Campaign Watch »

• Something for (nearly) everyone

  June 3, 2009 @ 3:00 pm | by Kilian Doyle

  Enda Kenny spent much of today’s Fine Gael press conference fending off accusations of flip-flopping over Sinn Féin. Beforehand, he got the chance, uninterrupted, to make his final Big Speech, surrounded by Byelection Big Cheeses.  Statesmanlike? You decide.

  

  Meanwhile, the Labour Party has just posted profiles online of some of their first-time male candidates, after chivalrously, letting the women go first.

  On the Fianna Fáil website, European election candidate Lord Mayor Eibhlin Byrne – or some flunky purporting to be her – has a new blog post up. She wants to take her “passion for Dublin and its people to Europe”. And leave her lovely pooch behind? Heartless isn’t the word.

  The Green Party had a full page ad in today’s Irish Times – which you can also see here - featuring gushing endorsements from such luminaries as Eddie Hobbs and Darina Allen.

  Pah. That’s the best they can do? Lowly Independent Mannix Flynn has Hollywood star Gabriel Byrne and music legend Christy Moore on his side. Beat that.

  

  Believe it or not, Sinn Féin’s Gerry Adams is quite the wag on Twitter. His tweets are usually mildly entertaining and a far cry from the usual “I’m at a shopping centre today shaking hands” guff that most candidates post.

  An example: “The sunshine continues. So does the election. Christy Burke has his arm in a sling. Hurt it opening a gate. Anything for a vote.”

  Or what about: “’Down along Thomas Street and by God in a jiffy I had my arms around her beyond in the park’. I sang as we drove along Thomas Street.” Wouldn’t you love to bug that car?

  Follow him here.

  Elsewhere on Twitter, an anonymous poster purporting to be “presiding officer somewhere in the North West” promises they will be posting about their experiences of polling day here. Expect plenty of tweets about “steady flows of voters” and people’s excuses for leaving their polling cards at home throughout the day.

• Most unfortunate slogan of the campaign?

  June 2, 2009 @ 9:06 am | by Kilian Doyle

  Independent Limerick County Council candidate Richie Smith (48) urges the electorate to “cut the bull” in this recent newspaper ad.

  As Limerick Blogger points out, this is a “poor choice of words” considering his conviction earlier this year for cruelty to animals “of the most appalling kind”.

  

  Meanwhile, someone’s been having fun with the world’s cheapest computer graphics programme and a Commodore 64. The results are, predictably, awful.

  

• Online campaigning: visionary or window-dressing? Discuss

  May 28, 2009 @ 10:16 am | by Kilian Doyle

  Labour candidate in the Tallaght ward for the South Dublin County Council election Dermot Looney has issued a brave boast. He claims that his online campaign is the “biggest and best” out of several thousand local election candidates in Ireland.

  Them’s fighting words, fella. Methinks the Greens, who seem to be on a mission to take over the whole Internet, may have a thing or two to say about that.

  To give Looney credit, he has been running his blog for years, with – he says – great success.  Not only that, but he has deftly cut the slaggers off at the pass by calling it the The Looney Left, which is a gesture of self-deprecation rarely seen among politicians.

  As anyone with even a passing interest in elections is aware, Irish political parties have embraced the Internet this year in a way never before seen, undoubtedly inspired by the success of the Obama campaign’s online mobilisation prior to last year’s US presidential elections, which changed politics forever.

  From MEPs with big budgets to lowly aspirant town council members, Irish candidates, like Obama’s team, are using every tool at their disposal, from websites to blogs to Facebook to Youtube to Twitter, in a bid to reach as many potential voters as possible. And, lest we forget, fundraise. 

  However, Ireland and the US are very different animals. The sheer scale of the US, which has a population nearly 75 times the size of ours and 140 times the land mass, means it is simply unfeasible for a US presidential candidate to knock on every door or even speak in every city. The internet was therefore quite simply the only possible way to reach everyone.

  While the same could be said for the large European election constituencies, most Irish politicians do not have the excuse of being unable to cover all the ground, particularly in the local elections, where candidates are vying to represent relatively small electorates. It could be argued that no matter how visible their online presence, there is still no substitute for politicians wearing out shoe leather and pressing the flesh.

  Or is there? What do you think? Is Politics 2.0  worthwhile, a waste of time or a bit of both?

• The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (in no particular order)

  May 25, 2009 @ 10:58 am | by Kilian Doyle

  Here’s quick round-up of some of our favourite election posters out there.

  First, Socialist Party European candidate in Dublin, Joe Higgins, “The Best Fighter Money Can’t Buy”. We hear he has a very strong left. 

  

  (Photo by Editor Tupp)

  Keeping it simple, Mannix Flynn, running for Dublin City Council, has opted for two-tone, minimalist chic. His slogan is “Don’t do the same things expecting a different result”, which is head and shoulders above most of the dross spouted out by the main parties. We wish him luck.

  

  The lucky people of Co Offaly have the privilege of opting – should they wish – to vote for the singing auctioneer/farmer, Independent “Man of the People” John Bracken, who wouldn’t look out of place in the Fureys.

  

  Not to be outdone by that other golden-voiced son of Clara, Brian Cowen (see video below), John has recorded a few political ditties of his own. Go here and here to hear them. His marvellous  There’s Too Many TDs Sitting In The Dáil is on repeat on the CampaignWatch MP3 player.

  

  Finally, words almost fail us. This is easily the most bizarre election-related installation we have ever seen. Ever.

  (Insert lame puns here about drumming up support, keeping abreast of the issues and turkeys voting for Christmas.)

  

  (We really wish this photo had been taken by Maman Poulet, but are grateful to Editor Tupp nonetheless)

  campaignwatch@irishtimes.com

• Video nasties

  May 22, 2009 @ 9:29 am | by Kilian Doyle

  Out of a sense of duty, we bring you a round-up of the main parties’ European election videos. Martyrs that we are, we’ve sat through them all so you don’t have to. Unless you really, really want to. We’re in need of a nice lie down now.

  Fianna Fáil

   

  

  Heavy on the warnings of economic disaster. Featuring candidates Crowley, Mooney and the two Byrnes. The rest of them don’t get a look in. Wonder how well that went down in HQ?

  EDIT May 25th:  FF European broadcast part 2. Accompanied by the dulcet Cork tones of Micheál Martin, it includes Aylward, O’Keeffe, Ryan and Gallagher, who were left out of the first one.

  

  Fine Gael

  

  Enda Kenny really needs to control his wandering hands. He looks like he’s signing for the deaf in this one. Features each and every one of the candidates. How equitable.

  Labour Party

   

  

  Eamo, Eamo, Eamoohh! Is there anyone else in the Labour Party?  

  Green Party

   

  

  Portentous images of impending doom followed by loads of kids paying with green toys to a soundtrack of uplifting, joyous music. It’d bring a  tear to a glass eye. (It has since been brought to our attention that this is a Europe-wide Green Party video, rather than an Irish-specific one, which is due out next week. We’re leaving it up anyway. For the sake of the children.)

  Sinn Féin

   

  

  This is pointedly titled an “EU election party political broadcast for the 26 counties”. So why is Bairbre de Brún in it? Is she running here?

• Tubridy reaches out to the little people

  May 21, 2009 @ 2:02 pm | by Kilian Doyle

  
  Is Garrett Tubridy – sibling of Ryan – employing children to put up his election posters? Or is he trying to show he represents the little people and wants to engage the electorate face to face?

  

  Apparently, heads are being taken off all over Rathmines by these eye-catching posters. See more vertically-challenged electioneering at The State of the Nation.

  While we’re on the subject of bright young things, Paul McAdam seems to be treating this politics thing as a bit of a joke.  This  poster was spotted near the Luas stop in Sandyford, so we can only presume he’s running in the local elections. We love his snappy slogans. And the empty box of beer used as a hat is a particularly nice touch. We predict big things for this chap. Or a hangover. Or both.

  

  (Thanks Ross Church for the photo.)

  Finally, kudos to Labour’s Michael McLoughlin for the cracking consonance.This campaign needs more of the same.

  

  (Thanks to Keith Martin.)

• Is this thing on?

  May 15, 2009 @ 4:05 pm | by Kilian Doyle

  Savvy politicians love YouTube. It’s a cheap, easy and accessible way to get their message across to thousands of voters (they hope) in a controlled environment without having to go to the hassle of knocking on doors and risking confrontation with disgruntled punters.  

  However, the quality of their submissions varies wildly. Some are slick, professional and evidently conjured up following long meetings with battalions of advertising execs, marketing gurus, image consultants, strategists, speechwriters and other political bigwigs.

  Take this one from Libertas, for example, which is reasonably competent.

  

  This, on the other hand, has all the production values of an al-Qaeda hostage video. Bit of crumpled cloth as a backdrop, shaky camera-work, murky lighting, terrified-looking subject pleading for his life with a look in his eye like he is half-expecting the axe to drop any second and put him out of his misery.

  Then again, given his party’s latest poll performance, you can hardly blame him for being scared.
  

• We’ve got more cyberspacers than you

  @ 12:45 pm | by Kilian Doyle

  The  Green Party launched its fancy new website today and, in celebration, their press office has sent us in a scintillating set of figures detailing their local election candidates’ quest into cyberspace.

  Apparently, of the 99 Green candidates, 32 have Facebook accounts, a dozen are Twitterers and over 20 have their own websites or blogs.

  The Green Party itself boasts 44,500 Youtube video views and a whopping 474 followers - and rising – on Twitter.   

  Now that they’ve thrown down the gauntlet, any other parties out there care to compete? 

  To see how much CO2 each Green Party Tweet emits, try this CO2 calculator for Twitter

  PS Anyone know off the top of their heads do the Greens plant a tree every time they post on their blogs? 

  campaignwatch@irishtimes.com