With reports from Fianna Fáil’s think-in of Bertie Ahern getting a welcome return to the party, it’s worth taking a relook at how he handled an interview as recently as 2018. (He walked out of the interview, a first for @dw_conflictzone )

32 comments

  3. It’s an ego trip for Bertie, like the arsonist returning to the fire.

    Everyone knows the crook and thief he is, so if he gets to swagger around again in the FF tent at the Galway races It’s a statement… look at me ! I got away with it and everyone knows what I did…

  4. I’ve often thought that if he hadn’t been a total crook, he probably would have been considered one of our best politicians and would be a shoe-in for President. The GFA was a great achievement and could have been his legacy. Instead, he is known as being a corrupt, lying bastard who fucked the country over.

  8. Is anyone else interested in protesting this? Just protesting Bertie in general, can we banish him?

    I’d seriously be up for a civil war if he got elected

  9. In fairness it was the first time he was interviewed. Didn’t know the protocol. Wasn’t provided with questions, wasn’t allowed eliminate questions. Absolute disgrace of interview by irish standards. GUBU

  11. The fact that this has been discussed and considered shows the absolute contempt these @$%^s have for the public.

  12. It’s important to remember that not one single solitary member of FF past or present is even slightly sorry for their squandering of the Celtic Tiger, or any of the stuff revealed in the tribunals, and they’d happily do it all again if they could.

    Of course they think Bertie should rejoin, in their minds he has nothing to be sorry for.

  15. I remember seeing an interview with him months before the 2008 recession and he was swearing over and over that our economy was safe, our banks were safe and most of all, our construction industry was safe.

    Can’t find it now but saw it on Reeling in the Years much later but can’t find it again! Almost like RTE removed that segment from the episode.

  17. Any party that takes him in knowing his history should be automatically ousted. Why not just make a public announcement that you’re planning to be corrupt as fuck and you think the public are absolutely stupid. This isn’t the place to incite violence but goddamn are they asking for it even considering him.

  18. This just shows you how deluded and out of touch Fianna Fail are.

    Ask the average Joe Schmoe in Ireland who was responsible for the hard landing 2008 and its devastating fall-out – most won’t actually mention Sean Fitzpatrick. It’s Bertie Ahern.

    So, if FF think Bertie Ahern with this man-of-the-people act can be rolled out for an encore to bump up their ratings, they are in for a nasty surprise.

  19. I really hope he runs for president. Imagine the craic in the debates. He wouldn’t be able to just get up and leave like he did in this interview.

  20. Corchorane is a blueshirt to his Leo Snakedar centrefold and 2018 is not recent unless we’re talking about glacial erosion.

  22. After 2010 all the brains left Fianna Fáil. A lot of these were paid advisors who were let go when they couldn’t pay them any more. Their young FF catchment dried up too. They last all credibility with the public and all you were left with then were the party faithful who really aren’t that bright. That’s your starting point. These people think that politics is a see saw and that things will come back around to them. They have no concept of the finality of their situation. These guys look at FF’s fortunes and they go “oh well we started doing badly around the time he left so obviously if we bring him back we will start doing well again.” It’s as simple as that and they are as daft as that and these are the people that the party reperesents as a proxy for the population. They’re daft fuckers and they’re the reason why any vote for FF is just a waste of a vote. They need to wind up and get ingested into FG already and let the rougher hold join Sinn Féin and just move tf on

    EDIT these are the same daft feckers continuously giving out about MM and says he’s holding the party back when in fact he’s probably the only reason they’re anywhere at all. MM’s genius move was to put the lipstick on the pig and deflect from all the gobshitery going on behind him.

  24. I never understood the whole bank account thing? Was he being paid he ministerial salary in cash? Surely its easy to prove that someone on the government payroll has an account?

  25. We talked about this over Sunday dinner today. In my view, there’s two Berties.

    There’s the great peacemaker, and the corrupt politician. I enjoy listening to his contributions on things like Brexit and potential unification, because I think he has a very good understanding of Ulster loyalism and of the statecraft necessary to bring about a lasting NIP and a potential unification scenario.

    However, I can’t countenance him potentially becoming the head of state, and I hope that people are aware that when they go to the polls in 2025 that he is, in the eyes of a tribunal (and therefore anyone who read its findings), an out and out crook.

    I think he has a role to play as an elder statesman as we inch towards a day of reckoning with the north, as we need to understand why peace is so important. But that role should be as a former Taoiseach and *not* as our President.

    Edit: just seeing the Martin isn’t *opposed* to him potentially rejoining FF. I’m a fan of Micheal Martin and think he’s a very decent man and able statesman, even if I don’t agree with all his politics. By marrying himself to the idea of a return of Bertie into politics, he might well destroy his legacy. It’s electoral suicide.

  32. Madness. People lost their homes, lost their pensions, lost their savings, got stuck with giant 35y mortgages even if they managed to keep the blasted thing paid, IMF, bailing out banks, tax rises, wages frozen for years, Irish Water foisted on us, not able to save for retirement, crippled trying to pay for childcare; on and on.

    He and his party had power for 14 y in the lead up to the crash. What party do you think did more to undermine housing policy in this country for years and years and years? I could see it in the early noughties, public housing stock being sold off and not replaced. Nasty poor quality housing being built. Not to mention he went to Russia in 2017 on some sort of trip with his pals to talk about investing in crimea in the face of eu sanctions. The man’s a corrupt “have no bank acc” gobshite with poor judgment to boot.

    The bloody nerve is unbelievable. If he was the only candidate I wouldn’t vote for him. They are dreaming if they think people would vote for him in any kind of numbers.

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