Where else would you get it?
A businessman runs up massive debts during the bubble by speculating on Anglo Irish Bank shares and property, and thus goes bankrupt.
Because Fianna Fail and the Greens made the bank's debts sovereign, Quinn now owes the Irish taxpayer for the debts he ran up.
The State attempts to secure Quinn's money and assets on behalf of the taxpayer through the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, and Quinn attempts to put those assets and money beyond its jurisdiction and out of reach.
This means, of course, that the taxpayer will have to pay even more of Quinn's debts if he brazens it out, while he will remain rich while being nominally bankrupt.
Fintan O'Toole puts it well in today's Irish Times:
"TAKE ALL the money raised this year by the cuts in child benefit. And from cutting the school clothing and footwear allowance. And all the cuts to jobseekers’ benefit, rent supplement and fuel allowances for the elderly.
Throw in the restriction of one-parent family allowance to children under seven. Pile on all the cuts in back-to-education allowances and community employment schemes. Take all of that money from the pockets of the poorest people in Ireland this year and you still haven’t reached the amount Seán Quinn agrees he owes the Irish taxpayer.
This is nothing to do with the €2.3 billion he borrowed from Anglo Irish Bank to buy its shares. This is the €455 million he borrowed to buy property – using that property as security. In all the noise and distraction, this much is undisputed: Quinn borrowed the money and put up the property assets as collateral. The State, however idiotically, took over that loan. Since Quinn can’t pay it back, the Irish people now own those properties."
Instead of expressing outrage at Quinn's attempts to evade paying at least part of his debts to the taxpayer, over four thousand thick gobshites crowded the streets of Ballyconnell, Cavan, last weekend to express their support for him.
Several figures including a priest, Father Brian D'Arcy, and some "stars" from the GAA - whose names I can't recall - took the podium to defend Quinn, pledge their undying support, and bolster his sense of psychopathic victimhood.
Cue lots of hysterical whoops and cheers of support from the assembled masses of half-wits.
Not only is Ireland a nation riddled with gombeens, it is one riddled with utter gobshites of the highest order.
It is embarrassing, as well as infuriating, to behold.
19 comments:
Parish pump politics at it's finest. He gave direct employment to hundreds and indirect employment to thousands. No it can't even be that, most of these jobs have dried up, it could be the yokels don't like the largely Dublin media lambasting "their man" or indeed it could be you are right "gobshites out in force" GM.
I heard him on the radio saying that he never owed anyone a penny....... WHAT???
To plug the 1.5 billion shortfall in Quinn’s former insurance empire, we are all paying a levy of 3 % on all policies for the foreseeable future. As to the "Demonstration" of support for Quinn and his clan. This is a perfect reflection of the Tribal mentality that has always persisted in Ireland. We can trace it back to early Irish allegiance to the local warlord or High King as the romantic historians like to refer to them . It is interesting that the GAA which is a sporting manifestation of this tribal loyalty was out in force to support Quinn, who let us not forget owes about 2.9 Billion to the Irish taxpayer and has sought fit to hinder the lawfully constituted High Court of this Republic to disclose the where abouts of this money. In fact his family have derived benefit from payments from these Russian funds.
However, in the narrative of the supporters in Cavan we are presented with their version.
1. Fr. Darcy( Priest to the rich and famous) , Anglo brought down Sean Quinn.
2. Mickey Harte, Sure he made a few mistakes but he gave us jobs and great support to the GAA.
3. The general supporters, sure they never did anything for us here and Quinn employed 6,000 so we do not owe allegiance to our fellow Irish taxpayers.
I see that the High Court has allowed 30,000 a month for living costs and that that Quinn’s nephew was able to enjoy a GAA match last Sunday as has picture appeared in the Sunday Independent. Despite all this, we have fellow Irish citizens in Cavan who are in total denial of the criminal actions that have taken place. What excuse is there for this?????
GUBU
And that, Ladies and Gentlemen, is small-town Ireland and the GAA in a nutshell.
We don't mind being dumped on, so long as it's our own who are doing the dumping.
Father Ted d'Arcy even went so far as to suggest that it was Sean Quinn who single-handedly kicked off the peace process ... we just don't know what saint lives among us, we unworthies.
You mean Gombeen Nation didn't send a deputation to do a study for posterity? Maybe next time?
Such instances need to be verified by independent sources.
It needs to be bottled and sold GM, I tell you...That thoroughly Irish trait of creating complete and utter disaster only to wax lyrical about it afterwards. Where else would you get it? The despicable Irish system created Sean Quinn and tore him down only to have it's raw constituents support him again as they sense begrudery in the system. There is a certain level of told you so, always present in Irish Meja circles, but in this instance their supporters are conforming to type. And that of course is, that IRISH PASTIME OF SELF DELUSION. The whole Bloody country has lost the plot GM many many years ago and is well past redemption. This is just another post celtic tiger example of it. You just can't reason with the yokel culture in this country. You just learn to be bemused by it. It's just an alcoholic system of selfdestruction and recovery over and over again. DELUSION AND RESENTMENT ARE ITS LIFES BLOOD. You just can't change a system which is as old as the trees and the grass in the fields. It should of course have been controlled by the politicians and regulators. It wasn't.
...The victimhood bit is great GM. Maybe they think they're worth the 30000 big ones a month? A poetic instance of MAD Capitalism eating itself...All on TV.
...Oh yes victimhooood, inevitable, no? Given the timing and all the other "alleged" UNTOUCHABLES still living the high life. It's obvious now that lot wont get the time they deserve. That's Ireland, that's subtle. No Surprise.
Funny how all the legal hyperbole is only occuring now with the lads on holiers and the PROPERTY TAX on the horizon. If Ireland wasn't such a HOLE it would be ironic.
Folks, we see many, many, many, many ever-recurring examples of gobshiteism in our little land on a very regular basis.
This one, however, wins the Gombeen Nation Gold Cup for Gobshiteism
Congrats to Sean Quinn and family, the good burghers who rallied around for him, Father D'Arcy and the GAA.
The rest of the world can once again marvel at the stunning capacity of many (or maybe even most) of our fellow citizens to make complete and utter gobshites of themselves.
It is a proud moment.
I think there is more going on here. Quinn is an illiterate yokel who made it big, and therefore is a symbol of the way in which no one makes it and gets away with it unless they come up through the correct channels. He did not take the accepted route to wealth and influence, that is, the political, posh-educational, artistic, athletic, or clerical routes. He came from the back of beyond and simply appeared, ham fisted and pockets bursting with money on a truly national scale. This is not allowed. He rode the the tide of small-time corrupt and illegal shenanigans, not big-time corrupt and illegal shenanigans like proper, assimilated Irish scum. He is a gombeen man, a local fixer, an impertinent, hustling hick who operates outside the system, like a rich drug baron or pornographer. He is Pablo Escobar. He is Larry Flynt. He is deviant: an un-assimilated crook of national importance. As such, he was a symbol of hope for millions of ambitious culchies, and as such he must be taken down by the Republican Ascendancy.
Quinn will be pursued relentlessly so that the well-spoken, assimilated scum who own this island can continue to ass-rape us unperturbed, and so that we will continue to submit without complaint. Of course our betters have every right to piss all over us. We're Irish; we'd be lost if someone with a posher accent wasn't ploughing our asses. But we sure as Hell won't take it from some rich yokel. We may be a nation of spineless, submissive whores, but we have standards.
Quinn will be persecuted so that the "right" people won't see a day in court. Meanwhile, the culchies are mourning their shattered illusion, not Quinn himself. You see, during the tiger years, it appeared that any hick could make it. They were given hope. They thought, briefly, that a man does not have to come through the Republic's various hatcheries of assimilation and privilege, whose doors remain firmly locked to them. They thought, briefly, that the economy had ushered in something like a democracy. But now they see that, as always, they truly are a lesser breed, each destined to become a dessicated little scrap of road kill ground flat beneath the rolling wheels of Ireland, Inc., just like their hero. They see that hope is gone from Ireland. As it always has been, and ever shall be.
We are all Quinn's victims, yes. But let's not forget how many other well-spoken scum victimise us. He is only one name on a very long list of users and abusers. Quinn is no worse than any other "big person". He is only being treated worse because he arrived from outside. He is the scapegoat because he is bottom caste. He never belonged anywhere near the top of Irish society. He never even appeared to belong.
So show a little compassion for Quinn's special victims: the confused and simple people who support him now -- those "souls of bronze and iron" as Plato put it, in whose hearts, however briefly and however falsely, he once inspired hope.
Besides, this exhibition in Cavan is the nearest thing to a protest against the way Ireland works as we are likely to see. The rest of us are too submissive and spineless to do anything more than tut.
thomas
Quinn-tessentially INSANE!! There is a madness that runs in the Irish genes, as well as the inbred stupidity. The statue to Charlie Haughy in Dingle is another proof of these traits. We would do well to hand the running of the country 100% over to the Germans.
"He is the scapegoat because he is bottom caste" True thomas, and it has to be acknowledged, that there is, a sense of sadness and unrequited anger to this protest. There is no doubt that Quinn is only small fry.
@TheNewOil "The statue to Charlie Haughy in Dingle" Good God that's true...
"We would do well to hand the running of the country 100% over to the Germans" Completely agree, the Irish are incapable of ruling themselves.
If ye didn't see it, some great bullshitery went on in his interview with Vincent Browne on Wednesday night (1st August) http://www.tv3.ie/3player/show/41/51511/1/Tonight-with-Vincent-Browne
Goes on for about 25 mins. Reverts back to Anglo and putting assets out of reach again at the end. The man is either a stubborn, selfish gobshite or completely stupid. And I'd be very had pushed to believe he is the latter!
Dakota, you are enlightened. Quinn didn't put us on the hook for his debts. A treasonous Dáil did that. (A strong word? Weakening the security, independence, and welfare of the state on behalf of interested parties -- what other word describes that? 'Treason' is correct.)
Quinn is merely exploiting the mechanism by which the Untouchables are being sheltered from the consequences of their own perfidy at our expense.
Yes, he's a crook. That hardly distinguishes him in this land of corruption and greed.
The O'Toole piece is a disgrace. He is providing cover to the Untouchables by singling out Quinn, an outsider, drawing our fire toward him and away from our true Masters. An obedient, useful idiot, protecting a rotten, treasonous establishment, like most in the Irish press.
thomas
Lads, I wasn't even aware of Quinns rise against - it would seem - the odds. Fair play to him for that.
But all I see now is a businessman who is trying to shift his assets out of the country, after he speculated and lost. Had he won, he would had been a genius... but I'm amazed that so many hitherto successful business types thought the property boom could continue forever.
I see all too familiar traits of assumed martrydom/victimhood with Quinn, and an awful propensity to blame everyone but himself. And that isn't particular to Quinn by any means. It's a denial that is nationwide.
Like yourselves, I was sickened at Lenihan's dodgy bank guarantee. But this is where were are at now... we will have to pay for this out of our wages - and such people in the PAYE sector have no choice.
So I have no problem seeing Quinn chased down on this. I like to think it might be a start.
Though I admit I might be a bit hopeful on that one.
I don't try to defend Sean Quinn BUT he said he has been treated with Great Vindictiveness by Anglo Irish - in its old form and whatever it is now called. No he is not stupid. I regarded his attempts to become bankrupt in NI ( overturned) and to hide assets as bewildering- completely futile for one with top lawyers- UNLESS seen as delaying tactics until the Anglo trial Finally get underway. Quinn's brother, Peter said the Anglo trial will be Extremely embarrassing for those at the top in Ireland. We'll see. Any chance of a big cover up ( in the usual way) will be stymied by the fact that Anglo Irish bank has a big English connection, many of the debts took place abroad- and of course EU/IMF bailout. I am NOT defending Sean Quinn- but his story won't be fully told till the Anglo Irish trial; 'The show is not over till the corrupt banker sings'- and he Will-I suspect he has the nature to blame as many of his former buddies as possible
Anna, My worry here is that with Quinn being singled out for vilification ahead of time, the ground is being prepared for his testimony to be dismissed. He will need truly hard evidence, which he likely can't produce; and even if he can, it will be under-weighted.
We saw this with the Ryan and Murphy commissions. Witnesses were discredited subtly, but enough to produce reasonable doubt. People who belong in prison walk the streets.
I don't want Quinn to get away with his shenanigans, but I am angry that he is being used as a scapegoat to protect scores of influential crooks.
The press, as always, is complicit. The more we hear what a singularly rotten guy he is, the less his testimony will weigh. I believe this is deliberate. Of course he is not unusual. He is representative of the ruling class here. Too bad for him that he never belonged to that class and can be jettisoned conveniently. Too bad for us that he can be used as a scapegoat to shield the rotten gaggle of traitors who own this island.
I am really pessimistic about all this. I predict that Quinn will take the fall, and we will wash our hands of it. Just as we are all satisfied with the Murphy and Ryan commissions now. It's been sorted. Time to move on, time to forget...
thomas
Seán Quinn is one of Ireland's top entrepreneurs and it is a disgrace the way he is being marginalised by the State. He created thousands of jobs and at no time could be described as being of the elite.
The nub of the problem here is that the Quinn Group was turning in 400m of profits, they estimated payback over 7 years of what they owned Anglo. The rest of their loans were performing and being paid.
What happened next still defies belief with Seán Quinn lured to Dublin to meet the bank while they took over his own offices.
What the State has done and is doing to Seán Quinn is a disgrace. We never needed our top entrepreneurs more than we do now.
SQ April 2015 Court case May force you to reconsider this viewpoint. You ROI masters are doomed.
Thomas ur quite ill informed on SQ, I've met many men hired by SQ who were stunned by his drive and vision on markets such as insurance cement and glass. How many people do u employ? SQ 8000. 163 richest person on plant 2008. Not bad for one man.April court case will be a defining moment in this sage, media starting to realise their error.
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