North of Ireland Politics

She's turning it to a Green white and orange debate, she has to. Although for the first time in history the UUP, PUP even Alliance are stamping down on it (Right now the Union is safe in their eyes and so it is), this is corruption nothing more and nothing less infact a PUP member put on Twitter 'If we'd rather be robbed by a Prod then leaded by a Catholic then we're in trouble' 

There will be lots of people who will see nothing else then a Union Jack and stay true to Arlene.. however many will go to the UUP/Alliance and many more just won't vote at all I believe Nesbitt has handled himself well he's from pretty close to me and I don't have much to say about him I think overall he'd be a big step forward.

A bigger step forward would be the nationalist vote improving, that has to happen under 50% is pathetic. 

Listening to Nesbitt/Eastwood earlier in the car on my phone they appear to be working in conjunction on the issue. SF have, they've told the DUP accept gay marriage.. well thats not going to happen so it'll be a general election in early February i seen Alex Kane has mentioned. An election is needed now, it could damage the DUP heavily.. strike while the iron is hot and have a general election.

I can't see McGuiness staying on, i think that will damage SF also. Outside McGuinness a lot of their party do lack any form of charisma, some of the SF ministers have been appalling as have the DUP mind. I mentioned this wouldn't work, and it lasted months.. why people keep voting for the same nonsense I don't understand, it baffles me.

'in the car on my phone' 

BBC Ulster on my phone connected via bluetooth to the car system, not quite amazing technology. 

That is a very true point but what happens if the facts aren't as bad as we'd all like, Nama was over looked (massively) some reports claim Robinson/Wilson had upto 7million stashed yet we never heard about it.. public out cry is there at the minute, personally I would prefer one now, where Forster is against the wall.

 

I'm sure what will come out of the investigation is that a couple of heads below foster at the time will be the fall guys and seen as being negligent. foster will be provided an easy route out and will therefore push on to keep as representative for DUP in the executive. I doubt there would be any kickback on this if the UK Treasury were paying the whole RHI bill, rather than leaving 490mn to be dealt with locally (if NI voted to stay part of the EU, you know full well that EU would make the NI taxpayer foot the whole bill)

to me this is all theater. SF's long game has always been to disrupt or (as unionists put it) keep the concession meter running. and they're very good at it. the last thing SF want is a fully functional and economically viable NI.  every few years things blow up and eventually after talks and concessions, it quiet down again, and the UK giv picks up the bill.

the bigger and far more important picture in all of this is brexit. it's happening and the consequences for the north are huge. the DUPers campaigning for brexit was another, in a long line of, stupid political moves. foster is an amateur compared with MMG. at least robbo was fairly shrewd, although he took his eye off the ball with mrs robbo.

brexit is a nightmare scenario for the unionist position. forget the border and immigration issue, for which there is absolutely no logical solution, firstly who the hell is going to pay for the short-fall in EU funding that NI receives (several hundred million euros a year). whose gonna pay the farmers several hundred million in EU subsidies? The uk have said they'll foot the bill but only to 2021 moment. why on earth would they keep paying it for another generation?! the english despise the place. it offers nothing and costs an absolute fortune.

the only viable long term solution is a one island economy. every fool knows it. the english would certainly love the prospect. the report on "modeling irish unification", undertaken by some canadian firm last is worth a read if you have time. difficult to access how accurate it is but the findings are very interesting and it points to the one island economy as the best long term solution for ireland.

anyway, we will watch this one play out but dont be fooled by all the noise of heating schemes, irish language, equality etc... this is SF doing what they do best and timing it nicely when the english couldnt get a flying f00k about the place. the election will produce a similar result with perhaps SF/ DUP loosing a bit of ground, but this is all just part of the theater. 2021 Census just around the corner which will see the pendulum of prod majority swing - that wont change voting overnight, but psychologically it's relevant.