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Post by hibernicus on Mar 16, 2016 20:28:29 GMT
Anyone with a vote in the NUI Seanad constituency should remember to vote for Senator Ronan Mullen, and NOT to vote for some of the "Repeal the 8th" types who are standing. Does anyone know of any other halfway decent candidates in the NUI or TCD constituencies?
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Post by irishconfederate on May 1, 2016 20:28:42 GMT
Sorry, found no place to post the following so thought it might be ok here:
Paul Clarke www.paulclarke.ie is a pro-life independent candidate who gives clear space to his pro-life position on his website. He runs in every election in Dublin bay North area. Deserves any support........
www.nationalindependentparty.ie/ ........ are/were a political party who have been very valiant in their efforts. They do not define themselves by Christian values but they do offer a grassroots, non-socialist party approach to tackling problems facing Ireland - a rarity!
Also, in my humble opinion, as will have to happen with Christian parties in Ireland in the future pending a miracle, www.nationalindependentparty.ie did pursue an agenda to unite all peoples (pro choice and pro-life) in an effort for greater self-governance for the people of Ireland. Perhaps the only prudent Irish Christian position in the future?
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Post by hibernicus on Jul 30, 2017 22:54:52 GMT
Justin Barrett has launched/relaunched his own "National Party" to promote the "National Idea". The "National Idea" seems to consist of hostility to immigrants and withdrawal from the EU, as well as being pro-life and pro-family. The assumption that there is only one "National Idea" seems pretty questionable to me. Some of his speeches available on the net show that he has not learned the basic point of public speaking (spell out your central points in advance so the audience know what you are going to say, make your main argument, then sum up what you've said). Instead, he just rambles - as he did years ago in his manifesto, THE NATIONAL WAY FORWARD. Interesting to see him advocating absolute free speech a la the US First Amendment, when his book is a manifesto for dictatorship. The NP website has several photos of Barrett taken from low down and with his chin jutting out to convey determination. I wouldn't touch it with a bargepole.
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Post by maolsheachlann on Jul 31, 2017 10:14:31 GMT
He seems to have a mixture of a persecution complex and delusions of grandeur, going by his speech. He also seems to be trying to distance himself from his Catholic past, there was a derogatory reference to "theocratic conservatism" in the speech which jarred on me. Also, he seems representative of a new strand of Irish nationalism which doesn't really have any programme of cultural renewal-- he didn't mention the Irish language once.
I would still probably vote for a National Party candidate as I feel national sovereignty and identity is under such sustained attack. I don't think it's really fair to criticise him for presenting his own vision of nationalism as "the national idea"-- you need a clear vision when you are a political party.
I don't think we have to worry about JB becoming an Irish Mussolini.
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Post by hibernicus on Aug 1, 2017 20:12:24 GMT
The mini-parties' main function at this stage is as a protest vote, but I think the Barrett National Party is outside the pale even for that; it's just too dictatorial. My objection to his "National Idea" is that it's not an idea at all, just a series of assertions. In order to persuade people you need to have some sense of what they think and why they think it.
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Post by hibernicus on Aug 22, 2017 22:05:40 GMT
One thing that strikes me very forcefully the more I think about is just how bad a speaker Justin Barrett is. He speaks in a flat, affectless tone as if he was reading out a list; he seems to have no concept (for example) that it might be a good idea to vary his tone of voice and time his pauses so as to emphasise points that he wishes to highlight,or to include "signposts" to help his audience to follow his argument. (The classic formula is - say what you're going to say, say it, then say what you've said.) This is a very odd feature of someone who has been in the public forum for almost 20 years - you'd think he would have picked up a few speaking tips. I think part of the explanation is that he is so sure that he has nothing to learn that it never occurs to him to think about other people's likely responses.
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Post by maolsheachlann on Aug 22, 2017 22:36:36 GMT
He has an extraordinarily unappealing voice, in my view.
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Post by hibernicus on Nov 27, 2017 21:01:27 GMT
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Post by hibernicus on Jun 17, 2019 22:53:05 GMT
Renua seem on their last legs. They only elected one councillor, the party leader, who promptly left the party. Since their constitution requires that the leader be an elected representative, they are now in an awkward position. They had a very good Euro candidate in Mid-West (where voters also had the chance to vote for Fidelma Healy Eames) but elsewhere made little impact. I would have voted for a Renua or Aontu candidate if I had one (usual terms and conditions applying) but had to content myself with voting for the least bad. The Pro-Life Campaign's list was useful but went up too slowly, and some of their info was posted too late to make an impact. Personally, I think politics is only about protest votes at this stage. We need to develop a self-sustaining subculture and we haven't got very far at all.
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Post by hibernicus on Sept 8, 2019 20:49:28 GMT
In the current issue of THE CATHOLIC VOICE John Lacken replies to people who criticised him for denouncing John Bruton being chosen to speak at the Knock Novena (in the previous issue of CATHOLIC VOICE, on the grounds that John Bruton was responsible for the introduction of divorce when he was Taoiseach). Several people contacted Mr Lacken to point out that John Bruton actually campaigned for the retention of the Pro-Life Amendment (for which, I might add, he was denounced by the usual suspects). Mr Lacken, quite reasonably, points out that this doesn't affect the issue of divorce; much less reasonably, in my opinion he points out that John Bruton canvassed for FG in the last election, after it had passed the Destruction of Life in Pregnancy Act (as it should have been called) and expelled several pro-life TDs. He argues that John Bruton is actually more harmful than Josepha Madigan on the grounds that his presence deceives Catholics and pro-lifers into thinking it is OK to vote for FG, when in fact it is wrong to vote for parties opposed to Catholic teaching. I have a great deal of respect for Mr Lacken's speaking up on such unpopular teachings as modesty, HUMANAE VITAE and the whistling-past-the-graveyard pretence of the Church authorities that all is well in Catholic religious education, but I think he is going too far here, partly because he seems to be presenting this as an obligation binding under pain of sin, rather than his own personal opinion. Here are my own personal views, and the reasons for them: (1) There is a fairly well-fixed Church teaching that we have a duty to vote (i.e. not to evade responsibility for the governance of the country). Given the lousy state of the major parties, Mr Lacken would appear to be arguing that as a general rule we should abstain or vote only for no-hope candidates (of course not all pro-life candidates are no-hopers, but quite a few are). (2) Mr Lacken's view seems to be making the perfect the enemy of the good (or at least the least bad). If one party is discernably better or worse than others, it is reasonable IMHO to vote to keep that party out (or put it in) despite its badness. For example, I have voted for protest candidates as a gesture of support for the pro-life cause, while regarding them as cranks who were not fit to be elected and being glad to transfer elsewhere rather than throwing my vote away. (This has not always been the case; in the last election I gave my No.1 to a very well-qualified pro-life Independent, who sadly was not elected.) Again, does he really think that Catholics who vote for the DUP and TUV in Northern Ireland (there were a few) because of their stance on abortion and other issues, were actually committing sin since these are definitely not Catholic parties and have certain unpleasant features? (3) Mr Lacken's view seems to imply that it is wrong to vote for any candidate representing these parties even if these individuals are in fact committed pro-lifers. (4) My understanding is that Church teaching is that it is permissible to vote for a bad candidate if one is doing so for a valid reason and not out of support for his badness. (For example: some years ago there was an election in Louisiana where the candidates were a notoriously corrupt politician and the Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. I think those people who displayed signs with the slogans "Vote for the crook - it's important" and "Vote for the lizard, not the wizard" cannot be charged with endorsing the candidate's corruption since they had a legitimate belief that supporting him was necessary to keep out an actual Nazi. I am not of course equating this with Irish conditions - I am using it to illustrate a general principle.)
Of course I have no authority to bind anyone's conscience - I am stating the principles, based on my faith, which inform my opinion, and I am ready to change my mind if I am convinced they are erroneous. But it will take more than an individual's bare assertion to convince me.
My own preference is to vote for candidates who can be trusted on life issues, but then to transfer to those bad candidates who seem less bad than the alternatives, in order to have the country governed as competently as possible and to keep out the very worst. I do not think I am committing sin by doing this, and I am ready to be convinced if someone can show that I am mistaken.
[BTW - In this post I originally referred to John Lacken as John Lavin. This was a slip of memory, for which I apologise. I have corrected it here and in the quote from this post in Assisi's post below - HIB]
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Post by assisi on Sept 9, 2019 13:28:39 GMT
In the current issue of THE CATHOLIC VOICE John Lacken replies to people who criticised him for denouncing John Bruton being chosen to speak at the Knock Novena (in the previous issue of CATHOLIC VOICE, on the grounds that John Bruton was responsible for the introduction of divorce when he was Taoiseach). Several people contacted Mr Lacken to point out that John Bruton actually campaigned for the retention of the Pro-Life Amendment (for which, I might add, he was denounced by the usual suspects). Mr Lacken, quite reasonably, points out that this doesn't affect the issue of divorce; much less reasonably, in my opinion he points out that John Bruton canvassed for FG in the last election, after it had passed the Destruction of Life in Pregnancy Act (as it should have been called) and expelled several pro-life TDs. He argues that John Bruton is actually more harmful than Josepha Madigan on the grounds that his presence deceives Catholics and pro-lifers into thinking it is OK to vote for FG, when in fact it is wrong to vote for parties opposed to Catholic teaching. I have a great deal of respect for Mr Lacken's speaking up on such unpopular teachings as modesty, HUMANAE VITAE and the whistling-past-the-graveyard pretence of the Church authorities that all is well in Catholic religious education, but I think he is going too far here, partly because he seems to be presenting this as an obligation binding under pain of sin, rather than his own personal opinion. Here are my own personal views, and the reasons for them: (1) There is a fairly well-fixed Church teaching that we have a duty to vote (i.e. not to evade responsibility for the governance of the country). Given the lousy state of the major parties, Mr Lacken would appear to be arguing that as a general rule we should abstain or vote only for no-hope candidates (of course not all pro-life candidates are no-hopers, but quite a few are). (2) Mr Lacken's view seems to be making the perfect the enemy of the good (or at least the least bad). If one party is discernably better or worse than others, it is reasonable IMHO to vote to keep that party out (or put it in) despite its badness. For example, I have voted for protest candidates as a gesture of support for the pro-life cause, while regarding them as cranks who were not fit to be elected and being glad to transfer elsewhere rather than throwing my vote away. (This has not always been the case; in the last election I gave my No.1 to a very well-qualified pro-life Independent, who sadly was not elected.) Again, does he really think that Catholics who vote for the DUP and TUV in Northern Ireland (there were a few) because of their stance on abortion and other issues, were actually committing sin since these are definitely not Catholic parties and have certain unpleasant features? (3) Mr Lacken's view seems to imply that it is wrong to vote for any candidate representing these parties even if these individuals are in fact committed pro-lifers. (4) My understanding is that Church teaching is that it is permissible to vote for a bad candidate if one is doing so for a valid reason and not out of support for his badness. (For example: some years ago there was an election in Louisiana where the candidates were a notoriously corrupt politician and the Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. I think those people who displayed signs with the slogans "Vote for the crook - it's important" and "Vote for the lizard, not the wizard" cannot be charged with endorsing the candidate's corruption since they had a legitimate belief that supporting him was necessary to keep out an actual Nazi. I am not of course equating this with Irish conditions - I am using it to illustrate a general principle.) Of course I have no authority to bind anyone's conscience - I am stating the principles, based on my faith, which inform my opinion, and I am ready to change my mind if I am convinced they are erroneous. But it will take more than an individual's bare assertion to convince me. My own preference is to vote for candidates who can be trusted on life issues, but then to transfer to those bad candidates who seem less bad than the alternatives, in order to have the country governed as competently as possible and to keep out the very worst. I do not think I am committing sin by doing this, and I am ready to be convinced if someone can show that I am mistaken. I think you are right to vote for the least bad if there are no pro-life alternatives. However it may eventually come to a point where all parties on the ballot sheet are so beyond the pale that the 'least bad' is just too bad. Perhaps one way of looking at this is to ponder what John Bruton should be doing. There is an argument that a John Bruton working inside FG could be an influence for the good, he could be mitigating the worst excesses of FG. Alternatively, if FG are so far gone down the road of progressivism, to the point where they expelled pro-life TDs, it might be the more honourable decision to leave the party and not canvass for them; I think FG are no longer capable of being influenced on this and other related issues and Bruton is wasting his time. As it is he is straddling two irreconcilable positions, his pro-life stance and his loyalty to his party (who, lets face it, probably bear little resemblance to the party he once knew and believed in).
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Post by hibernicus on Sept 10, 2019 19:21:41 GMT
I agree that there are absolute limits (actual communists and nazis, for example). That said, I think it is permissible to vote even for a very bad candidate if the alternative is worse, and I don't like judging other people's decisions in this matter unless they explicitly engage in evil actions or express evil motives. Put things another way, I would prefer it if Mr Lacken said that this was what he thought best and here were his reasons, rather than his declaring off the top of his head that what he says is the only right way to do it. And the view that a FG pro-lifer is worse than a FG pro-abort because the former is more likely to lead the faithful to vote for FG reminds me of the old joke about the Bible Belt fundamentalist who said he disapproved of fornication because it often led to dancing.
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