51st state – some kind of Joaquin Phoenix-style prank

Pointing out the comprehensive lunacy of members of the banking industry these days is like coming back from a salmon barrel-shoot with a bountiful cargo, but amongst the highly inflated dime-a-dozen madness one banker’s claim earlier in the week stood out like a sore thumb that was broken because of late debt payments.

Michael Soden, former Bank of Ireland Chief and current Central Bank adviser, has been showing the kind of ingenious thinking that made Ireland’s financial enterprises the envy of the world by advocating, wait for it, Ireland leaving the EU and possibly becoming the 51st state of the U.S. Wow, someone give that man a medal. Preferably not The Charlemagne Prize though.

Part of me hopes this is some kind of Joaquin Phoenix-type pisstake, or some desperate histrionic attempt to flog the book he’s just penned. But then I realise that not only are bankers much more predisposed to the realm of mind-boggling fantasy than satirical humour, shy of claiming the secret to eternal youth is printed just below the publishing info nobody would dream of buying the thing anyway. So, unlike NAMA, I’m choosing to take the value of the comments at face value.

Soden opines that Ireland’s hands are tied by the EU and if Europe can’t find a solution that “accommodate(s) the needs of the Irish electorate, should we look elsewhere”. Interesting theory, though the needs of the Irish electorate are to dole out a battering that hasn’t been administered in four years. And Ireland’s hands are tied - such as it is – because Ireland is in such a bad financial state (because of people like him) that we have the largest deficit in the Union, four times the EU limit. And if Ireland did go the way of Greece, it’d be German taxpayers ruefully though dutifully paying the bill. Ireland was the architect of its own downfall, the EU are the recovery team.

He doesn’t stop there: “Our membership of Europe has to have balance in all aspects, particularly in relation to our culture, our sovereignty and the price we pay for economic and financial independence. Have we unwittingly surrendered these precious aspects of our society as the price of European Union membership?”

No, Michael, we have not. Back in 2001 around the time of the SSIA scheme launch the other 14 European finance ministers thought Charlie McCreevy’s economic policies were so insane that all he was missing was a white coat, a streak of unruly grey hair and a maniacal laugh, but it didn’t stop him pursuing them. Regarding sovereignty, the EU isn’t some hostage-taking cabal run by Alan Rickman and his brother Jeremy Irons, it’s the sum of its national parts. And for all the threats we’ve heard over the years Ireland has yet to be dragooned to service in a European Super Army or forced to legalize abortion. Though I will concede that the EU and its precursors did force our hand on some issues our own governments didn’t really want to go near, unconscionable things like paying women the same as men and decriminalizing homosexuality. The tyrannical bastards.

As for Europe’s role in our cultural erosion, I haven’t the faintest idea what people who say that mean exactly. Irish is an official language of the EU and you can find books and documents as gaeilge in Brussels with ease. They also fund thousands of community programs, international cultural exchanges and cross-border cooperation projects. There are myriad youth and community groups, organizations of incalculable value who would simply not exist without either the Youth In Action budget or the various stages of Peace funding.

It’s also worth stating that according to last year’s figures while the US is Ireland’s main export partner at about 21%, the next on the list is Belgium, on around 18%. Belgium is a country the size of Maryland with a population slightly higher than Michigan. But I’m sure if we were to switch sides, Governors O’Malley and Granholm could pick up the slack. And not to disappoint those who beat their chest or wave the flag decrying the loss of our independence, but prior to the EU we were practically reliant on trade with Perfidious Albion. I’ve heard it suggested brave old Ireland was better off before joining the EEC in 1973. We really weren’t.
But hey, maybe I’m being too hasty. Let’s consider part two of Soden’s bullet-proof plan, becoming the 51st state of the union:

“The possible consequences of political and economic association with the US would be a massive influx of foreign direct investment, a link to the US dollar, a reduction in unemployment, and who knows, maybe an annual payment for a number of years to get our finances back in balance.”

True, nothing asserts national sovereignty like joining another country. Apart from the fact if we joined the US it wouldn’t really be foreign direct investment anymore, it’s a very compelling case. After all, unemployment in the States is basically zero, and North Dakota can devalue the dollar unilaterally whenever it likes to stay competitive. I especially like the idea of the annual payment. If only there was some kind of continental union within Europe that provided structural funding of some kind to help us build up our infrastructure. Wishful thinking I guess.

Of course one section who wouldn’t like joining the US are politicians. Given Ireland has about the same population as Alabama, that means only seven congressmen/women, two senators and a governor at the top level. A lot of TD’s are going to be out of a job. Even Barack Obama would have trouble with the idea, as although he could rely on Ireland to vote heavily Democratic in election years, our Blue Dog stance on some issues would cause him a few headaches during congressional votes. Besides, it would totally take away our exotic allure.

The sad truth is that the origin of Ireland’s central corrosive problems are to be found much closer to home. The EU didn’t compel Charles Haughey to borrow an eighth of AIB’s annual income in the seventies, or take money from any businessman who’d indulge him. The EU didn’t compel TD’s to open Ansbacher accounts. The EU didn’t compel Michael Lowry to let Ben Dunne pay for house renovations, or Ivor Callely to fiddle his expenses by claiming he’d officially moved to west Cork even though his website claimed (and still claims) that he lives in north central Dublin. And the EU sure as hell didn’t compel the top brass of our banking sector to think they could do whatever the hell they liked, whenever the hell they liked. Or for our government to appoint the more insane amongst them as an adviser to the Central Bank.

The EU might be terribly easy to complain about, but if Ireland left it in the morning and found traveling to Paris or the Algarve much harder, texts and calls much more expensive while over there or medical expenses costing an arm and/or a leg if God forbid you got in trouble, then those complaints would be ten times louder. And not for nothing, but if you did shun the EU and decided to holiday at home, it’s because of the European Blue Flag program that our beaches are as impressive as they are.

Ireland’s connections to the US are as valuable as they are historic and long may that stay the same, but to suggest we’d be better off without Europe is as churlish it is childish.

Return to the economic woes of 1992 could mean a cosmic do-over for Ireland

Election literature - Dick Spring

The more I think of it, the more it makes sense: Ireland has obviously found some kind of wormhole in the timeline a la “The Twilight Zone”.

Consider this submission for your approval: Unemployment so high it’s getting vertigo; a rickety, Fianna Fáil coalition led by a deeply unpopular midlander staring down the barrel of an unseemly end; a Fine Gael party bedevilled by their unfashionable leader; while Labour make unprecedented gains in the polls, absorbing disaffected independents from all directions and looking forward to enormous gains in constituencies were previously James Connolly himself would’ve struggled to get half a quota.

Yes folks, it’s 1992 all over again.

With the benefit of hindsight we now know that 1992 was the high water mark of misery in what had been an extended period of chastened economic woe, but from then on things got steadily better: unemployment went down, investment went up and, mirabile dictu, governments even ran budget surpluses.

As many great things happened in the years following ’92 as ruddy awful things happened in the last two years, awfulness precipitated by the astounding hubris of the notion that the past was another country, never to be re-visited. It wasn’t. But, as the indicators seem to be suggesting, the political gods are offering a second chance, a cosmic do-over of sorts. The parties would do well to make the most of it.

The party with the most to gain and the most to learn is undoubtedly Labour. After the election of November ’92, Dick Spring’s tide engulfed 33 seats in the Dáil chamber, over double what they’d had previously. But after election night things went downhill: Labour’s gain had been Fine Gael’s emphatic loss, and the two old coalition partners could only muster 78 between them, five shy of a Dáil majority. With Labour’s reluctance to bring the Progressive Democrats into the equation and John Bruton’s hostility toward the Democratic Left, Spring’s ambition of getting a turn as Taoiseach was looking bleak. So, Labour did the unthinkable and turned to Fianna Fáil, who were holding out hope they would and had studiously prepared for such an eventuality.

Fianna Fáil and Labour formed a government in January 1993 that was touted to last well into the next century but Labour and Spring, who had won said 33 seats on the premise of radical change and hoisting Fianna Fáil from office, paid a heavy price.

Pilloried in the media and trounced in subsequent by-elections, Labour readily jumped ship in December 1994 following the bungled extradition of the paedophile priest Brendan Smyth, and following a shift in the numbers game were able to form government with Fine Gael and the Democratic Left after all. While it was one of the more stable and successful governments the country has ever seen, the voters’ memory was sufficiently long to see Labour’s representation halved at the next election. Eamon Gilmore would do well to seek the counsel of Spring following the results of the next election. Or failing that, read Christopher Marlowe’s “Dr. Faustus”.

Fine Gael too have lessons to learn. It was patently clear from early on in his leadership of the party that Bruton was thoroughly unelectable as Taoiseach, and polls repeatedly had him miles behind the popularity of Dick Spring prior to the election. There were even suggestions that Bruton make way for a more palatable cross-party leader, suggestions he flatly rebuffed. All of this was compounded by his unilateral calls for coalition government without consulting his prospective partners and obstinate and haughty attitude to sharing power with the ex-Stickies in the Democratic Left, an attitude he’d have to shelve two years hence. Even when Labour went into government he couldn’t convert what should have been a slam dunk in terms of political point scores, and hobbled on as leader after an attempted heave in early 1994, demoting some talented dissenters in the process. That he found himself as Taoiseach at all was as much a surprise to him as anyone else. As it turns out, he was unelectable as Taoiseach, as his was the only government not formed following an election, and he failed to win a second term in 1997.

Enda Kenny’s story is remarkably similar to Bruton’s, if a bit more hapless and a bit less capable, and his zero-tolerance approach to working with Sinn Féin may be one he has to revisit if things don’t quite go the plan at the next election. If he’s still in charge by then.

For Fianna Fáil, the picture is a bit more bleak: the best they can hope for is control their damage for next time round and elect a conciliatory leader to replace Cowen, Micheal Martin would be ideal. But Fianna Fáil is the nation’s default setting and history has proven that if they keep quiet on the opposition benches for a while, pretend the last few years didn’t happen and elect a likeable leader, or at least someone difficult to hate, then all manner of sins will be forgiven. Fine Gael and Labour have to be much more careful. For the Greens, it’s bleaker still. Prayer can only do so much.

The next election, as it was in ’92, is an open goal for the opposition. If Labour maintain a principled stance at the point of impasse and if Fine Gael sort out their leadership woes before they encounter another round of stonewalling deals they’ll later rue or making lone runs they’re incapable of, they might just convert it this time. Whether all concerned do things differently once they’re in power next time around is much harder to predict.

Irish nostalgia lovers in for treat with 'Reeling in the Years' - SEE VIDEO

Care to take a guess what the big talking point is in my circle of friends this week? It’s not the repeated calls for political consensus by Environment Minister John Gormley (mainly because most people can see it as the master class in fig leaf couture that it is), or the fact that apparently a third of Irish people in their mid-twenties are driven loco by the fact they’re still living with their parentis (we try not to dwell on that one). It’s not even the depressing realisation that, after seeing "Ferris Bueller’s Day Off" on the TV this week, my father was roughly the same age as I am when the film was released (I have to confess, that one is all mine). In actual fact, the big, preoccupying story this week is the return of "Reeling in the Years".

In TV terms, only episodes of "Mad Men" featuring Trudy Campbell come anywhere near close to matching the excitement I’m currently feeling.

For the uninitiated, "Reeling" is an historical documentary series, a popular culture travelogue documenting life, politics, attitudes and sport through a very Irish lens. The idea and execution thereof is simple, but incredibly effective. Using only archive footage (and occasionally pregnant pauses), contemporary music chosen with clever precision and a few explanatory sentences rolling across the bottom third throughout, Reeling In The Years has profiled every year from 1962 (the year after the national broadcaster Teilifís Éireann came into being) to 1999, with the new series beginning this Sunday bringing us right up to date.

The show has been an unmitigated success for RTÉ, receiving universal plaudits, becoming the staple of many a summer afternoon’s viewing and a scheduler’s dream, as it’s habitually in the top ten of most watched programmes in any given week it’s shown. Such is its popularity that they had to had to reverse their initial decision not to release DVD’s of the show (because procuring the rights of external archives and music for such a venture is a job so stressful and expensive it’d make Hercules weep) and released two slightly amended compilations of the 80’s and 90’s. The compelling mix of a bullet-proof format, nostalgia and learning by stealth has made "Reeling in the Years" not only the national social studies class, but the national common denominator.

While the proximity to the events profiled will be much closer than previous series, the rate at which things have changed in Ireland even over the last 24 months will have given the producers more than enough scope to use their trademark retrospective tongue in cheek humour and penchant for finding clips of statements that proved wry prescience, the most infamous example being Charles Haughey claiming he’d “keep a little something for myself” in response to being asked what he’d do if he won the newly launched National Lottery, accompanied by Wet Wet Wet’s “Wishing I was Lucky”.

So while it’ll be interesting to see how stories fresh in the mind are dealt with, even more interesting will be the memories evoked by big events long since buried, like the Y2K bug, the ban on smoking, the infamous nude painting of Brian Cowen or, God forbid, the Saipan debacle of the 2002 World Cup. Opening those wounds again could precipitate a second civil war.

But whatever the new series shows and however is shows it, Ireland will be watching attentively.

It will be available internationally on http://www.rte.ie/player

'Ireland's Greatest' series illustrates Ireland's lack of leadership figures

RTÉ television is currently half way through their “Ireland’s Greatest” series, a search to find the most outstanding Irish citizen ever. The series is comprised of five documentaries fronted by the advocates of the respective candidates: Michael Collins, James Connolly, John Hume, Mary Robinson and, eh, Bono. All those names are of course pretty remarkable in their respective ways, but the list as a whole is even moreso. Not one of those greats have actually led the country.

Big Mick certainly would have had he not been killed in what are even now contentious circumstances, so his legacy as a leader can only be extrapolated. James Connolly too died before he could exert any influence on the institutions of power. John Hume never held a government posting after briefly being Minister for Commerce in the ill-fated Northern Ireland executive of the early seventies, while Mary Robinson’s role as President was largely honorific. Bono sang "Mysterious Ways".

Not only that, but the candidates are, apart from all belonging to the most recent corner of history, largely left-leaning figures, and not one of them were members of Fianna Fáil, the party that has run the country for about three out of every four year since they formed. Irish voters, as the old Peronist maxim goes, signal left and turn right.

The discrepancy between who we like in theory and who we vote for in practice is enormous. As it stands, the Dáil is inhabited by an unseemly amount of mini Boss Tweeds and souped-up county councillors who aren’t fit to hold Mary Robinson’s briefcase. TD’s so backbench they’re in constant danger of getting nosebleeds or falling off the edge, who’ll vote for health cuts in Dublin and attend rallies about how important the local hospital is back home. And yet, these people get elected time and time again, because they’re Great Local Men. They tend not to be women.

Now granted, every country has their parochial interests and loony-toon members of parliament sent to the capital by their constituents for no other reason than it beats having them at home, but in Ireland the respectability deficit lamentably goes all the way to the top. Since they’ve taken over, Taoiseach and Tánaiste Brian Cowen and Mary Coughlan may as well have done their business in quick-motion accompanied by ragtime music, such has been their disastrous administration. As they stumble from one unforced embarrassment to another and preoccupied by market confidence in the country, they’re either unaware or uninterested in the fact that the country lost confidence in them ages ago. The previous occupant of Cowen’s office Bertie Ahern, a modern day Emperor with new clothes if ever there was one, can currently be seen in a universally-derided TV ad for a tabloid newspaper offering sports tips from a kitchen cupboard. The opposition Fine Gael should have an unassailable lead in the polls but are being held back by Enda Kenny, who while a decent man is much less leadership timber than flat pack furniture.

This isn’t an “It was better in the olden days”, fadó fadó thing either. The abiding memory of John Bruton is acting like Wayne and Garth at an Alice Cooper concert when Prince Charles visited Ireland. Albert Reynolds always looked like the right answer in an odd one out competition when pictured with world leaders. Liam Cosgrave, our angriest and most stubborn Taoiseach, once claimed he hoped the Israelis and Palestinians settle their differences along Christian principles. Charles Haughey, though easier on the world stage than most, saw himself as more of a Renaissance Prince.

Of course we have had leaders of gravitas and international renown over the years like Lemass or Lynch or FitzGerald, but Garret 'The Good' left office 23 years ago, and we haven’t really had a good one since.

Ireland’s reputation around the world has taken such a battering of late that we can’t really afford many more years without some inspiring leadership, to say nothing of all the other things we can’t afford.

When Barack Obama was inaugurated nearly two years ago, nations the world over wondered out loud if they had such a figure amongst them. I’ve no doubt that we have a few potential Baracks somewhere, the shortlist of Ireland’s Greatest proves we can produce those kinds of people. We just need to get better at voting for them.