To quote Gene Hackman in Enemy of the State - âyouâre either incredibly smart or incredibly stupidâ
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Itâs the modern equivalent of a rotten borough. People campaigned for years for emancipation and democracy. And the voters response is to elect familial dynasties like the Collins whose only allegiance is to themselves.
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Eoin OâBroin seems like a capable and alright sort. He has some government lackey rattled within an inch of his life on radio one at the moment
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FG have pulled off a stunning vote management operation across the country. A lot of preferences too. Considering how close the first preference % was between FF and FG to have significantly more seats is impressive.
That Conor Lenihan clip announcing âweâre backâ is bloody terrifying
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Would that not have more to do with FG simply running more candidates?
In some cases yes, but as SF show in Donegal, you have to know what youâre doing with them.
As I suspected, Byrneâs surplus still had to be distributed. Smith edges out Ardagh by 35 votes. Ardagh has requested a recount.
Yes they are better than FF at it alright. I donât think FF expected the surge to them in some areas and didnât run enough candidates. Then you have The alpha males like Collins and O Dea who wonât take running mates.
The other side of the coin is Mayo where FF with 25. % are going to share the 4 seats 2/2 with FG who have 51%.
The big story for me on transfers is that all of the AAA transfers have been gong to SF all night. The AAA have pulled in a respectable vote in pretty well very constituency and have brought a lot of SFers home so I assume Mary Lou will be very nice to Paul Murphy from now on.
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Incredible.
Sinn Fein miss out in Wexford.
Youâre being very disingenuous, the SF vote has remained consistent in Donegal. The first pref % is pretty much in line with the last election, the problem lies with their strategy here. Donegal has lost a seat in this election and SF threw another candidate into the mix, they also have an independent republican candidate running in Tom Pringle.
The gains FF have made in Donegal at this election has been completely at the expense of Labour/FG.
Labour didnât run a candidate this time round - last time McBrearty got about 4k votes, the FF vote is up 11% and the Fine Gael vote is down 10.4%, The SF vote has not had a noticable swing, what they have done is messed up in their strategy. Running 3 candidates, in a constituency that lost a seat, which has a strong independent republican candidate will cost them.
I can tell you now that he was promised a junior min if he brought in Neville
So it was an anti government vote, not a republican vote, that saw FFâs increase in support. Glad we cleared that up.
You havenât cleared anything up.
The SF vote has remained steady, all that has happened is the establishment parties swings has been wholly internal. SF are down 1.5% in first pref in this vote and that swing has been taken up by Pringle.
FFâs gain has been taken from FG/Lab, the figure back that up.
Woah my point on Donegal curing vs the establishment has been proven.
I donât need to make further points. Thereâs no arguing against it.
You claimed that the 2011 swung to SF was due to a republican swung from FF. I said it was an anti-government vote.
The swung back to FF wasnât a republican swing, as you have admitted.
Ergo FF support in Donegal is not dependent on republicans.
No, no, no.
You said it was âanti-establishmentâ - not anti-government, anti-establishment.
And what you meant by anti-establishment has been the three governing parties that have been in powers since the stateâs inception - FF, FG, Labour.
Donât dare atttempt backtrack now.
The republican vote in Donegal has remained static, thatâs another fact.