Gilmore condemns Greens 'nothing to do with us' stance

[Gerrymanderer]

Labour Leader Eamon Gilmore has launched a major attack on the Greens "nothing to do with us stance".

He says "The Green Party is the first party to go into coalition and to say that they will accept no responsibility for anything that the government and its members do and that they will take no steps to demand acceptable minimum standards from Fianna Fail. The 'nothing to do with us' approach marks an extraordinary abdication of responsibility on the part of a party that was particularly vocal in putting the case for high standards by office holders, when it was in opposition"

Trevor Sargent defended Bertie strenously at the ploughing despite calling him "a dead man walking before the election" and the Greens vigourously distanced themselves from Patricia McKenna's call for Bertie to resign. My god they are more Fianna Fail than Fianna Fail themselves.

http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/frontp ... l?digest=1

http://www.labour.ie/press/listing/1190 ... 24240.html

[Eddiepops]

Nope, we will take 100% full responsibilities for our actions. Don't you think it's a little strange that every time FF or the PDs do something corrupt, ill advised, incompetent or morally banckrupt that the press and opposition immediately resort to "how can the Greens countenance this"? Once we start taking backhanders, fiddling with planning, etc, then by all means we should be throoughly attacked. Until then we're going to try focus on getting the things done that our reps were elected to do. Our numbers did not put FF-PD back in government, if they had I would have voted no. Time to just make the best of a bad situation!

[}IknowurbutwhatamI{]

Nope, we will take 100% full responsibilities for our actions. Don't you think it's a little strange that every time FF or the PDs do something corrupt, ill advised, incompetent or morally banckrupt that the press and opposition immediately resort to "how can the Greens countenance this"? Once we start taking backhanders, fiddling with planning, etc, then by all means we should be throoughly attacked. Until then we're going to try focus on getting the things done that our reps were elected to do. Our numbers did not put FF-PD back in government, if they had I would have voted no. Time to just make the best of a bad situation!

That's the spirit, bualadh bos .

[ibis]

Labour Leader Eamon Gilmore has launched a major attack on the Greens "nothing to do with us stance".

He says "The Green Party is the first party to go into coalition and to say that they will accept no responsibility for anything that the government and its members do and that they will take no steps to demand acceptable minimum standards from Fianna Fail. The 'nothing to do with us' approach marks an extraordinary abdication of responsibility on the part of a party that was particularly vocal in putting the case for high standards by office holders, when it was in opposition"

Har har har. Now if only (a) Labour wouldn't have done the same thing, and (b) they didn't seem afraid to actually go toe-to-toe with Bertie themselves, as opposed to trying to pick off junior coalition partners.

I worry that the strategy of focusing on the PDs as opposed to FF was seen as successful at the last election - if the problem is FF, what exactly is served by attacking everyone around them instead? If the objective is to ensure that no-one is willing to go into coalition with FF next time for fear of bad press, the problem with the strategy is that FF are unlikely to be gentle on anyone in coalition with FG either.

[Eddiepops]

Labour Leader Eamon Gilmore has launched a major attack on the Greens "nothing to do with us stance".

He says "The Green Party is the first party to go into coalition and to say that they will accept no responsibility for anything that the government and its members do and that they will take no steps to demand acceptable minimum standards from Fianna Fail. The 'nothing to do with us' approach marks an extraordinary abdication of responsibility on the part of a party that was particularly vocal in putting the case for high standards by office holders, when it was in opposition"

Har har har. Now if only (a) Labour wouldn't have done the same thing, and (b) they didn't seem afraid to actually go toe-to-toe with Bertie themselves, as opposed to trying to pick off junior coalition partners.

I worry that the strategy of focusing on the PDs as opposed to FF was seen as successful at the last election - if the problem is FF, what exactly is served by attacking everyone around them instead? If the objective is to ensure that no-one is willing to go into coalition with FF next time for fear of bad press, the problem with the strategy is that FF are unlikely to be gentle on anyone in coalition with FG either.

Hear hear, and has been stressed ad nauseum elsewhere on the site, the strategy of focusing criticism on the smaller partner did of course not succeed - in that despite the PDs loses FF still had enough seats to form a government with them.

I don't mind all of this really, i suppose it is the job of opposition to do it, I just wish that when they criticise us it would be for things that we had done, rather than others.

[greengoose]

Nope, we will take 100% full responsibilities for our actions. Don't you think it's a little strange that every time FF or the PDs do something corrupt, ill advised, incompetent or morally banckrupt that the press and opposition immediately resort to "how can the Greens countenance this"? Once we start taking backhanders, fiddling with planning, etc, then by all means we should be throoughly attacked. Until then we're going to try focus on getting the things done that our reps were elected to do. Our numbers did not put FF-PD back in government, if they had I would have voted no. Time to just make the best of a bad situation!

Lie down with dogs and you catch fleas...

But not on Planet Bertie.

[greengoose]

Nope, we will take 100% full responsibilities for our actions. Don't you think it's a little strange that every time FF or the PDs do something corrupt, ill advised, incompetent or morally banckrupt that the press and opposition immediately resort to "how can the Greens countenance this"? Once we start taking backhanders, fiddling with planning, etc, then by all means we should be throoughly attacked. Until then we're going to try focus on getting the things done that our reps were elected to do. Our numbers did not put FF-PD back in government, if they had I would have voted no. Time to just make the best of a bad situation!

PICTURE REMOVED BY DAVID COCHRANE

[The Word Of Truth]

Yes, but you were happy to blame FF and others Govt partners when it suited you, see extract below from http://www.unlockgridlock.com/
------------------------------------------------------------------
Who caused this mess?

Mainly Fianna Fail, the PDs and Fine Gael.
Bertie Ahern likes to say that traffic congestion is as a result of ‘progress’, but this is not the case. It is down to bad planning, pure and simple.

Large areas of land were rezoned for housing in Lucan and Clondalkin over the last 25 years. Tribunals have shown that some of these rezonings involved an element of corruption, but in most cases they were just poorly planned. Lots of housing, but no facilities and certainly no thought about how people get from A to B.

[rockofcashel]

Labour Leader Eamon Gilmore has launched a major attack on the Greens "nothing to do with us stance".

He says "The Green Party is the first party to go into coalition and to say that they will accept no responsibility for anything that the government and its members do and that they will take no steps to demand acceptable minimum standards from Fianna Fail. The 'nothing to do with us' approach marks an extraordinary abdication of responsibility on the part of a party that was particularly vocal in putting the case for high standards by office holders, when it was in opposition"

Har har har. Now if only (a) Labour wouldn't have done the same thing, and (b) they didn't seem afraid to actually go toe-to-toe with Bertie themselves, as opposed to trying to pick off junior coalition partners.

I worry that the strategy of focusing on the PDs as opposed to FF was seen as successful at the last election - if the problem is FF, what exactly is served by attacking everyone around them instead? If the objective is to ensure that no-one is willing to go into coalition with FF next time for fear of bad press, the problem with the strategy is that FF are unlikely to be gentle on anyone in coalition with FG either.

wise words.... spend 5 years attacking FF is the only way you will possibly change the perception of enough people to consider not voting for FF, and will give any Opposition a fighting chance of winning Government. Otherwise, the only choice will be who will FF's next coalition partners.

I said it before and I'll say it again.. no matter how successful FG were in regaining 20 seats, when FF only lose 3, then it's not worth anything

[Pidge]

Yes, but you were happy to blame FF and others Govt partners when it suited you, see extract below from http://www.unlockgridlock.com/
------------------------------------------------------------------
Who caused this mess?

Mainly Fianna Fail, the PDs and Fine Gael.
Bertie Ahern likes to say that traffic congestion is as a result of ‘progress’, but this is not the case. It is down to bad planning, pure and simple.

Large areas of land were rezoned for housing in Lucan and Clondalkin over the last 25 years. Tribunals have shown that some of these rezonings involved an element of corruption, but in most cases they were just poorly planned. Lots of housing, but no facilities and certainly no thought about how people get from A to B.

You'll note that FG weren't in government with FF at the time. The point being made there is that the bad planning policies of those parties led to gridlock. If the point was that it was the parties in government, then FG wouldn't have been included.