Re-Generation Ireland

I haven’t had time to update this lately, but thanks to a chuckle-worthy comment from someone over at forum.ucc.ie it reminded me. More fool them really. I stopped writing here mostly as I got into Friday morning debates via ‘The Week that Was‘ on Cork Campus Radio with members of Fianna Fáil, Labour, the-party-formerly-known-as-the-PDs-but-now-the-Irish-Liberals, Sinn Féin and Fine Gael. Quicker than writing away here for the most part.

This blog has taken a back seat also as I’ve spent more time writing for papers like the Echo, the Sunday Business Post, and even got a mention in the Irish Sun. The Evening Echo in Cork paid me some of what they owe me, which is nice of them- a day before the Festive Secular Holidays!

I’ve spent a lot of September-December reading the current affairs and economics of NAMA (thank you IrelandAfterNama) and Budget 2010. The Murphy Report has utterly crashed all over Ireland’s social foundations and might just be the flood needed to force a drift between the Catholic Church and the State. I’ve no qualms with the Church getting decoupled from Irish society, it is well overdue.

The Green Party Conference came and went. Stag hunting policies kept a hopelessly disliked and inept government alive for perhaps another 10months. Honestly, its a mockery. Fees were ‘kept off the adgenda’ for the meantime dependent on ‘budgetary constraints‘, but I’ve a tenner riding on the idea that the Registration Fee is going up.

And the Unions and strikes… well I just do not know what to do about them. I think the Unions were wrong, but not for what the media are spinning out. I think they were wrong to enter a negotiation process. Most people believed there would not be a deal, in fact members of UNITE told me early in the talks that the Government were determined to cut pay and that was the bottom line. The Unions should have gone on general strike until a concrete set of economic proposals were accepted into 2010. They broke neither the media’s bias towards protecting the rich elite (as elaborated by Fintan O’ Toole and Vincent Browne), nor the Government’s fragile political situation. If anything, because of them being perceived as being ‘beaten’ they have contributed to this emasculation of the savagery of Budget 2010 and lent more credence to Brian Cowen’s authority in Government. For that, I think they are dopes.

2010 is going to be an interesting year. Ireland is without any doubt in the middle of the greatest social upheaval since its foundation in the early 1900s. The Left and the Progressives are going to hopefully look at 2010 as the year to rebuild, formulate a response and enter the fray of the media world with their own agenda. If Rage Against the Machine can get No.1 in Ireland and the UK against the corporate machine headed by Simon Cowell (a man more liked than Brian Cowen!), I see no reason why the activists in Ireland cannot rally around a common banner.

I know some of us are. Solidarity this holiday season with Sinn Féin and our comrades the SDLP in the North of Ireland.

And unless you’ve been under a rock this last month I’ve been outed as running for UCC SU President. I am, and let me tell you I am very serious about winning.

Nollig Shona daoibh!