Coming soon to County Cork 'Dallas' - Oil industry could change Ireland forever

Josh Henderson, who plays John Ross Ewing III on Dallas.
{Photo: International Business Times}

Oil has been found under the seabed off the coast of Cork in Ireland and the company that found the oil says the field "should yield 280m barrels of oil."

280 MILLION barrels of oil and at $100 a barrel that is ... wait ... hold on ... oh forget it - a whole pile of cash.

Ohhh, there's going be to some wealth kicking around Cork all right. There'll be a lot of rich people. Rich Cork people. Dubliners will be sick.

I can see it all now. Cork will soon be dominated by huge, ugly, glass skyscrapers where in the top floors oil millionaires named John Joe will chase even more millions and young female minions. These same men will also snap up Cork's grand old estates of the landed gentry so that they can carry on the hard work of greed and lust in an 18th century manor house surrounded by a few hundred acres of lush pasture land. It'll be great!

They'll insist on displaying their love for Irish culture by giving their estates fake Gaelic names like Áibhéalín - meaningless in Irish - but they'll pronounce it as Abilene as in Texas and they'll feel good about themselves for spelling it as if it's a native Irish word.

These new Hibernian oil barons will be known as Oilbernians. It won't be a case of the Celtic Tiger reborn. It will be far worse than that.
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Without a doubt Hollywood get wind of this and will jump at this story of all this new found money in the old world. The idea of the misbehaving Oilbernian will be too good to pass up.

It could be a movie. I'm sure you could do justice to the story in a movie, but I'm hoping for television. Not just any old television either, but the show that I believe will be used a model by the Oilbernians - Dallas.

Dallas should come to Cork. Dallas will come to Cork. I'm sure of it. Just think about it: the Ewings in Cork.

Dallas was massively popular in Ireland in its heyday in the 80s. I don't know if the new show is or will be as popular, but, regardless, when the film crews and, especially, the actors arrive the people of Ireland will go gaga. The show's makers won't be able to resist that kind of pull.

So John-Ross Ewing will come to Ireland to do some deals with a (hopefully) glammed up version of the real-life John Joe. And John Ross will find that Middleton's whiskey and John Joe's niece, Bridget, appeal to him a great deal. It'll all get very messy when John Ross isn't put off any of his pursuits, including Bridget, when everyone discovers that John Ross's great-granddaddy and John Joe's great-granddad were brothers.

Of course an attractive, sexy, greedy, conniving woman will have to have come with John Ross. She'll roam the highways and byways of south Cork looking for Bridget or some dirt that she can use to disgrace her, to separate her from John Ross.

Eventually she'll find Bridget's home is in Youghal and she'll want to go there. And then it will happen. The moment will have arrived. That moment I've been waiting for for so long, a quarter century, since I first heard how Youghal is pronounced.

The woman will be driving along Cork's small, windy roads, getting lost regularly. She'll be wearing next to nothing, well other than a raincoat over a sweater and a shirt or two, long trousers, two pairs of socks and wellington boots - gotta keep it somewhat realistic - when she'll slows down to speak to a local lad of about 19 years of age walking along the road. This besotted, be-spotted young man will stare in utter awe as the Texan beauty slowly and drawly asks him, "Y'all from Youghal?"

I'll leap out of my chair and punch the air. "Y'all from Youghal?" I'll shout it out loud a dozen times or more. I've been waiting so long to hear a Texan to speak those words. I'll laugh and sing it out again and again.

At some point it will pass from vaguely amusing to annoying to worrying to the point where my children are crying and my wife is calling for the men in white coats to come take me away. I'll go happily too - asking each of them in turn if "Y'all from Youghal?"

What of John Ross, John Joe and the two women I hear you ask. I don't know. I can't get past that moment, but it will be great when Cork is rich on oil and Dallas comes to the Rebel County.

* Of course, given the prejudices of Dublin people, I'm sure they'd have a different television show in mind for Cork people and their new found oil riches - The Beverly Hillbillies.

Mitt Romney should have gone after Barney not Big Bird because PBS is a dinosaur

Mitt Romney wants to save money by cutting the
government subsidy for PBS.

During Wednesday's Presidential debate Mitt Romney said he was prepared to de-fund PBS even though he loves Big Bird and Jim Lehrer. Romney was right to take a stand against PBS, but not because it is going to save money for the American taxpayers, but because PBS is an unnecessary government intrusion in the marketplace.

In 1970 when PBS was born there weren't many television channels and educational or niche programs  wouldn't have been able to find a place on one of America's three main networks. That was the thinking anyway.

Whatever about the 1970s that justification doesn't apply today. The costs of broadcasting and getting that signal into American homes has collapsed. The market has fragmented and there are literally hundreds if not thousands of channels available to viewers. All those channels are only begging for content that will bring eyeballs.

I daresay that Big Bird, Barney, Jim Lehrer, Charlie Rose and Downton Abbey would bring eyeballs wherever they happened to go. They would find homes on one channel or another. Heck, I bet even 45-year-old repeats of Lawrence Welk would find a slot on some obscure digital cable channel. {Okay, don't hold me to that one.} And, of course, broadband is blurring the lines between what is television and what is internet. Every program on PBS could be shown on TV or on the web, even Lawrence Welk.

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Read More:

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Again it's not about the money. PBS gets about $300m per year from the government, which represents about $1 per person per year. Obviously not a whole heckuva lot.

However, it is completely unnecessary and should be cut. Actually PBS is not just unnecessary but it actually distorts the market. All those free-market television stations and web sites should not be competing for viewers (& subscribers and advertisers) with a government-funded corporation.

We have the same problem in Ireland where the national broadcaster, RTE, is also distorting the market. Only in Ireland the cost is not $1 per person per year, but €160 ($208) per household per year - an outrageous amount.

At least PBS isn't spending tons of money to outbid commercial stations for the rights to major sporting events as RTE does. At least PBS isn't outbidding commercial stations for the rights to popular dramas and comedies as RTE does. At least PBS isn't outbidding the commercial stations for the few half-decent broadcasters in the country as RTE does.

The Irish argument in favor of keeping RTE within the cossetted public sector is that the quality of the news coverage other programming would suffer if not for RTE and it's massive tax. My response is always, "how do you know? We've never tried it."

Barney does not need PBS
to get on TV
{Photo: PBSKids.org}

I don't know if the quality of the news coverage would be as good if RTE was privatized, but at least I wouldn't be forced to pay for political programming that is at odds with my own views. That's the same for everyone in Ireland, other than the few well-heeled, liberal, south Dublin people whose views RTE expresses unreservedly.

RTE is so expensive that it's beyond just an annoyance that it gets taxpayers' money. It's immoral, people on small incomes paying for the the commercially non-viable programming beloved of the better off.

PBS is much the same, but the amounts are much smaller per person. Still, if Swan Lake can't find a sufficient audience to make it a commercial proposition on TV how is it right to take any money from those who have no interest in ballet to provide it for those who do?

It makes no sense whatever in today's day and age. You want to watch Swan Lake? Find it on YouTube if you can't find it on one of the hundreds of TV channels available today. There is no excuse for public funding for PBS. That model is as dated as a rotary telephone. It's a dinosaur and should be extinct.

Mitt Romney wants to save money by cutting the
government subsidy for PBS.

During Wednesday's Presidential debate Mitt Romney said he was prepared to de-fund PBS even though he loves Big Bird and Jim Lehrer. Romney was right to take a stand against PBS, but not because it is going to save money for the American taxpayers, but because PBS is an unnecessary government intrusion in the marketplace.

In 1970 when PBS was born there weren't many television channels and educational or niche programs  wouldn't have been able to find a place on one of America's three main networks.* That was the thinking anyway.

Whatever about the 1970s that justification doesn't apply today. The costs of broadcasting and getting that signal into American homes has collapsed. The market has fragmented and there are literally hundreds if not thousands of channels available to viewers. All those channels are only begging for content that will bring eyeballs.

I daresay that Big Bird, Barney, Jim Lehrer, Charlie Rose and Downton Abbey would bring eyeballs wherever they happened to go. They would find homes on one channel or another. Heck, I bet even 45-year-old repeats of Lawrence Welk would find a slot on some obscure digital cable channel. {Okay, don't hold me to that one.} And, of course, broadband is blurring the lines between what is television and what is internet. Every program on PBS could be shown on TV or on the web, even Lawrence Welk.

____________
Read More:


Attack on Big Bird by Mitt Romney most interesting moment says viewers -- GOP candidate won but will PBS attack be most remembered from first debate?

Irish broadcaster RTE accused of Democratic Party bias

Even from Galway, Mitt Romney trounced Barack Obama in debate -- Irish shocked, but Romney won tough debates in Boston in 2002

_____________


Again it's not about the money. PBS gets about $300m per year from the government, which represents about $1 per person per year. Obviously not a whole heckuva lot.

However, it is completely unnecessary and should be cut. Actually PBS is not just unnecessary but it actually distorts the market. All those free-market television stations and web sites should not be competing for viewers (& subscribers and advertisers) with a government-funded corporation.

We have the same problem in Ireland where the national broadcaster, RTE, is also distorting the market. Only in Ireland the cost is not $1 per person per year, but €160 ($208) per household per year - an outrageous amount.

At least PBS isn't spending tons of money to outbid commercial stations for the rights to major sporting events as RTE does. At least PBS isn't outbidding commercial stations for the rights to popular dramas and comedies as RTE does. At least PBS isn't outbidding the commercial stations for the few half-decent broadcasters in the country as RTE does.

The Irish argument in favor of keeping RTE within the cossetted public sector is that the quality of the news coverage other programming would suffer if not for RTE and it's massive tax. My response is always, "how do you know? We've never tried it."

Barney does not need PBS
to get on TV
{Photo: PBSKids.org}

I don't know if the quality of the news coverage would be as good if RTE was privatized, but at least I wouldn't be forced to pay for political programming that is at odds with my own views. That's the same for everyone in Ireland, other than the few well-heeled, liberal, south Dublin people whose views RTE expresses unreservedly.

RTE is so expensive that it's beyond just an annoyance that it gets taxpayers' money. It's immoral, people on small incomes paying for the the commercially non-viable programming beloved of the better off.

PBS is much the same, but the amounts are much smaller per person. Still, if Swan Lake can't find a sufficient audience to make it a commercial proposition on TV how is it right to take any money from those who have no interest in ballet to provide it for those who do.

It makes no sense whatever in today's day and age. You want to watch Swan Lake? Find it on YouTube if you can't find it on one of the hundreds of TV channels available today. There is no excuse for public funding for PBS. That model is as dated as a rotary telephone. It's a dinosaur and should be extinct.

*Even as a kid I thought that was a dubious proposition because I remember stumping my teacher when I asked why Mr Rogers was on public television and Captain Kangaroo was on a commercial channel. I could see no obvious difference in the content of the two programs.

Fourth anniversary of Ireland's bank guarantee, which guaranteed nothing but national misery

Brian Cowen (left) and the late Brian Lenihan
the bank guarantee is their legacy..

The day of the "bank guarantee" doesn't have the ring of a momentous occasion, the sort that will feature in history books for generations. Yet, in Ireland, the day of the "bank guarantee" ranks right up there with all the other tragic dates in Irish history.

Granted the bank guarantee doesn't rival the Famine in terms of epic tragedy, nor does it really compare with any of Ireland's lamentable, failed uprisings or the Civil War, but nonetheless that date of the Irish bank guarantee will be one that will live pretty much "in infamy" for generations to come.

September 30, 2008 was a black day for Ireland. From that day what remained of Ireland's sovereignty and independence was doomed. The guarantee Ireland into a financial straight-jacket that gradually morphed into shackles.

On that day the Irish government pledged that all the debts owed by Ireland's banks were backed by the state. €400 billion - most of it owed to banks in other EU states or the US - was now guaranteed by us, the taxpayers of Ireland, so that those non-Irish banks would not experience the pain that the free market would have imposed on them.

I remember that morning very clearly. I remember listening to the news as I drove, mumbling to the radio. Two weeks earlier Lehman Brothers had collapsed and that was bad enough, but suddenly, with the Irish government's announcement of the bank guarantee everything seemed much darker.

I was still sitting in my car listening for reaction and trying to understand exactly what the bank guarantee meant when I heard popular talk show host Gerry Ryan proclaim his pride in the Irish government for taking so bold an action. I knew what he meant - the guarantee did seem like a massive preemptive strike to deaden talk of bank failures - but I remember practically shouting at the radio that the government better have had a good, long look at the banks' books before they guaranteed them. "We're all on the hook, now Gerry", I shouted before I finally turned off the radio and got out of the car.
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Irish women and children first to suffer as government cutbacks hit


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To be honest I didn't fully grasp all the implications at the time, but I knew Brian Cowen (Taoiseach - Prime Minister) and Brian Lenihan (Minister for Finance) had just bet the house - our house - on the banks. I trusted that they knew what was in the banks' books. They didn't. I trusted that the top bankers had been straight with the Cowen and Lenihan. They hadn't. I trusted that the people at the top of Ireland's political and financial food chain would not squander Irish independence. They did.


Now four years on it is clear that the bank guarantee was a calamity. Perhaps there were no good answers at the end of September 2008. Perhaps we were facing a disaster regardless of what path our government took. We will never know for sure, but we do know that things could hardly be much worse.

Over the past four years the economy has declined sharply and unemployment has exploded to around 15% and now that other age-old Irish phenomenon - emigration, which most of us had thought was gone for good - has surged back into the headlines. Last year the net emigration figure was 34,000, up from 27,000 the year before.

That figure will not fall any time soon either. Once emigration gets going it is hard to stop. In fact, if the economy in Britain begins to pick up the outflow from Ireland will only accelerate. Some people like to point out that a large chunk of those who have left recently are "foreign nationals." That is true, but the rate that "Irish people" are leaving is also rising.

Regardless, what matters is not the origins of those leaving, but the age and it is mostly young adults who are leaving. This is only going to worsen Ireland's economic situation because people in their 20's pay the most taxes compared with what they demand from the state.

As the number of young people declines so does the amount available to the state to pay state workers, whose salaries the state has vowed not to cut, and to fund education, health and the social programs for the elderly, the disabled and the young.

This is generating a dependency bubble in Ireland, where more people will be relying on fewer people paying into the system. It's unpalatable but inevitable that cuts are coming to all those dependent on state funding. Otherwise the bubble will burst.

All of this can be dated back to the bank guarantee. Of course the guarantee was a reaction to a crisis created by mismanagement and malfeasance over a number of years, but the guarantee was the wrong step at the time. Too few questions were asked of the bankers. Too little of the burden was passed on to the non-Irish banks that had lent - recklessly - to Ireland's banks. Cowen and Lenihan understood too little about banking and finance and risk and, as it turns out, too little on gambling. They bet; we lost.