Nothing Left to Say? The Recession Diaries - February 8th
So George Lee has resigned. No doubt this will fill newspaper columns and blog posts with analysis of what this means for Fine Gael, Enda Kenny (will he be pushed?, the Government and, of course, George. So far the one question that has not been answered - and not raised much either - is: what were the policy disagreements that drove George out of Fine Gael and out of the Dail? So far, all we have been treated to is, from George’s perspective, is that he didn’t have sufficient input into Fine Gael policy. So far, however, he hasn’t touched upon the specifics of the type of policies he wanted input on. Did he have proposals that were unacceptable to Fine Gael? Were there Fine Gael policies unacceptable to him? What would have been the result of such input?
Or are we in the ‘policy-free zone’ that constitutes so much of Irish politics? If so, if there were no fundamental differences between Fine Gael policy and George Lee, then what we have here is a case of someone who resigned because he didn’t have enough input into policy that he didn’t disagree with anyway.
Or maybe there’s something more provocative. Maybe George had nothing left to say on economic policy. Go back to his 10-point plan. Read all the points he makes. They have, for the most part, already been take up by Fine Gael (some of them, like point number one, was already party policy) or has been acted upon by the Government. His 10-point plan that he ran on in the by-election is pretty much last year.
Maybe he just couldn’t think up another 10-point plan to impress upon his party, the Government and the nation.
Maybe he just lost his . . er . . edge.
Discussion
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Comment by: Brid Connolly
Feb 9th 2010 at 09:02
George Lee’s resignation was inevitable, though surprising, as the economic critique that he provided as a journalist is useless in politics, particularly since he jumped from the relative high moral ground of the fourth estate into the murky undertow of the clientalism endemic in the current regime in Irish politics. His journalistic critique centred on the hyper-expansionism of capitalism, but then he joined a right wing party that, at its heart, is totally in agreement with this ideology. With his understanding of macro economics, he should have clearly seen the ideology underneath the rhetoric. Further, of course, Irish politics is all local, and there is absolutely no room for the national interest.
Comment by: Robert McC
Feb 10th 2010 at 11:02
Well… Lee’s resignation has for a moment shone a light, allbit not a very bright one on the insitutionalisim that cloaks and protects both the political classes and the civil-servant class, particularly those employed by RTE, in that he was able to slot back into a well paid position with the national broadcastor. Surely this has got to be unfair. Surely it can-not be right that some working people in our socity are afforded this incredible protection, whilst others can be ‘cast out’ with no protection at all?