Post Election '07 Eirig and Dublin PSF

by DEMOCRAT Sun May 27, 2007 16:42

I think that the leaders debate showed Adam's to have a very limited range of knowledge on the breadth of topics that would be required of any aspirant to government.....

by Ed Burke Sun May 27, 2007 17:34

The constitutional position of the North has been settled. So that is not an issue for the people in the Republic. S.F's eagerness to enter into coalition with F.F. is hardly a radical position. Why vote for S.F. when you can have the real thing with F.F? Sinn Fein has become the Fianna Fail of the North. We already have a F.F down south so there's no need for S.F.. And Adams on TV clearly displayed his ignorance of the political economy of the Republic. Sinn Fein have already peaked in the South, and are now in decline. They are the Fianna Fail of the North and Ian Paisley's junior partner. There's no need or room for them down south. They should just go away, you know.

by Oisín - ÓSF Tue May 29, 2007 12:38

We got squeezed, the people got scared of the possibility of Enda Kenny forming a goverment and went in and voted FF. They told us they would vote Sinn Féin but so scared by the FF bogie men that a non ff vote was a vote for FG. The only poll which had us near what we got was the tally on the day, why because people werent planning on voting FF they did so at the last minute out of fear and against FG.

SF's vote has grown since 2002, the loss of Sean Crowe is very sad but the performance of a number of other candidates is very encouraging. Would all those who wished and prayed for a collapse to happen please wise up and realise it didnt. I would have loved to seat ten seats taken and was very disappointed but it was not collapse.

by Big Mac Tue May 29, 2007 15:32

Oisin seems to be peddling Adams' latest excuse. Adams says it first so it's OK then the rest of SF are expected to repeat it like the sheep they are.
The fact is the people of the South don't want a spineless party who keep doing u-turns to get into power. They don't want another FF, therefore the $hinners will remain a small party like the PDs. The southern electorate got rid of the tinpot dictator McDowell and they most certainly don't want another one in the shape of Adams.
The only reason that $F got such a large vote up here was because the Nationalist / Republican people hated Paisley so much, Adams doesn't have such a bogeyman in the South.

by Patrick Henry Tue May 29, 2007 17:51

CTN, we need a new balance of power in the whole of Ireland and not just in Dublin as you seem to be inferring. More so here in the North where we need a Real Republican Party capable of achieving, by peaceful means, the ideals of those who gave their lives for the betterment of the working class people of Ireland. In that working class I also include the thousands of migrant workers forced to come here for a better way of life who are now the new exploited. I'm sure Bobby Sands and James Connolly would agree.
Eirigi should work towards drawing representatives from all these people into their ranks as their support will become crucial in working class Republican politics of the future.
As yet we no party capable of uniting the working class people because creed and the lust for power always got the better of erstwhile idealistic people.
$inn Feign are going nowhere therefore we must create a party that is.

by Jolly Red Giant - Socialist Party/CWI Tue May 29, 2007 19:11

You said

'SF's vote has grown since 2002, the loss of Sean Crowe is very sad but the performance of a number of other candidates is very encouraging. '

In reality the SF vote actually dropped in the majority of constituencies that SF stood in both 2002 and 2007. There were increases in some constituencies but in most cases these increases were very small (in the order of less than 2%).

I am waithing with interest for Sinn Fein's analysis of its election result and how it impacts on its strategy in the North.

by Big Mac Tue May 29, 2007 19:55

It seems, Oisin like other members of $inn Fein are lost for words while they wait for Adams to compile a list of answers for them.

by Cathal Goulding Wed May 30, 2007 10:07

Adams /McGuinness axis forced undesirables down peoples throats- ie. Dennis Donaldson & the many wideboys throughout the city who were eventually expelled after a decade of terror and corruption.

There is actually no reord that blames Mc Guinness or Adams for Donaldson's death, that was more than likely people who were not in the IRA. it was a bit embarrassing as the provos had said he would be safe living in Donegal.
If you want to see the what Adams etc. are really like and what they are capable of read Blanketmen by Richard O Rawe

by interested Wed May 30, 2007 11:48

Have any elected representatives joined Eirgi? (the "newly morphed" whatever the fuck that means).

by CTN Wed May 30, 2007 12:05

Good afternoon Interested,

Morphed is politico-slang for metamorphosing- (transforming).

This group started of as a merely Dublin based campaigns group splintering from SF but now have members all over Ireland.

They run energetic campaigns over the country like the shinners used to do before the mass resignations started hitting home, recently some members were arrested outside Stormont on an anti - war ticket.

As a result of the volume of applicants to join their ranks- many of which were disgruntled shinners they became an All Ireland campaigning group- more applicants swarmed to them and only last week (in advance of the shinners getting a busted snout of the electorate) they decided to become a political party.

They have not yet decided to contest elections but I think its natural they would progress down that road.

No they haven't any elected shinners on board yet but do have its brightest and best former members of the Dublin officer board including former organiser's & p.r.o'.s etc.

Ironically they also contain Mary Lou's sister Joanne who was a huge asset within the shinners.

An interesting contest for the hearts and minds of the shinner membership and republican left in Dublin will now ensue between these two parties....

by Big Mac Wed May 30, 2007 19:09

I've read 'Blanketmen' and it seems that after Bobby's election result, Adams saw the potential for future electoral success. Did he allow men to die in order to have Owen Carron elected? I don't know, but if he did then he is as guilty of their murder as is Thatcher.
However time will tell as secrets such as these have a way of coming to the surface. Now that people are no longer afraid of a backlash from the enforcers in the 'RA' more and more are starting to talk freely and eventually someone in the know will come forward and tell their story as Richard O'Rawe has.

The one thing that stands out in my mind is that within about 4 years of the Hunger Striker's deaths, Adams pushed ahead with the beginning of his takeover of P$F.

Whatever happened to Owen Carron in the meantime?

by CTN Thu May 31, 2007 09:20

I think he's still involved with the shinners but don't know if he was included in the on the run amnesty.

More importantly what will happen to Adams if the shinners lose more clout in Dublin?

Their latest black eye here may start a downward spiral which he contributed to the start of.

by it Fri Jun 01, 2007 15:11

CTN. are you a member of eirigi or an interested watcher. AS a watcher myself one of the qualites i liked from the start was not getting into the whole kick SF thing which to me is so easy anyone can do it and most people do...... from the right to the left. Eirigi just seemed to say we disagree thats ok we'll do or thing. Good bye. i'd be disapointed if eirigi line up for some battle with SF in dublin. all it will be is a pissing contest between who has the biggest/best subgroup in dublin. so what. the world won't stop. people in dublin need to realize that it's ok to disagree and when you do that then you can ' respectfully ' disagree and if the oportunity arises respectfully agree. otherwiswe s2s shannon or what ever cause pops up in the the next few months are just hopeless in this city

by TAL Sat Jun 02, 2007 01:17

CNT,
Are you seriously suggesting that Eirigi are competing with SF in Dublin? A group of ex-office staff do not make a party. You obviously haven’t lost the arrogance you gained in SF but when you do a little bit of work on the ground (and I don’t mean a poorly attended protest outside Bertie’s office), come back and people might take you seriously. As it stands Eirigi are just one of those “micro-groups” you always complained about when you were still in SF.

by CTN Sat Jun 02, 2007 12:29

Howya TAL- you've (thankfully) got the wrong guy as I was never in SF- but I did know people who were and they have defected to Eirigi.

As a watcher I have no interest in working on the ground but do know that as Eirigi are doing more campaigns than the shinners and are getting plenty of publicity e.g the arrests outside Stormont last fortnight, its logical to believe they will leech more members of them.

A Shinner from Ballyfermot only last week told me they were in serious trouble in Dublin.

My comments are completely clinical - I have no bias towards either or, but from a neutral standpoint I find the rise and decline of DSF interesting, especially as these new factors emerge- I voted for many parties in the election and the SF candidate was high in my preferences, I am not bashing them per se just commenting on how it stands and were I think they went wrong....

No point in shooting at the messenger - the facts are the shinners are losing votes and members in Dublin - read all about it!

by Patrick Henry Sat Jun 02, 2007 16:49

I think that the reason that so many people get the boot into or kick $F is that they got to this point in politics by sending young Volunteers out to kill and blow our own towns and cities to rubble. I was one of those young people and I watched many of my generation die on active service because we believed in those self same people who are now part of keeping our country partitioned.
$F are like FF and FG they were created by people who rose to prominence during the struggle for freedom then became part of the system keeping us partitioned.
Of course we kick $F just as they kicked members of the SDLP for doing what they $F are now doing. Was forcing people like Gerry Fitt out of their homes into exile not worse than slagging $F off?

by CTN Sat Jun 02, 2007 17:52

If I had a grudge against the shinners I wouldn't have to get personal and kick at them- Adams kicked them in the head twice himself - by changing their economic policy during the campaign, then to top that his enemies guffawed in delight at all his spectacular goof-ups in the media.

I can understand how you can feel shortchanged Patrick, after a 40 year campaign to end up in Stormont with no army and a small party going backwards in the south is a kick in the teeth for many chukies.

I feel sorry for activists like TAL who have put in the groundwork and have to suffer this defeat.

I imagine all defeats are hurtful in politics but when they are inflicted primarily by your own leader it must be especially painful and problematic.

by watcher it Sat Jun 02, 2007 18:26

i accept your point but i still think kicking SF is two simplistic, it maybe enjoyable for some or teraputic on some level. as i said what i admired about eirigi was that they just got on with it, they didn't define themselves or allow themselfs to be defined as opposition to SF and the reason i think there right to do that is because the world, ireland, dublin even are so much bigger. I was unsure if CTN was a member or not, no offence but glad to hear your not

by CTN Sat Jun 02, 2007 18:33

Strictly a spectator of these interesting times.

by Patrick Henry Sat Jun 02, 2007 18:37

Firstly CTN, I am not a 'Chucky' I'm a former Volunteer in the IRA that has been led up the garden path. I no longer advocate violence as a way forward as I saw how people like me can be used to force people like the leadership of $F to the top of the political tree, then abandon everything they encouraged me to believe in.
Although many who fought the war have left the $hinners or were forced out because they had opinions, many like TAL still remain but unless they are real ass lickers they too will be shafted and replaced by the likes of Mary Lou, in what has become Adams' spring cleaning of $F, the bringing in of people who would be acceptable in the hoped for coalition with FF that was to be his icing on the cake. A bit stale as it turned out.

by CTN Sun Jun 03, 2007 11:53

I hope that you have not been offended- without being artificially plausible in agreement I feel that the Adams era has been a Human Resource disaster for mainstream republicanism.

Almost everyone I have ever known that was linked to the provisional movement has left, whilst almost everyone I have ever known that were linked to other political parties here in Dublin are still attached to them.

Their presence here on the ground in the city is massively reduced from what it was even 3 or 4 years ago.

This will impact further on their electoral aspirations.

by Con Fri Jun 08, 2007 20:01

It is my understanding that far from "office staff" the Shinners lost some of their best activists to Éirígí -to name but a few-their national organiser, a Dublin organiser and ironically enough (in the context of Crowe losing his seat) a former Chairman of Tallaght Sinn Fein.

by CTN Sat Jun 09, 2007 01:43

At last someone else realises this is what hurt SF most in Dublin.

Coupled with Adams' new image as a butterfingers on the economy and peace process fever at an all time low- SF are in it big time.

by CTN Sun Jun 24, 2007 16:51

Fellow bloggers as this article is now in my opinion dated please be aware as I shall not be giving it further attention I will not be able to comment on any replies to my blogs.

Thanx,

CTN