For the past decade when things were going well, the government provided support to Science Foundation Ireland, who dispense research grant funding to Irish third-level institutes.  This has resulted in an increase in the numbers of PhD graduates and has provided for the training of post-doctoral research scientists and has provided places in third-level institutes […]

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The German constitutional court has just made a decision on the Lisbon treaty and clarified what it says about an EU-wide army.  The findings are available here -
http://www.nationalplatform.org/lisbon-treaty/german-constitutional-court.html
What is relevant for Ireland is this particular passage:
384
(2) The wording of the Treaty of Lisbon does not oblige the Member States to provide national armed forces for […]

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I have identified three areas where there is need for structural reform in order for Ireland to prosper in the future - electoral reform, educational reform and entrepreneurial reform.  These are my thoughts on these issues. 

1. Reform the system of election.  There should be at least 10% of the elected officials (Senate and Dail) without […]

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1. Banks: Why make good banks and bad banks?  In the national spirit, why not have some indifferent banks?  In such a scenario the bank manager would be pretty indifferent when you came in looking for a mortgage.  You ask for a mortgage and he is not sure about it, he’ll think about it and […]

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Very interesting post about Libertas and that member of the landed gentry elite, Lord Ganley.:
http://cedarlounge.wordpress.com/2009/01/12/uh-oh-someone-better-tell-chairman-ganley-the-prague-libertas-office-doesnt-appear-to-be-returning-his-calls/

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Sometimes all we have is our reputation.
This point has been illustrated very vividly this morning in Waterford, where the only thing of value, it seems, that is left in the Waterford Crystal factory is its reputation.  And indeeed, how valuable it is proving to be.  For more than 200 years this company has survived recessions, […]

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Was watching Questions and Answers last night and one thing came across stronger than ever.
Declan Ganley rabbits on about there being an elite in Brussels and they don’t listen to the people.  However, the truth is that the politicians in Brussels have to listen to the people, otherwise they don’t get elected.  They only got […]

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I see the BBC is listing a bunch of options for the EU after the Irish NO vote.  One of them, bizzarely is that the Irish would get additional opt-out protocols inserted in the treaty with guarantees on, among other things, abortion.
There was a cast-iron guarantee concerning article 40.3.3 written into Lisbon.  Are the BBC […]

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It looks like the NO vote will win today and the EU reform treaty will not be ratified by Ireland.
Scare tactics
My opinion on this is that this has been a success for the politics of the scare tactic and a tremendous success for George Bush’s mouthpiece in Ireland.  The EU project has hit a major […]

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Well, according to Paddy Power, the Lisbon Treaty will make it through.  The YES camp are odds-on favourites, with the NO camp being at 2-1.
The interesting one is the margin of victory.  The shortest odds are for a victory between 50.01-54%.  The odds here are 4-7, that is to say if you bet 7 Euro, […]

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