Openly one anyway. Iâm sure at least one other holder of the office sucked cock
God willing mate. God willing.
We would be the laughing stock of the world. Zero credibility on the international stage. Bond yields would go through the roof and the ISEQ would crash.
Are you saying Ireland has never had a gay head of state?
Youâre extremely naive if you think that.
Coveney is weak.
Talking about Fine Gael being a party for everyone. Delusional. FG is already characterised as a centre right Party and hated by the Rastoolers. You arenât going to win those votes (the only logic for Varadkar going on about this United Ireland party stuff again is getting the TD votes of border area representatives looking for a strong Brexit policy, otherwise itâs a waste of time as well).
Itâs time for FG to act as they are perceived. Be aggressive and be bold.
The âJust Societyâ marketplace is a crowded field already with the Fianna FĂĄilers, Labour, Sinn FĂŠin and the hard left loons fighting for the âgive me everything for freeâ brigade.
Shoring up the middle class vote in Dublin and winning back some rural votes is achievable with a combination of pro Tax payer policies and a good Cap Ex programme.
The fact that Simon is crying that Varadkar was better organised and has policies designed to win back voters reflects badly on him as a leadership candidate. Coveney should have flanked him with the country TDs and Senators, many including Michael Ring gave heavy blame to Leo for the Dublin centric FG campaign last year. Instead Varadkar comes up with the increased debt to the GDP policy in order for there to be more Cap Ex. He goes to the rural TDs and tells them of all the roads he will build for them and has this United Ireland tag line for the Heather Humphreys of the world.
Coveney seems to have thought that rural FG werenât going to vote for a shirtlifter and all he needed was to get Dublin reps onside like Kate OâConnell and Maria Bailey.
He been caught flat footed and is now desperately trying to appear as the benevolent Landowner with a conscious to save face.
1 Like
The problem for the Blueshirts is that Leo is not trusted by huge swathes of the country.
He might be the golden boy of the FG right wing but he has very limited appeal outside of this demographic. You are living in la la land if you think this guy can drastically improve FGâs performance from the last general election.
1 Like
How do you know that?
The statistics from the IT today showed that with the wider public yes Coveney is more popular, but so what? Coveney as I said is not going to turn over voters from working class areas. They arenât going to win with a plurality of Champagne socialists. That counts for sweet fuck all.
FG dropped to 25.5% the last time, performing well below what they were actually polling. Varadkar just needs to increase the % by 4 or 5% to win seats. They arenât going to get an overall majority anyway, we live in a multi party system. FG will be targeting rural seats they lost last time out and Varadkarâs Cap Ex policy is design precisely for that. Thatâs why the majority of their elected reps are backing him, he has policies to win back seats.
Simon Coveney being a slightly taller version of Martin isnât going to do anything for Fine Gael in winning back seats.
The more labels that people throw at Varadkar the better, as it shows peopleâs fear of him and what he can do for FG. For too long FG have pussyfooted around Irish politics, happy to go into government with Labour on occasion. Happy to take the Blueshirt label and Thatcherite label all the while quietly whispering Michael Collins and keeping social programmes in place. They have to be bolder as a party.
Youâre basically suggesting that Fine Gael do what the Tories did from 1997 to 2005.
Fine Gael pretty much maximised their vote and seat numbers in Dublin at the last election. 2 in Dublin Bay South and Dun Laoighaire, one in Dublin North West.
There are very few seats they have a chance of gaining in Dublin and few enough around the country.
There are a lot more they could lose.
I see them going down to an average of about one per constituency at the next election, maybe slightly above, which would be in the region of 42-44 seats.
Ding ding, read the post. I said âshore upâ middle class Dublin and win back rural seats. Not increase Dublin.
FG will look to win their votes from homeowners who consider themselves to be in the middle class and their old farmer base. They will motivate those voters to come out.
What is the point of Simon Coveney talking about âfairnessâ when it will do absolutely nothing for Fine Gael? They arenât going to outflank the parties already occupying the left space. All Coveney is doing is making himself look like a right mug when the next election comes around and the housing crisis in the country is still around. Varadker is not appealing to those people and not making any pretend notions of that.
Separate your personal politics and what is best for FG as a party.
Oooooofffffffttttttt!
ignore people who will always vote for you and will never vote for you, appeal to those who may vote for you
thatâs the key
1 Like
Rural seats such as?
Tipperary, Roscommon and at a push Longford-Westmeath are the only ones that immediately spring to mind as likely or possible gains.
There are more likely or possible losses in non-Dublin constituencies, such as Meath East, Louth, Clare, Wexford, Galway West and Limerick County.
I donât give a toss whatâs best for FG as a party as Iâll never vote for them.
But as somebody such, I would be very slightly less hostile to a Coveney-led Fine Gael than I would be were Varadkar leading it. I imagine this will be a more common view among floating voters.
He will look to bring the likes of Naughton inside the tent. He doesnât like Kenny.
Varadkar is going to open the wallet for capital projects to win back some of the rural voters who feel everything is âtoo Dublinâ. Coveney could have done the same but looked like a right mug when he was going on about Varadkar being Dublin centric with loads of rural TDs lining up for Varadkar at the same time. Policies are key.
I can see Kildare South, Tipp, Roscommon and Cork where they can do well.
I accept in 2016 FG maximised their seats out given their %. But the % they got was well below what they polled consistently for months. That shows a level of fatigue in FG voters that they didnât turnout. They need to be motivated to come out. Water charges et al dominated the headlines last cycle out and FGâs message was just tired, with Enda Kenny only speaking when allowed by his handlers. It is unlikely FG will go below 25/26% again so I think itâs unlikely they drop seats.
Nobody has told me why FG should be looking to go into the same market as SF, FF, PBP or Labour which is what Simon is suggesting. He doesnât have a policy on it but is coming out with sound bites. He is going against a set of parties who will up front say they will tax the wealthy, Apple, magic money tree et cetera to pay for stuff. Saying âwe have to appeal to allâ is meaningless twaddle.
Itâs generally more successful for a right-wing party to at least give the impression of trying to appeal to all.
Thatâs what Major and Cameron did, and some people think May is trying to do, anyway.
Fine Gael wonât win votes from Sinn Fein or the AAA/PBP/Solidarity but rejecting trying to appeal to the floating vote which Fianna Fail/Labour try to appeal to is madness. Itâs highly unlikely they can ever lead a government by doing that.
Fine Gael would be a lot more likely to win back seats in Cork under Coveney - Cork South Central, Cork East, Corth North-West and Cork South West would all be possibles were he leading. They wonât take back any of them under Varadkar.
Varadkarâs big problem is that heâs taking over at the end of what is already an unusually long natural cycle for Fine Gael. They get their go in government every 10-15 years or so and then it ends, and Fianna Fail inevitably come back.
FF and FG will simply trade positions after the next election. I think Varadkar will get very frustrated by that. His lack of patience will not be well suited to propping up a minority FF government, which, as long as it doesnât completely fuck things up, will likely mean further gains for FF at the election after next. Varadkar is power-hungry above all else and isnât in politics for the long game, which means that presuming FF do lead the next government, itâll be effectively game over for him.
You are comparing a first past the post system to our system, a waste of time. I could say the exact same thing to you about the Labour Party needing to run to the centre to be electable but you would have kittens. But thatâs irrelevant.
Show me how FG are going to win these types of voters by going for Coveneyâs empty fair society blurb?
There has been no election yet. The poll this morning shows FG out as the number 1 party. The idea that it is done is a fallacy. We have an economy continuing to grow and Fianna FĂĄil are still caught up with deciding what they are politically from week to week.
New leaders tend to get short term bounces, the operative words being âshort-termâ.
Theresa May is in now in dire straits after less than 11 months as UK PM.
Who was the last shirt lifter that was Taoiseach? Must be going back a good while?
I said Head of State.
Time and time again weâve been told that a genuine left-wing party is needed but the continued floundering and then re-branding of AAA/PBP/Solidarity etc etc would suggest that under your logic such ideas should be abandoned too?
Do you think Leo has a wider appeal among non-FG voters than Simon?
A genuine left wing party is needed, not to get elected to govern but to drag the right wing back towards the centre and hold them accountable. Labour, instead of doing that, dragged themselves towards the centre to be elected and they were obliterated for it. The AAA or whatever they are called these days arenât a left wing party, they are a populist party.