From top: Acting Taoiseach Leo Varadkar: Sinn Fein negotiating team, from left: Matt Carthy TD, Pearse Doherty TD and David Cullinane TD at Leinster House this afternoon

Leo Varadkar said the rallies are “designed to be the next phase in Sinn Féin’s campaign of intimidation and bullying”.

He added: “I wouldn’t be surprised if their next step is to take to the streets.”

Speaking at an event in Dublin, Mr Varadkar said: “It shows once again this is not a normal party.”

Sinn Féin is planning five rallies – the first in Cork tonight [see below] – with the others in Dublin, Galway, Cavan and Newry.

SF rallies an ‘unwelcome development’ – Varadkar (RTÉ)

Rollingnews

UPDATE:

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61 thoughts on “Rallying Cry

  1. b

    SF’s housing plan, backed by billions of new money will rest on encouraging developers to forgo commercial development in favour of social housing

    I assume all those meetings to arrange that will be livestreamed then?

    can’t wait

    1. theo kretschmar schuldorff

      The rallies seem intended to protest the following important issue:
      37 + 12 + 5 + 6 < 80

    1. Dr.Fart

      jesus. leo has derailed so hard that even one of his biggest fanboys is criticising him, “a bit.”

    2. realPolithicks

      That’s how bad things have become for FFG, even rob thinks leo is talking through his derriere. It’ll be cian next, the cracks are showing lads.

      1. 01101101 01100011

        to give Rob_G his due…with me at least any to + fro discussions I’ve had with him have been based on fairly straight lines

        but clearly there are others on here who may be flying a wee bit too close to the sun

  2. Brughahaha

    Whats wrong with taking to the street Leo?
    Though the right to protest was a cornerstone of democracy ..clearly Leo thinks otherwise.

    1. bisted

      …would these be like the ‘monster meetings’ of Dan O’Connell’s time…don’t think they were approved of by the ruling class either…

    2. Cian

      “Whats wrong with taking to the street Leo?”
      In a democracy we have a thing called elections. And they are there to give the various parties their mandate – and the outcome shows what the people think. If there hadn’t been an election in a few years then a demonstration may make sense. But we literally had an election last month.

      The people have spoken.
      They said “m’eh… we can’t decide which of you should be in power”.

      1. Jeffrey

        I disagree on your last assessment. First preference votes are not to be ignored, they are the most important marker of elections (you know, like who got first place?) – Ireland happens to have a sh*tty election process with transfers (who ever thought that was a good idea…) but be sure that in a “normal” election SF was taking the house, shed and the all garden too.

        1. A Person

          Hello all SFIRA. You did not win the election. If you did, why have you not formed a govt. You can bully all you like on here and moan about Dublin media, but you did not win the election. As for this nonsense of talking about first preference votes, seriously grow up. The PR system is widely adjudged to be the most democratic way of voting – I know you shinners are not used to democracy.

          1. Dr.Fart

            i don’t see much democracy from your lot, person. Eg. Fine Gael defying the findings of the data protection commissioner on the PSC. Clubbing together to demonise and destroy the life of whistle-blower McCabe. Murphy meeting privately with developers to change rules so they could build co-living blocks. . . The list goes on and on. All this shouting of warnings from FFFG about SF as if they have any kind of decent record to boast of, and not just the destruction of the country over decades. so sling your hook, you grouchy status quo keeping deluded crackpot.

          2. Cian

            @Fart: you should learn want democracy means.
            None of your examples are related to democracy or lack thereof.

        2. Cian

          @Jeffrey
          1st preferences: SF: 24.5% FF: 22.2% FG: 20.9%
          TDs: SF: 23.3% FF: 23.3% FG: 22.0% (if you exclude the Ceann Comhairle)

          The reason the SF have 2 fewer seats than they should is because they didn’t put enough candidates forward.

          1. Cian

            Oh, and if this election was judged as a first-past-the-post then we would have:
            SF: 39 (+2)
            FF: 47 (+10)
            FG: 33 (-1)
            Others: 40 (-10)

            In 18 of 39 constituencies the eventual winners were already top placed after 1st preference – so transfers made no difference.

        3. Rob_G

          It’s amazing that Jeffrey is referring to a party that got one-quarter of first preferences; the way people are going on, you’d think SF got 70% of the vote, and were somehow diddled out of an additional 40 seats…

      2. 01101101 01100011

        Hi Cian

        see this is the problem ye now face

        if only Leo had done his job properly and represented the interests of ALL his fellow citizens equally in the first place instead of just SOME of them, eh?

        and that kind of response of his only serves to make the establishment look a little more silly, petty perhaps and it’s a really tough one to overcome

        I hardly imagine that meeting/demo/whatever tf it is would have amounted to a hill of beans, generated much energy, interest, involvement. Now? It might even make Reuters!?! strategy like this is nearly impossible to counteract lest be accused of being against a citizens right to gather in a public place, express their opinion, have their voices heard, etc. take your hint from stateside, just look at how the finest minds struggle with Trump

        a half-clever move and a predictable dinosaur response

        how is he still employed?

        1. Cian

          Do you honestly think that SF will represent ALL citizens equally?

          Every decision that a government makes has both positive and negative impacts. There is a finite amount of money so all money spent somewhere is effectively not spent somewhere else. If they decide to spend money on, say, health over defence – there is a negative impact directly on the defence forces and also various knock-on effects. Once the money is allocated to health where it is spent will have a positive (and negative) impact.

          If you have an axe to grind you can point at the negative parts and ignore the positive – and say “look at those people – the government is not representing them”.

          1. 01101101 01100011

            If you have an axe to grind

            Cian, stating the obvious won’t help you much here

            Your Taoiseach has let an awful lot of people down, a fact demonstrated to him in person at the election just past…he’s had his arse handed to him on a plate in that election yet here he still is somehow? the longer the better imho! spinning furiously and still not seeing where he went wrong and worse still 100% clueless about how to stop the slow motion car crash (would someone in FG take the shovel off him ffs? :) :)

            Maybe if he had paid more attention to my big sis (now effectively emigrated to Aus), my older bro who despite his so-called great job in a Dublin code factory can’t remotely plan a future family life together here with his girl and will be gone by the end of the year, me myself in my final year who can already see the writing on the wall and am presently planning a life in a much fairer European country with a younger bro who will likely be following me out –

            maybe if Mr. Varadker and his super special economic model had cared enough for the ones like us I mightn’t be so pssed off. 4x highly trained and educated people under 30 who won’t be participating in your economic slavery model Cian. Myself and my siblings get to pay a price though, a father who despite appearances I know will find it hard that all his kids are proper gone and an upset mam who doesn’t “do skype”

            So do enjoy your economic success Cian!

            I’m delighted for you that you are enjoying the positive parts of his legacy. Me? I’ll just keep grinding the oul axe here :)

            ps. I couldn’t give a fupp about SF. but I’ll certainly enjoy watching them outwit and outfox your sophisticated eejits ;)

            LOL

          2. Cian

            you say “4x highly trained and educated people”
            isn’t that nice that the country you grew up in believes in free primary and secondary education and heavily subsidized 3rd level? See not everything in Ireland is awful.

            Perhaps if FG had re-routed money from 3rd level education (they should have gone down the student loan route back in 2010??) and put that money into social housing you’d be in a different situation?
            a) you’d be uneducated with access to cheaper housing…. but no job; or
            b) have a €60K loan to pay back before you could get a mortgage to pay for your cheaper housing.
            would that be better? or just different? perhaps you and your siblings would be better off…but others would be worse off.

          3. 01101101 01100011

            yes Cian…I should be quiet now and go with the flow, drink that koolaid and follow Leo’s lead! accept his system with all its limits and fits and do the best I can with that. yes, all will be great as the trickle down eventually reaches me, hm? I should be grateful yadda yadda. its not all bad, look at those rich kids over there, shure I can aspire to be one of them?

            except my education was far from free and your contribution to it for me and that of my siblings was minimal – I have my parents and hard work in my part time job to thank for meeting my fees, expenses and rent.

            Is this the bit where you go off now and come up with some stats to support your argument because, like, we could be Greece or something something? would you hope that I’ll have some kind of epiphany, realise how I’m doing it wrong, not working hard enough, cheating the system, not getting up early enough etc? oh and that I’m making it even worse because I’m not playing ball with your twisted economy driven logic and in turn I’m the problem, like I’ve signed up to be part of some economic pyramid scheme and now I’m spoiling it for others by refusing to perpetuate it? yeah, my fault LOL

            (what IS this obsession anyway with Tories and their urge to compare us to other nations, cobble up endless excuses to justify their Us and Them ideology and the (failing) attempt to install it here? bizarre :)

          4. Cian

            I have never said that Ireland is perfect – far from it.

            I’m just saying that there are some great things in Ireland (e.g. education) and we should show some thanks for the stuff that is done well (and also acknowledging that there is room for improvement). Yes, you paid some money for collage (and you had a part-time job – that is tough – I had to work through college too) but unless you are a non-EU student you were hugely subsidised by the taxpayer.

            ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I’m a glass-half-full person – I appreciate the things that are there. You come across as a glass-half-empty – you will only acknowledge the stuff that is missing,

          1. GiggidyGoo

            Are they protesting about the result of the election Cian? My, but you’re scraping the bottom of the barrel these past few weeks. If that’s the standard of pawns FG now sends out, it’s disappointing.

          2. GiggidyGoo

            Looks like they’re having a public meeting to me. Are you saying such public meetings are protests? What would the likes of JoB Madigan be protesting about then?

    3. class wario

      The neolibs are extremely strong believers in ‘democracy’ as a concept only being invoked every 4-5 years and only by way of the ballot box. Anything else is seditious.

      1. Cian

        I’m not sure who you are referring to. But the fact of the matter is that there was an election last month. Nothing major has happened since.

        The 25% are moaning that they only got 25% of the votes.

        1. GiggidyGoo

          The only ones licking their wounds are the FFGers. So much so that they are populating the Seanad with their failed election candidates.

    1. Jeffrey

      Rallies would be more in view of an election and composed of mostly supporters. Here its public meetings where everyone is welcome. Leo clutching at straws is all.

    2. Dr.Fart

      theyre public meetings. he’s using the word ‘rally’ to draw comparisons with Trump. Other parties, including his own, have public meetings regularly. He’s purposely changing the name to try avoid the hypocrisy being pointed out. But he’s underestimating the people once again.

  3. 01101101 01100011

    LOL

    more panic pants from the establishment!

    you can see the knots in his head oherrr…this isn’t how it’s supposed to work..sht..sht…make urgent note to PA…get Drew on the line asap…could he get some of those lads in the dodge ex-Manchester police vans to attend and stir things up a bit…or is that too obvs…ooherrrr..help

    also tell me, will people catch Coronavirus if they are minded to attend?

      1. missred

        I do believe the handshaking thing at mass was discouraged during the swine flu epidemic, so sure, why not…

      2. Spaghetti Hoop

        I was at a funeral recently and the celebrant said yiz can just nod at each other if ye don’t want to shake hands.

        Panic stations (of the cross). Influenza kills something like 6000 people a year and there was no nodding alternative for that!

  4. Dr.Fart

    he’s in the death throes. i fear he’ll flail and flap for a long time yet, sticking to his guns and using the tactits that saw his downfall.

  5. V

    Bit rich in fairness
    Cribbing about the Shinners going out an about, booking Hotels, just like loads of their own pals in-between elections, advertising public information meetings and hosting Town Hall type community forums

    Great big cry baby there Leo,

    Especially when we remind ourselves that even at a National Exec level, both FG and FF aren’t a bit shy about the size of their own tents when they take over the Ploughing with their own rallies –
    in wellies, putting out plates of custard cremes n’ everything

    And quite frankly Leo’s own #CheatersCheatUsAll was exactly what he said there campaign of intimidation and bullying

    Someone needs to put a dummy into Leo’s trap there
    Cian?
    Tis worse ye’re making it for yerselves

  6. frank

    I sadly lived in Dundrum for a period of time. Any given week of the year you could go to either a Josepha Madigan or Neale Richmond public rally in the Goat grill of a Tuesday or Wednesday night.
    There is probably a FG rally there tonight about the sinister rallies this Sinn Fein lot are attempting

  7. Dr.Fart

    the demise of varadkar and FG is delicious. the only thing as tasty is watching the melt-down of Rob_G and Cian

    1. A Person

      Again SFIRA, you supposedly won the election. Where is your govt formation? As opposed to attacks on:everyone in msm: the leader of our police force (not MI5 – even Mary Lou supported his appointment, although I didn’t); and everyone who comments on here. Get off the ditch and hurl.

      1. Dr.Fart

        you’re using so many varadkar lines that i think you might actually be him. SF don’t have enough seats to form a gov. and FF and FG refuse to talk to Mary-Lou. A move done purposely so it will look like SF won’t form a gov., but it’s impossible with FFFG refusing to talk. They’re playing silly buggers, and you’re fully onboard, peddling their stupid untruths and encouraging their games. I think all signs point to you being in FG. Maybe a TD. You peddle their lies and you also speak like them. Sports analagies etc., you stink of one.

        In an ideal world, for you, how would you have liked the election to go? Would you like if it was a clean sweep for FG? sole power for them? if so. why? Why do you think FG are a good party to run the country? given how everyone else paying attention can see in clear light how awful their tenure was. Tell me why you think that’s as good a health service we can have, or as good a housing sectore as we can have? DOn’t be afraid to be honest, eg. if the answer if “because i’m a party member and I literally don’t care about anyone else except the shirt on my own back” … just be honest in ur answer. maybe its “i actually have no idea whats going on but im sticking to my guns anyway” .. be honest

        1. A Person

          I am not a party member, unlike most of you and your made up colleagues on here (all lads). I have said this repeatedly I am biased again the shinners because of their very recent history, including Up the Ra comments (SFIRA), and because of their ideology. I don’t like the fact that you still have unelected people from outside this state having a say in our affairs eg Michelle O’Neill at every photo op, and Gerry on the negotiating team. Housing and health is a mess, but given your policies of narrowing the tax base, and getting rid of property tax (all populist crap) how will these be fixed? Oh, and the constant spin – we won the election.!!!! Your didn’t. Again attack me, you “must be a FFFG TD” (ffs) as opposed to the issues.

          1. GiggidyGoo

            “I don’t like the fact that you still have unelected people from outside this state having a say in our affairs……”
            Yet you have no problem with Drew Harris and his British entourage? Armed too, rolling around in this State.
            G’way will ya!

          2. A Person

            He was appointed in this state. Was Michelle O’Neill elected or appointed to any office in this state? No she was not. Did Mary Lou friends object at the time? No she did not. Why don’t you just go back to ruling your own little statelet?

          3. GiggidyGoo

            He wasn’t elected. That was your point.
            And you dodged the point then about Drew Harris and his non-state/non-elected/ non-appointed assortment of armed bodyguards cruising around this State.
            But you west brit blueshirts wouldn’t be bothered by that of course.

          4. Frank

            this is the new narrative with regard Sinn Fein.
            “they are bullying and shouting down discourse on social media”.
            splutter. the temerity of the rabble questioning the status quo. how very dare they.

            also. do you have a problem with the unelected governance we get from Brussels or do you just hate our northern brothers and sisters.
            theres a name for that type of A person.

          5. A Person

            Again you just proved my point, Belfast bully boys. You just attack people who disagree with you and never address the issues. Was Harris appointed in this state (I have no idea about his security detail)? Did Mary Lou object to his appointment? Was Michelle O’Neill elected or appointed to any office in this state? Did SFIRA win the election?

  8. :-Joe

    Urgh,,, listen up you dopey F-f/g apologists…

    SF have the upper hand not because they have a majority with 25% vs 25%+25% or because they represent change..

    It’s because nobody wants F-f/g in together again as a coalition etc. Not even most of the deluded 50%-ish of voters and supporters of both halves of the F-f/g establishment for the bhoys party.

    Stop whinging about the past history of the IRA and the north and objecting to freedom of assembly and the right to protest..

    Der Leodar is a west-brit tory(scum) wannabe charlatan… Literally taking a dump on republicanism and democracy right in front of your nose. Along with me-hole martini…

    You’re all acting like clueless daft f’n eejits!

    :-J

    1. A Person

      And that’s the quality of your reply? We won 25% and therefore we should win! Seriously….how old are you?

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