Haven’t we had enough of keeping stumm, of “whatever you say, say nothing”, of getting elected first and telling the truth afterwards? The good guys of the economic crisis are those who have been willing to tell it as it is; some of the rest probably kept quiet out of self-interest, but even those for whom that was not true have contributed to the debasement of public debate and political culture: they have helped to maintain the Irish electorate, and the Irish state, in the condition of political immaturity that has led it to its current condition.

Let your yea be yea and your nay be nay. Speak the truth and shame the devil. Say it loud and say it clear.

bjg [who votes only in Senate elections]

I agree with Eichengreen. Fine Gael is in the position of probably not being able to state this truth at the moment. I have written it myself on my website. The country must get its fiscal gap down and then renegotiate.

This side of a general election, Fine Gael cannot really say this. Afterwards they will be forced by markets and by the public to get real. If I am elected, I will ALSO force a little dose of reality into the procedings. As it is Noonan, Varadkar, Hayes, Bruton are easily the best Economic Team in Irish politics. That is obvious.

I’m going to stop reading this stuff it’s making my head hurt - and please can someone come up with a better economic term than “kicking the can down the road”.

How about: “Making a Hail Mary pass”?

“The State pledges itself to safeguard with especial care the economic interests of the weaker sections of the community, and, where necessary, to contribute to the support of the infirm, the widow, the orphan, and the aged.”

At this moment, few are weaker than bank shareholders, and the Article puts their interests above those of “the infirm, the widow, the orphan, and the aged”.

bjg

The EU has almost as much insane immunity with their currency to gamble with as the US Treasury. About 60% of global foreign exchange reserves are held in dollar-denominated instruments and about half as much again held in Euros. This isn’t a currency that’s going to go to the wall… it’s out of the question. It can no more be uninvented than the idea that a Federal State in the US could decide to start their own currency again… which would be fun - but it isn’t going to happen. The reality is that even if they have to bail out Spain and will probably largely print to do it… if it means a modest adjustment of comparable values between the dollar and the euro (and it probably won’t because of dollar printing) so be it. Chine will sooner or later have something to say about the value of their savings depreciating but that’s another matter.

As this piece rightly points out, though in an exaggerated comparison with reparations at Versailles, the public in Europe will effectively and patiently organise at a grass roots level, to prevent their politicians pushing their agenda through… printing will look like the easier route.

My own offering is “irresolution” especially for the failure to introduce resolution regime
heres a few synonyms for irresolution from the online thesaurus
Synonyms: averseness, dawdling, delay, delaying, demurral, doubt, dubiety, equivocation, faltering, fluctuation, fumbling, hemming and hawing, hesitancy, indecision, indecisiveness, indisposition, irresoluteness, misgiving, mistrust, oscillation, pause, procrastination , qualm, reluctance, scruple, shilly-shally, skepticism, stammering, stumbling, stuttering, tentativeness, timidity, timidness, to-and-fro, unwillingness, vacillation, wavering

@Eoin
I suspected as much - but the “Irish” threw me.

You learn something new every day!

Not a word to give to a Guardian typesetter though