Damien Mulley

Well I think that’s what they mean when Ciaran Cuffe says all their election posters get turned into sewerage pipes.

The smell of Polypropylene on my hands from the election posters. (yes we are recycling them, into sewer pipes)

But will they take any shit from Fianna Fáil if they find themselves in Government with them?

Amazing that the political parties pay experts to brief them on broadband and telecoms and then they come up with the following backwards, mundane, buzzword laden tripe:

Fine Gael in Government will adopt a two-stage strategy to revolutionise broadband access in Ireland recognising that Ireland has one of the lowest take-ups of broadband in the EU and the total failure of Government policy in this area, with many householders and businesses unable to connect to a broadband service.

It’s more than just takeup. There’s quality, there’s competition and there’s the future.

• We will immediately prioritise the extension of access to basic broadband services across the whole country. Other countries with similar population density and settlement patterns, such as Norway and Northern Ireland, have achieved 100% coverage of basic broadband services long ago. We will ensure it happens here.

How? Care to mention the way this will be done? Do you actually know or would you do what Dempsey did and just ask the Civil Servants? Cos you know, that really worked didn’t it?

• We will move quickly to put in place so-called Next Generation networks that will improve on the existing broadband service as a second stage in our strategy to create a fresh vision of our future telecoms needs. The fastest broadband available to households in Ireland is still slower than that available in many countries.

If you do get into Government, how will you do this? How how how? NGN is a buzzword that the current Government are latching on to as well.

• We will achieve this vision in a way that will be efficient and speedy and will not be characterised by an overblown budget or an inordinate delay. A number of options are available.

Talk, talk, talk.

One possibility is to create a brand new infrastructure under State control.

A little more detail there lads?

Another possibility is the pooling, integration and further development of existing telecom assets of private and public bodies under the management of a new Public Private Partnership, with organisations taking ownership shares in the new entity commensurate with the value of the assets contributed – subject to control by the State of the infrastructure.

Sounds really messy. Too many stakeholders spoil the broth?

• We will work, over a short and well-defined period, with ComReg and the industry participants to agree a plan to achieve this vision in the shortest time and most cost effective manner.

Same ole shit,, different political ribbon. You cannot guarantee shortest time and cost effective. Working with the telecoms poodle means it’s doomed.

If this is how Fine Gael plans on our telecoms future then Ireland isn’t going improve.

Via the BBC Editor’s blog is another Michael Howard Newsnight moment. No, not the most famous one where he got asked the same question 12 times by Paxman but where he rips into Alistair Campbell and does it in such a cool and reserved way. Campbell really seemed stuck for a reply besides the “You’re a sore loser” line.

This is of course the most famous Newsnight clip ever:

Via Irish Election is the Bertie statement. Leave my family alone is the gist. Good spin.

See it starts out well but then goes downhill after the first 30 milliseconds. I can just see them planning this over their half double decaffeinated half-caf, with a twist of lemon.

Roight, the main requirement, roight, is not to make him look wooden, so, ye know, I think we need to make him as animated as possible.

And that they did. Ladies and gentlemen it’s the elastic spastic show! All he was short was to tap dance. Actually if he did he’d get more respect. Right now the video starts off with a twist, a lean, a hand moving from one side to the other of the body and resting on the other hand.

He’s talking a little too quickly. Props bad. Put the paper down. Stop saying contract so much, stop talking about signing it so much. There’s repetition to enforce something and there’s repetition in a way that tells the audience “Dearest fuckwits.” Guess which Enda appears to be doing? Now, why are you looking at us like that? You appear to be lecturing us. You are acting like a teacher giving out to a naughty child. Get away from behind the desk, it makes you looking like you do not treat the viewers equally.

And then there’s the middle. STOP SHOUTING. It’s torture. Stop shouting “sign the contract”. This is the kind of shit that they force prisoners in Guantanamo to watch on repeat in order to break them. Only FG fanboys thought the speech was worth watching again.

The video ends then with the whole teacher pupil relationship and not the fantasty school uniform, misbehaving school pupil being punished by the hot teacher. Like they’d have anyone able to fill that roll anyway… Overall this is awful. The idea and the facts are good but the implementation was beyond lousy. But at least FG had their leader in their video besides old bats talking about Fianna Fail being amazing cos they gave them electricity and brought the wheel and fire to Ireland.

Update: The killer quote from Treasa:

I think your party political broadcast is a shambles and poorly produced and patronising and all sorts of bad things like that…and if I think you paid good money to communications consultants for it, I’ll wonder if I can trust Fine Gael to get me value for money when they can’t get value for their own