EDITOR – Halfway through the General Election campaign, it’s disheartening to see our political parties stuck in a cycle of short-term promises – welfare increases, tax cuts, and energy credits. These may be popular, but they fail to address the long-term vision Ireland desperately needs.
The reality is that our political leaders act this way because it’s what we, the electorate, demand. My toddlers might want sweets and ice cream every day, but as a parent, I have a responsibility to give them what they need, not what they want. Leadership means thinking beyond the immediate, even when it’s unpopular. Yet political parties won’t do this – they can’t afford to. If they offer tough but necessary solutions, they won’t get elected – unless we demand it.
This is where we, the electorate, must step up. We need to hold our politicians to higher standards. The future direction of our country cannot come down to who promises to fill the most potholes or who offers an extra fiver in your pocket. These aren’t solutions – they’re distractions.
Instead, I challenge my fellow constituents to demand better. Ask candidates how they plan to fix the system so that the same pothole won’t crack open again next winter.
Ask how they’ll build a sustainable future, where Ireland can lead in renewable energy, solve the housing crisis with streamlined regulations, and create an economy that supports our needs for generations to come.
We’ve learned over the years that throwing money at problems doesn’t fix them. If it did, we’d have the best healthcare system in the world. Instead, we need creativity.
Ireland is at a crossroads. We have the resources and potential to tackle our greatest challenges, but it requires us, the voters, to demand creativity, vision, and bold thinking from our leaders. Let’s change the script.
The first step to winning big as a country is to think big.
Gearoid Buckley,
Timoleague.
Can we entrust nature to our politicians?
EDITOR – With the election campaign underway I hope that the urgency of nature restoration and the need to save what’s left of our fragile co-systems will not be lost amid the noise and distraction of political promises and fantasy manifestos.
Yes, more money in our pockets is always welcome, and in many cases vital just to lift people out of poverty, but without clean air to breathe, clean water to drink, and uncontaminated food to eat all the money in the state coffers or private financial accounts will not be worth the paper it’s printed on.
Our planet is dying, and acting as if this threat to our existences as a species will go away if we stop talking about it won’t help us much when the hands of the doomsday clock strike midnight.
Ireland’s role in the fight to save the planet might not seem so important in the grand scheme of things but, apart from our contribution to the cause, our example can also be crucial in swaying other nations that might be faltering.
In this respect I think it’s about time we ended our abysmal treatment of wildlife. Many species are tottering on the verge of extinction and precious habitats are being ravaged as if we wanted to be rid of them. Yet, the outgoing government, like the others preceding it all the way back to the foundation of the State, has allowed a host of despicably cruel practices that add to the ecological woes of our wild birds and animals.
Even birds whose conservation status is listed as ‘poor’ can be shot. Foxes still have no legal protection and are hounded from November to March, chased down and ripped apart for fun at this eleventh hour of our escalating planetary crisis.
Badgers, which are protected in law, have their protective status removed by special exemption to allow thousands of them to be snared and shot, scapegoats for the failure of the long-running and failed bovine eradication scheme.
The Irish hare is hailed by conservationists as the flagship of our biodiversity because it’s one of our few truly native mammals, dating to at least the Ice Age of 10,000 years ago and possibly back another 60,000 years before that. It has been in decline for the past half century due to habitat loss resulting from urbanisation and modern agriculture.
Yet, in the run-up to Christmas, hundreds of these creatures will be forced to run from hyped-up dogs … for a gamble and a laugh. Their cries pierce the winter air from Cork to Donegal as the dogs maul, strike, or toss them about on rain-sodden, wind-swept fields.
I don’t want to strike a pessimistic note, but can we honestly entrust the future of our ailing eco-systems; our diverse, life-enhancing flora and fauna, to politicians who licence this premeditated attack on the very symbol of nature in Ireland?
John Fitzgerald,
Callan,
Co Kilkenny.
Tell candidates how you feel about Gaza
EDITOR – The US has chosen the new face of its empire. Trump has already sworn his allegiance to Israel and thus also to the continued destruction of Palestine and its people.
While Biden/Kamala greenlit the genocide, it is clear that Trump will keep it going.
We know that facing yet another four years of a Trump presidency is terrifying. US-made bombs continue to drop on Gaza and Lebanon resulting in terrible human consequences.
Zionists and white supremacists will be even more emboldened by Trump’s win. The billions the Biden administration has sent to fund genocide in Gaza shows us that the priorities of the powerful are far from the needs of the people.
The Biden-Harris administration refused to listen to their base that overwhelmingly supports a ceasefire and a halt of weapons to Israel.
This corruption and violence is not confined to any one US election cycle, but is endemic to American institutions and history.
From the genocide of native peoples to the enslavement of black people, these legacies have paved the way for the US’s ongoing support of Israel’s genocide in Gaza, where Palestinians face unimaginable brutality daily.
As a general election looms, we need to let our candidates know that we want meaningful sanctions on apartheid Israel, and we want them now!
Start with banning bombs and bullets landing at Shannon en route to Israel.
Tell that to our aspiring candidates when they come calling. We have power in our votes and they all want them now.
Daniel Teegan,
Listarkin.
