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Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Ten Irish political predictions for 2009

Taking my key from Cllr Forde, my ten predictions at random are

1. Fianna Fail to fail to overtake FG in European Parliamentary representation. They could even lose in Dublin though it is unlikely, fact is I think Labour are more vulnerable.
2. Obama's first foreign policy military crisis will involve an attack on US territory but not the continental US. Guam or somewhere like that.
3. Greece continues to suffer from serious civil unrest. A national government or even a military coup could be in prospect
4. Ireland fail to qualify for the Soccer World Cup.
5. Lisbon Treaty is passed in November by 55% to 45%
6. Irish Unemployment for 2009 peaks at 11%. but then stabilises at that level rather than significantly falling back.
7. Teachers and ESB workers strike.
8. The waning of immigration
9. Anglo Irish ceases to exist as it is taking into state control. BOI and AIB bob along. Eventually I expect RBOS or Santander or even a sovereign investment fund, someone foreign at least, to hoover up a lot of the smaller banks including Anglo. Oddly enough this leads to the emergence of a genuine 3rd player in Irish banking
10. FG to do the double in Dublin South and Central! Those elections to be held the same day as the European and local elections.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

1. Fianna Fail to fail to overtake FG in European Parliamentary representation. They could even lose in Dublin though it is unlikely, fact is I think Labour are more vulnerable.

I agree with the first half for sure. But I just don't see PdeR struggling, unfortunately.

2. Obama's first foreign policy military crisis will involve an attack on US territory but not the continental US. Guam or somewhere like that.

Heh!? Do you need to share something here?

3. Greece continues to suffer from serious civil unrest. A national government or even a military coup could be in prospect

Mmmmm interesting....would have massive implucation for EU.

4. Ireland fail to qualify for the Soccer World Cup.

Negative thoughts are bad, negative thoughts are bad...

5. Lisbon Treaty is passed in November by 55% to 45%

Suspect so, I thought it was in october though.

6. Irish Unemployment for 2009 peaks at 11%. but then stabilises at that level rather than significantly falling back.

Yep.

7. Teachers and ESB workers strike

ditto

8. The waning of immigration

Can't count as a prediction its already happening.

9. Anglo Irish ceases to exist as it is taking into state control. BOI and AIB bob along. Eventually I expect RBOS or Santander or even a sovereign investment fund, someone foreign at least, to hoover up a lot of the smaller banks including Anglo. Oddly enough this leads to the emergence of a genuine 3rd player in Irish banking

Ok.


10. FG to do the double in Dublin South and Central! Those elections to be held the same day as the European and local elections.

I think Alex White will take the DS seat.

Unknown said...

1). I think it is less about PdeR struggle so much as there not being mobile transfers in the way there were last time. No Ivana this time to tie up left leaning voters, so Joe and RBB if he runs should do better. Deirdre will bomb big time. And SF will benefit from the Libertas candidate. Nope, I think given that it is European election and in the context of Lisbon that there are more transfers for MLM than PdeR.

2). I'm challenging my inner Charlie Stross there.

3). I agree the EU has never properly considered how it would deal with a military coup in a member state or even more oddly a properly fascist government denuded of the racism/anti-Semitism of the Nazis.

4). I could be hedging my bets in that it could just Stephen Ireland that doesn't qualify.

5). I'm going Nov so that it is more of a distraction in the lead up to Budget '09

Anonymous said...

Oooh, not very positive predictions there. The teachers strike, in particular, sends shivers up my spine. I was in school during the last one and, while it was nice for the first while, it soon descended into chaos. Needs to be prevented, although I can understand how frustrated the teachers must be after all the cuts. They're not miracle workers.

I also like how the soccer makes it onto a political predicitions list :)