The Irish bailout - it's not our fault!

There is something comforting about being back on familiar territory as the laughing stock of Europe. The world, even. Nearly like pulling on a pair of tatty old slippers.

After years of listening to the nonsense about the Irish economic miracle – obviously unsustainable – we are back in the ha’penny place, blaming everyone else for our ills as usual.

The current public sentiment in Ireland, possibly fostered by sections of the media and the blogosphere, would appear to be that it is all the fault of the Germans and the French. The Germans especially, as their banks “recklessly loaned” (David McWilliams on Today FM, 29th Nov) money to Irish banks.

This kind of logic is much the same as that emanating from the whinging Irish investors who were like flies around ordure at every apartment launch not that long ago, snapping units up off the plans – aided by Irish Government tax incentives. It is not Johnny and Mary’s fault: it is the banks' for loaning them all that money.

Now Johnny and Mary, along with Irish institutions, companies, builders and developers, cannot pay back those loans because they borrowed too much for their properties, which were overvalued by their own speculation, and are now in negative equity. They borrowed money they could never realistically pay back, for properties that were worth less than they are. So now they and the banks are bust... or would be but for the bailout and the money the ECB has already pumped into them.

Granted, the Irish banks – who were better appraised of the domestic economy than those in Berlin or Paris – were only too happy to loan recklessly.  But were John and Mary complaining as they got the go-ahead for their latest interest-only loan? No, they thought they were on the pig’s back. Now that they have fallen off, everyone else is at fault.

The games of denial and blame, of course, all add to the comedic element, and no doubt provide added mirth to those watching events from abroad.

But that’s what we’re good at.


Speaking of which, here’s an amusing-enough joke from last Sunday’s Tribune:
An angry man walks into a bar, orders a drink and says to the barman “All Fianna Failers are arseholes”.
A man sitting at the other end of the bar pipes up “Hey, I resent that!”.
“Why, are you a Fianna Failer?” replies the first man.
“No”, comes the answer, “I’m an arsehole”.


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