When they came for the senators, I remained silent. I was not a senator.

If the Senate is abolished, it cannot be reformed. The fact that Senate has not been reformed so far is more an indictment of previous and current governments than of the Senate itself. Institutional inertia is a fact of life.

Without going into conspiracy theories, why was this proposal not submitted to the Constitutional Convention; the abolition of one third of the National Parliament will have far more serious consequences for democracy in Ireland than reducing the Presidential term of office or the increased participation of women in politics.

The party whip system has undermined the primacy of the Dáil over the Government (Art 28.4) and we know from the final days of the last government that ministers outside the ‘gang of three’ not only were not involved in decision making but were not even informed of what was happening. Imagine the appalling vista where the Economic Management Council consists of the actively malevolent, rather the merely incompetent.

Stop Ireland's SOPA

Below is the text of a letter I sent to all my local TDs on this subject.  If anyone cares about Ireland's future as a knowledge economy, please send similar to your local TDS.

Dear Deputy for Dun Laoghaire,

I call on you to oppose the proposed enactment of “S.I. No. of 2011 European Communities (Copyright and Related Rights) Regulations 2011.”

This legislation subverts the democratic process, favours the special interests of corporations over the rights of individual citizens, will destroy the largest growth sector in the Irish economy, and will subject the citizens of Ireland to unwarranted and unintended censorship.

The means by which this legislation is proposed to work will not achieve its intended result of protecting the rights of copyright holders. Infringing sites will still be accessible by even the most minimally technologically literate persons. This legislation serves only to erode our rights and discourage international investment.

Yahoo!, Twitter, Facebook, Google, AOL, FourSquare, LinkedIn, PayPal, Zynga, and many more US based companies protested against similar legislation in their country (SOPA/PIPA) which attempted to assuage copyright holders concerns by censoring the Internet. These companies and similar are the lifeblood of Ireland’s future knowledge economy. To believe we can summarily enact legislation that will censor the Internet and not severely detriment our economy and our democratic rights is foolhardy.

On the 11th of January, The European Commission recognised that the Internet “has enormous potential for boosting growth and creating jobs.” and that 20-25% of new jobs could come from growth in this area; growth which will not be possible if the policies in place are more harmful than productive.

This legislation is bad for the Irish economy. It jeopardises the fundamental operation of our largest technology employers, is hostile to investment and relocation, and stifles our technology start-ups. Please do not let this legislation pass.

Yours sincerely,

Where was the ECB when all this happened?

The recent Nyberg report which blamed everyone, and no-one, for the banking debacle omitted mentioning one institution. The European Central Bank (or Europaische Zentralbank as it is called in its native language) took over a number activities from the national central banks when we joined the Euro. One of the tasks of the ECB/EZB is to monitor the Euro area banking sector to identify any vulnerabilities and to check the resilience of the system.

If the ECB had been carrying out its assessments competently, it should have noticed that the growth in credit provided by Irish banks, and therefore the indebtedness of bank customers, vasttly exceeded the growth in the economy in Ireland. This apparently is a basic measure of economic prudence.  There is no mention of this in the 2008 Financial Stability Reports which suggests that it was not regarded as important or was not noticed at all.

This oversight by the ECB in no way absolves our regulators of blame but it is interesting that our fiercest critic and harshest taskmaster in the bailout has a lot less entitlement to the moral high ground than it currently claims.

It's not just me that thinks it's wrong.

Check out this op-ed column by Paul Krugman in today's New York Times. It is called Eating the Irish. Paul Krugman is no George Lee but he is professor of Economics and International Affairs at Princeton University as well as a columnist for The New York Times and won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2008.


One commentator raised an interesting point: who are these bondholders/creditors (who should be taking the loss instead of the Irish people)?  Give us the names and amounts! And the interest paid to them to date.

€7.9bn to Anglo Irish Bank bondholders

I just read in the Irish Mail on Sunday that €7.9bn was paid to senior bondholders in Anglo Irish Bank. So half of the pain that the Irish people will have to endure over the next four years will go directly to those wealthy individuals who could afford to speculate on a small Irish bank.  These speculators knew that their funds were subordinate to the deposit holders in the event of a call on the bank, which is why they were getting a higher return.  They also knew that Anglo was earning profits considerably in excess of what a prudent bank of the same size would produce.  Since Anglo is effectively a failed entity, they should be entitled to their share of what is left after the deposit holders are paid off which is what a Cork friend of mine described as 'five eights of f--- all'.


Without getting involved in conspiracy theories, can anyone explain why this was covered by the Irish Mail on Sunday and I believe the Sunday Tribune, but not the Irish Independent, the Irish Times or RTE.