Leo Varadkar (2 Viewers)

rettucs

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Post of the week winner: 22nd March, 2013
Is Leo Varadkar the world's greatest genius whose trying too hard to make us think hes not a genius or is the guy as big a moron as he seems?

I had to do a double take the other week when he said there would be no referendum on whatever that EU finance thing Noonan was trying to sneak in because a referendum would be (I shit you not) 'undemocratic'.

Now I read this in the Irish times. The context is that he won't drop the tax/VAT applied to fuel (petrol/diesel) because he feels increasing it in the first place didn't raise much extra revenue for the state. Here is the logic he applied

“The Vat is 23 per cent but the evidence is that as people spend more on petrol or diesel so they spend less on other things. It is not the way people think it is. It is a crude comparison but people may spend less on clothes to spend more on fuel so there is actually no gain in terms of tax”.


eh, yea Leo, cos people don't have any more money to spend.

Then this bit;

Mr Varadkar said if there was a reduction in VAT on fuel, the money would have to be recovered elsewhere.


how about clothes Leo? Like, if not directly from clothes, from the money the people working in the clothes shops pay cos they still have a job, or the dole they don't have to draw cos they still have a job, or from those people manufacturing/importing/shipping the clothes (varying of course, depending on where and by whom the clothes were made).

Hes a bit of a dunce really, no? The new Conor Lenihan if you like. Eamonn Dunphy said that he used to like Varadkar, that he was always worth listening to, but since he became a TD hes lost the ability to think for himself. I don't pay very close attention to politics or politicians, but he ain't wrong about that second part.

Anyway I'm going to update this thread every time Leo says something stupid. I expect it to be a pretty active thread.
 
I look forward to the updates. I don't know what to make of him myself. I didn't like his comment about democracy, I reckon he's in it for himself like the rest of them (except for that coveney lad who doesnt know what he's doing) and he doesn't want people interfering with the mandate they got in the election etc.
 
And overall, the whole crisis is the people's fault.
They voted in Fianna Fail, knowing that they were corrupt as fuck, every one of them up in front of one Tribunal or another.
Everyone that cast a vote for FF - and a majority did, were saying they wanted the housing bubble to persist and fuck everything else.
Well, that's what they got.

Now there's a massive mess and they bitch about everything that the crowd they voted in to take care of it does.

Democracy is a joke, because people are buffoons.
I don't have a better system though.
 
well, i was thinking specifically of lowry when i wrote that post.

Right. He's a cute hoor, but he's our cute hoor.
Master of the system, that guy. Horrible human being obviously.

And, I would venture, the black sheep within FG. That he wasn't a FF man still staggers me.
 
how about clothes Leo? Like, if not directly from clothes, from the money the people working in the clothes shops pay cos they still have a job, or the dole they don't have to draw cos they still have a job, or from those people manufacturing/importing/shipping the clothes (varying of course, depending on where and by whom the clothes were made).

Didn't they increase excise duty on fuel in the budget too? VAT is applied right at the end AFAIK (certainly when we import stuff in work we pay VAT on the import duty) so you're actually paying more money to the government in 2 ways, the increase in the excise and the increase on VAT on the increase to the excise. I would be shocked if that's having a negative impact on the tax take elsewhere.

He was in the year above me in school, I thought he was an arsehole then too.
 
Referendums are undemocratic.
We have a representative democracy not a direct one.
The people voted for this coalition and now they have to live with it.
You can't put every decision before the people, it would be bonkers.

If it's a constitutional issue, let someone challenge it in the courts.

But they are only democratic when the government wants you to vote again and again until there masters in Europe get the result that they want (Nice and Lisbon). Now though the Irish people have wised up to this little ruse, have turned virulently anti Europe and they know damn well that we will vote NO. So now the spin is that referendums are undemocratic.This is double speak that would make George Orwell proud. Our sovereignty is gone - we are just another province of the IMF/ECB and our elected representatives are mere figure heads.
 
Now though the Irish people have wised up to this little ruse, have turned virulently anti Europe and they know damn well that we will vote NO.

See,I think thats what Varadker was getting at with his 'undemocratic' talk,I reckon that any referendum put in front of us now will be shot down merely so we can give the government a poke in the eye,we wouldn't be voting on the referendum so much as on the austerity deal that's been foisted upon us.
Still,it was an unfortunate turn of phrase for Leo to use.
 
bertie used to make noises about calling referenda over issues which should have been dealt with in legislation; handy way of washing your hands of responsibility over divisive issues.
 
And overall, the whole crisis is the people's fault.
They voted in Fianna Fail, knowing that they were corrupt as fuck, every one of them up in front of one Tribunal or another.
Everyone that cast a vote for FF - and a majority did, were saying they wanted the housing bubble to persist and fuck everything else.
Well, that's what they got.

Now there's a massive mess and they bitch about everything that the crowd they voted in to take care of it does.

Democracy is a joke, because people are buffoons.
I don't have a better system though.

So, so true. I am a firm believer that the leaders we elect and the system we employ mirrors the type of people we are as a nation (in as far as one can stereotype a nation of people or lump them into one homogeneous group). Some people are greedy, ergo, we get greedy people in power. People like to do things under the table or pull strokes, ergo, ...etc etc etc.
 
See,I think thats what Varadker was getting at with his 'undemocratic' talk,I reckon that any referendum put in front of us now will be shot down merely so we can give the government a poke in the eye,we wouldn't be voting on the referendum so much as on the austerity deal that's been foisted upon us.
Still,it was an unfortunate turn of phrase for Leo to use.

We have every right to vote on this, in any case ,don't forget we voted against two European treaties already so that can't be really used as an excuse. Actually it is important that we vote on this preferably with a NO vote because the treaty only consolidates and centralises more power to the ECB.
 
So, so true. I am a firm believer that the leaders we elect and the system we employ mirrors the type of people we are as a nation (in as far as one can stereotype a nation of people or lump them into one homogeneous group). Some people are greedy, ergo, we get greedy people in power. People like to do things under the table or pull strokes, ergo, ...etc etc etc.

The sad thing is is that we won't have learned from this and more than likely we will vote back in the same gangsters that got us into this mess in the first place. Remember it was FF who guaranteed the banks, it was FF who ignored warnings from economists etc so it is not entirely our fault.
 
The sad thing is is that we won't have learned from this and more than likely we will vote back in the same gangsters that got us into this mess in the first place. Remember it was FF who guaranteed the banks, it was FF who ignored warnings from economists etc so it is not entirely our fault.

It was the electorate that wanted income tax reductions. It was the electorate that wanted no stamp duty for first-time buyers, tax relief on investment property. Many of us were complicit in the mania, we also ignored warnings from the boffins, head in the sand type shit.
 
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