Will Ireland's emigrants catch a break on property tax?

Ireland's Minister for Finance, Michael Noonan,
introduced the new property tax.

In all the time I have lived in Ireland there has never been a property tax. That is all about to change as the government is rolling out a tax on residential property this year.

Irish homeowners will start to see the bills for tax owed on their homes from next month. As you can imagine, no one's all that happy about this.

The biggest losers of course are all those struggling homeowners, the people who took out huge mortgages to  family homes during the boom, have taken substantial pay cuts or even lost their jobs and are now faced with a new tax that will cost them hundreds each year.

I know if you live in America your initial reaction will be something like, "What are they moaning about? I pay $4000 per year." And you'd have a point. However, the American system has a series of taxes - Federal, state, local, - the sum total of which can be substantial, but probably not on a par with what the average Irish person is paying. For example, does anyone in America pay a 23% sales tax? I don't think so.
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It is always difficult comparing tax rates in different countries because there are so many different taxes and what those taxes are supposed to provide is different too. Take my word for it: Irish people pay a lot in taxes, this is a new one and they're not happy about it.

Right now many people are saying they "are not going to pay." Sure many of them are blustering, but the Household Charge that was introduced last year was seen as a precursor to this year's full property tax was ignored by a large percentage of households. Maybe the government will someday catch up with those who refused to pay the Household Charge, but the fact is at the end of December nearly 30% of householders had not paid the tax. No matter how you slice it, that's a significant level of non-compliance.

Unless the government ups its game they can expect at least the same level of non-compliance. So far all we've heard is that they're upping their threats. The head of the Revenue Commissioners recently noted that they had the power to take the money from any non-payer's salary or pension or even bank account. In other words they have you. Unless ...

When I heard those comments the other day the thought struck me that there's one group of homeowners who might slip through the Revenue Commissioners' net: emigrants. I don't know how many there are, but anecdotally there are quite a few. Families, couples and singles who have bought homes have had to leave Ireland and their homes (rented, if they're lucky). There's a good possibility I'm missing something, but from the looks of it right now emigrants might owe the property tax, but it doesn't look like the Revenue Commissioners have any way to force them to pay.

I'd like to think that emigrants will catch a break here. I'd really like to believe the government would waive the property tax for those who have had to leave Ireland due to the dire economic conditions, but if there is one group the government doesn't really care about (ignore those crocodile tears) it is emigrants because they cannot vote. Thanks to that and thanks to the fact that most of them had to leave due to circumstances not of their making I hope they can avoid the property tax. It's the least they deserve.

Ireland and the debt deal - 24 hours of farce and high drama

Mario Draghi, head of the European Central Bank.

The end is nigh; the sky is falling. We're all doomed, doomed I tell ya. That was Wednesday night in Ireland. It was as if the end-times had arrived.

It was a very strange 24-hours from Wednesday afternoon to yesterday afternoon. It all started with breathless reports on banking and Ireland's national debts from Irish reporters in Frankfurt. There were leaks and rumors: the Irish government had secured a deal on the bank debts that the state had absorbed. What that deal was, nobody could say exactly, but we had "a deal."

Part of the deal involved the liquidation of the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation (IBRC), which was established by the government in 2011 as something of a banking hospice for the brokist, most bankrupt bank on the planet - Anglo-Irish Bank - and its little brother, another broke institution, the Irish Nationwide Building Society (INBS). Anglo is the Bank that Broke Ireland.

So far, so good you might think. Well, maybe not for the 800 people employed by IBRC, but given how hated Anglo-Irish was there didn't seem to be a whole lot of sympathy for those people.
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As Wednesday evening turned into night that's when things started getting strange. The details of the deal were not forthcoming and then the noises from reporters with contacts "in Frankfurt" (that is, the European Central Bank - ECB) began to sound ominously like there was no deal after all.

That's when the mood of television and radio reporters went from baffled to aghast as they found there were no answers to their questions. That's also when Irish tweeters went bananas.

There was nothing on the debts, but the IBRC liquidation was going ahead. That required government involvement because everything had to be finished by 7am Thursday morning, although we weren't told why. In order to get that done the Dáil and Seanad (Ireland's lower and upper houses of parliament) would have to have a late, possibly all-night, session. We were also told that the President was cutting short his state visit to Italy so he could return to sign the bill into law on Thursday morning.

It may not sound like the makings of a high drama, but it really was. All the frantic confusion evident in the government's rushing to get 50 pages of legislation drafted and passed by 7am Thursday sent Irish tweeters over the edge. In 140 characters Irish economists and banking experts - those who weren't pronouncing on our impending doom on television and radio - were conveying their skepticism and fatalism in equal measure. The rest of Ireland's tweeters joined in, often adding humor to the fatalism.

#PromNight was soon trending in Ireland, a reference to the Anglo-Irish Bank promissory notes at the center of the whole national debt crisis. The sense that we were coming to an apocalypse was thanks to the similarity between Wednesday night and the night back in late 2008 when the parliament stayed late to approve the bank guarantee scheme that has led us to national bankruptcy and the loss of national sovereignty.

Announcements from Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Enda Kenny were pushed back a few minutes. Then another few minutes. The whole thing had the feeling of a farce or, as people here presumed, a national tragedy. Eventually, around 11pm, Kenny and his government made their way to the Dáil where they expected to have a vote on the legislation - 50 pages of it - despite the fact nobody had yet read it. A short period of shambolic parliamentary proceedings ensued as the opposition parties sought some time to consider the bill.

At this point cool economic discussion and political analysis on TV and radio was replaced with something akin to a desperate moment of national prayer. "Please God, don't let them make things any worse." The tweeting was even more desperate.

When the discussion of the legislation finally got going - around midnight - it was a welcome relief. The endless droning of politicians didn't make anyone feel better, but at least they put us to sleep. We'd have to wait til morning to find out if the verdict was death. Or worse.

Thursday morning things were calmer. Maybe it was simply that the sun had risen on a new day that provided that glimmer of hope, but the fact that we learned that the bill was passed by both houses and signed by the President after his mad dash home from Italy was at least certainty.

That calm gave way to even more hope as rumors of an ECB deal again began to circulate. The strangeness returned around lunchtime when Mario Draghi, head of the ECB was asked about the deal during his regular press conference. His response: We "took note" of the Irish actions. "Took note." And with that commentators were baffled again and twitter was aflame. A collective "I knew it! We are screwed" was the general theme. A few other journalists at the press conference asked for more clarity, but Draghi remained indecipherable.

We only had a short while to wait, however. At 2:30 the Taoiseach rose again in the Dáil to announce that we did, in fact, have a deal with the ECB. Amen.

Calm has been restored, although nobody seems too clear as to whether (a) the legislation rushed through on Wednesday night is actually constitutional or (b) the deal on the debts that we got was all that great. For many people the fact that we have removed any doubt about whether the state was going to repay Anglo's debts makes this deal a bad one. I have sympathy with that view, but that ship sailed a long time ago. There are virtually no bondholders left. The debt now is to the ECB and there was no way we were going to renege on that.

The deal may not be great, but it's better than we had. The total debt will not be paid off til 2053, which makes it more like war reparations than bank debt, but so be it. The state wrongly guaranteed those loans and now we have to pay.

The new deal makes it a bit more affordable and pushes back the pain enough so that we can at least hope that with a bit of luck and a bit of inflation and economic growth the debt will seem less significant than it was last week. We're still sick, but it's a chronic rather than terminal illness. That's progress.

Irish-America - let's back our Scottish cousins in their bid to overturn the USDA's haggis ban

Poet Robert Burns, whose "Address to a Haggis"
inspires the desire for the 'plucky' Scottish dish
at this time every year.
{Photo from CeltNet}

Haggis is banned in America and our fellow Celtic-Americans (new to me too), Scottish-Americans if you will, are none-too-pleased about this. Haggis is a traditional Scottish dish, the composition of which is probably best not considered around meal-time.

As explained recently by the BBC's Jon Kelly, Haggis is made from a 'sheep's "pluck" (heart, liver and lungs) minced with onion, oatmeal, suet and spices, all soaked in stock and then boiled in either a sausage casing or a sheep's stomach.' Mmm mmm. Don't that sound good.

Okay, to be quite honest, it doesn't sound like my cup of tea. Although I'm sure if I knew what was in the white and black puddings I enjoy as an essential part of my Irish breakfast it might be equally off-putting. Maybe if I could blank out what I know and force a forkful of haggis into my mouth I might really enjoy it. I'm at least open to the possibility that I might enjoy it, if not quite as open to the possibility of actually tasting it.
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Gutter a good place for Haggis
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Whatever about my personal preferences, Scottish people like to eat Haggis, especially on January 25, when they celebrate Burns Night commemorating the birth of their national poet Robert Burns, aka Rabbie Burns.

So in Scotland later today they'll be sitting down to a fine haggis dinner, but their cousins over in America won't be able to do the same because the US Department of Agriculture has banned haggis.

The ban has been in place since 1971. The USDA apparently doesn't care for human beings eating sheep lungs. Who can blame them, but is it really that unhealthy? I mean sure the Scots are nuts, but I doubt the nuttiness is caused by the food so much as the desire for the food is caused by the nuttiness.

So the Scots are battling the American bureaucracy and not getting very far. It's not hard to understand why either. Let's face it, the Scots' star has waned in America just as the Irish star has waxed. Irish-America is a much more potent force than is Scottish-America. On this issue I say let's give them a hand or at least offer some moral support.

Sure it's not our battle and I'm not asking people to go to the wall for the right to eat a sheep's lung, but we do like to toss around the word "Celtic" now and again, even impress upon our friends that it should be pronounced with a hard 'C' (Keltic). Some of us even (secretly) enjoy the Thistle and Shamrock radio program, which celebrates the music of Scotland as well as Ireland.

I'm not asking you to abandon the rivalry with the Scots, such as it is. We can still smirk when Braveheart comes on the television, knowing that those beautiful "Scottish scenes" were mostly filmed in Ireland. We can continue the fight to see Irish whiskey reclaim its place on top in America, having seen it swiped by the Scots during prohibition. I just think we could and should join in the chorus demanding that our Celtic cousins be allowed to eat sheep's lung.

Ye Pow'rs, wha mak mankind your care,
And dish them out their bill o' fare,
Auld Scotland wants nae skinking ware
That jaups in luggies;
But, if ye wish her gratefu' prayer
Gie her a haggis!
{From Address to a Haggis by Robert Burns.}

New York Times paints a picture of a mythical 'green' Ireland

Electric car charging point - they're not hard to find in Ireland,
but you're more likely to see a unicorn than to see someone
using one of these.

Perhaps over Christmas you came across a NY Times article about Ireland and carbon tax. The article essentially claimed that the Irish people had swallowed Al Gore's Kool Aid en masse and have experienced an environmental and economic miracle thanks to our new found environmentalism.

If you did happen to see that article you were hopefully asking yourself one key question: is any of this true? The answer, in a word, is 'no.'

Ireland may well be "40 Shades of Green", but that sort of 'green' is not among them. Granted Irish people are wary of messing with their beautiful green land and that sometimes frustrates me, but they are far removed from the picture of a nation of environmental devotees that the Times' Elisabeth Rosenthal painted. In fact, most of Rosenthal's article is a complete nonsense. I'm not sure it even qualifies as journalism.

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Rosenthal interviewed one politician for the piece - former Minister for the Environment Eamon Ryan. Ryan was one of six Green Party TD's (MP's) in the last Dáil (Parliament). His Green Party was the junior partner in the last government, which brought in the carbon tax. That government is also widely blamed for the bank guarantee that has bankrupted the nation, destroyed our economy and (temporarily we all hope) ended Ireland's 90 year experiment with sovereignty.

In the election that followed our economic collapse not a single Green Party TD managed to be elected. The party barely exists now, but Rosenthal tracked down Ryan to get a positive assessment of the carbon tax. If the carbon tax was the blessing Rosenthal claims how is it she couldn't find a single current government minister or even elected official to sing the carbon tax's praises? None of the remaining Fianna Fáil TD's was willing to speak in favor of the carbon tax despite representing the senior partners in the government that brought it in. Odd if the carbon tax is all Rosenthal claims it to be.

Rosenthal's economic claims were even more laughable. What little good news Ireland had in 2011 was entirely due to the Irish operations of large US technology and pharmaceutical companies. The domestic economy declined in 2011.

Rosenthal's entire article is a sham. Carbon taxes were introduced just as the economy was going into free fall. The sharp decrease in emissions is ENTIRELY due to the fall in economic activity. So many companies have gone to the wall that production has decreased sharply. Unemployment has sky-rocketed so fewer people are driving to work and emigration has taken off again so there are actually fewer people here burning oil and gas. That's the real carbon emissions story. Everything else is a green fiction.

The carbon tax is just another tax. Taxes have risen across the board. Our VAT rate (sales tax) is now 23.5%. All sorts of other new charges have been introduced, often with little or no protest because we all know the government is broke and we all know that our European masters love all these new charges. So they come in, we moan and then we pay them. That's what happened with the carbon tax.

Rosenthal ties in charging people for their garbage collection service with the carbon tax. That's a completely different issue. Ireland has limited landfill space and it's filling up fast. Garbage collection was getting too expensive for local governments so they sold off the routes and now we have to pay. I don't think this situation would be unfamiliar to many Americans.

My absolutely favorite part of Rosenthal's fairytale was the accompanying photograph of an electric car recharging its battery. The picture was taken at a car dealership. Funny that, considering there are hundreds of these electric charge points all over Dublin. You know why she didn't get a picture of someone charging their car at one of those curb-side charging points? Yup, you guessed it, NOBODY uses them because NOBODY has an electric car.

I was in California two weeks ago. In first the ten minutes I was in Pasadena I saw more electric cars charging their batteries than I have in the two years since the Irish government began rolling out the unused infrastructure for the non-existent national fleet of electric cars.

The Ireland I live in is not the one Rosenthal wrote about. The one I live in is still bankrupt, still hemorrhaging young people, still awaiting further tax hikes, still governed by people sensible enough to know that the average Irish person is still unconcerned by 'climate change.' The Ireland she described is a mythical green land experiencing an environmental-policy-led economic turn-around. You can probably find the 'Little People' running Rosenthal's Ireland.

An American solution to Rory McIlroy's Olympics conundrum

Rory McIlroy clowning with fans of Europe at the Ryder Cup.
The Ryder Cup is safer for McIlroy because he doesn't have to choose 
between Britain and Ireland. He represents both playing for Europe.
{Photo from the Belfast Telegraph}

Rory McIlroy's caught in a bind not of his own making (mostly, anyway). Golf is coming back to the Olympics in 2016 and he'd like to participate, but he has to choose between playing for Ireland or the United Kingdom.

I generally steer clear of these topics that touch on nationality and Northern Ireland, but in this case I can't stop my American brain working on a possible solution. My American solution might not satisfy anyone in Ireland - north, south, Loyalist, Republican, Unionist, Nationalist, Protestant or Catholic - but might actually be a win-win for the sporting bodies involved.

My idea revolves around television and money - could it be more American? - and is basically this: The Decision II.
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Do you remember the hour-long program a couple of years ago during which LeBron James (eventually) announced his decision as to whether he was going to remain in Cleveland playing for the Cavaliers or move to Miami to join the Heat? Do you remember that nonsense?

At the time I thought it was the dumbest thing I'd ever seen, but ESPN knew better than me. Millions of people watched. It was the highest rated program on American TV that night.

So there's the precedent. I would, however, tweak the James program somewhat. Rather than having McIlroy announce his decision I would go for a coin flip. Yeah, that's right - a coin flip. A flip of the coin will relieve McIlroy of making the decision himself, which he is clearly uncomfortable doing, or letting others do it for him. And using a coin flip will make the program genuinely suspenseful because even McIlroy won't know which team he is going to play for, unlike in The Decision.

I can easily see how this could be played out for an hour on TV - with huge ratings in Ireland and Britain. But I suspect that McIlroy's choice could even be pretty big television in America and that would make it a financial gold mine.

Big ratings and millions of advertising dollars rolling in. The program will be a winner for whatever network gets the rights, but McIlroy will be due a substantial fee. This is where the win-win comes – McIlroy donates his entire fee for the program to the Olympic committee of the 'losing' nation.

He hardly needs the money now that he has his new $200m contract with Nike so donating his fee will be fairly painless for him. Yet the amount should be big enough to be a substantial boost to either the Irish or even the UK Olympic committee. He could even go further and donate his sponsorship money from participating in the Games. By donating his money to the 'losing' nation's Olympic committee McIlroy will soften the blow for those who will be disappointed to see him wearing the 'wrong' colors in Rio.

Of course, there is one other possible American solution: McIlroy could take out American citizenship and play for the United States in 2016. By so doing he will annoy everyone equally in this part of the world (while simultaneously enhancing his own financial bargaining position with sponsors in America). Just consider the headlines and the build-up: 'Olympian Rory McIlroy from Holywood to Hollywood.' What a fairytale!

Irish people, shivering in their own homes, have only themselves to blame

Irish people have been turning off the heating in their
homes because of the cost of gas

Saturday's Irish Independent reported that many Irish people are turning off the heat and shivering in their homes thanks to the cost of natural gas in Ireland. Frozen Irish people is a result of a combination of the collapse in the Irish economy and the doubling in the residential price of natural gas over the last 7 years.


The real kicker here is that for the most part Irish people have no one to blame but ourselves. In order to ensure that natural gas is as expensive as possible we have added taxes onto the price of gas and worked tirelessly to stymie any attempt at increasing production of natural gas in Ireland.

The additional "carbon tax" was added a few years ago. The purpose of this tax was two-fold: (1) to provide subsidies for the wind energy production boondoggle err, industry and (2) to encourage Irish people to simply use less gas - that is, they want us to heat our homes less and cook less.

At the time the carbon tax was imposed on us the Irish government was a coalition of a big party - Fianna Fáil - and a small party - the Green Party. The carbon tax was a case of the Green Party tail wagging the Fianna Fáil dog. Yet, even after we threw them out of office and obliterated the Greens' political representation the new government didn't have the courage to reverse the "carbon tax."

The carbon tax is frustrating, but not as frustrating as what's going on with the production of natural gas. It's becoming increasingly clear that the seabeds around Ireland are rich in oil and natural gas, especially natural gas. Yet we have been unable to properly exploit this resource thanks to small groups of protesters holding up production.

It's the same with the gas held deep beneath the rocks in Ireland. The process to free that gas and bring it to the surface so that it can be distributed to the homes and schools and businesses of Ireland is called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

The introduction of fracking is the source of America's energy revolution, which has seen prices of natural gas fall sharply and will lead America to energy independence. Fracking could well work a similar miracle in Ireland, but we lack the political will to ensure that local concerns are allayed and trouble-making environmentalists* are sidelined.

We can't even import cheap natural gas from America thanks to the ridiculous regulatory situation. Hess Corporation and other partners want to import liquefied natural gas from America to a new facility in Kerry, but despite getting approval from the planners in 2007 the facility is still mired in red tape and may remain so through 2014.

So for the foreseeable future Ireland will be denied cheap natural gas, whether Irish or imported from America. The carbon tax, however, will remain as a daily kick in the head, an additional extra cost on top of our exorbitantly expensive natural gas. The Irish government's position remains "keep shivering." We vote for them, though, so we have only oursevles to blame.

* The ability of environmentalist protesters to stifle this industry actually makes me wonder if we'll ever see the oil coming ashore in Cork.

If the Irish are going to fawn over a foreign leader it should be China's Xi rather than Obama

China's new leader, Xi Jinping at the Cliffs of Moher in
County Clare during his visit to Ireland last February.
Pat Hayes, Mayor of Clare is with him.
{Photo: MaxPix.ie}

Last week's announcement that the next year's G8 summit will be in Northern Ireland set heart afluttering south of the border. 'Do you think ... Could he ... Would he?' A little shutter of excitement at the thought that maybe, just maybe President Obama will come amongst us again.

Memories of his triumphant 12-hour 2011 'homecoming' visit are still fresh, but oh, how the Irish people would love to have even fresher memories. Now, thanks to the G8 summit, there is real hope.

Forgive me if I'm a tad cynical about the Irish hero-worship of President Obama, but his role in Irish affairs thus far has consisted of (a) having a pint of Guinness in a town he'd never heard of celebrating roots he never knew he had and  (b) denigrating Ireland as a tax haven.

I regularly hear that "Obama loves the Irish." Hmm. I'm sure he loves being loved by the Irish, but that's not quite the same thing. If you tell me that President Clinton loves the Irish I'd probably buy that. But President Obama? I don't think so.
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If we want to prostrate ourselves before a foreign leader it would be far better to do so in the full knowledge that we're doing so cynically in the hope that we will get something out of it. That would be preferable to having grown men and women slobber adoringly over a man who is, after all, a politician while seeking nothing in return other than that he accept our adulation.

So if we're going to restrict ourselves to only cynical and hypocritical boot-licking then the question is: Who to woo? Angela Merkel is the obvious choice since she holds our future in her hands, but something tells me false fawning will get us nowhere with her. Vladimir Putin? That would require too much debasement on our part. We have to be able to draw the line somewhere. Prime Minister Harper of Canada would be an intriguing choice because so many Irish people are heading to Canada these days, but we should be able to find plenty of common ground with him without being untrue to ourselves.

No, for me there is only one choice: China's new leader Xi Jinping. We should set our sights on Xi because China is an increasingly powerful player in the global economy, China's government plays a big role in the country's economy and because we have already made a good start with him.

Xi spent a few days in Ireland back in February and by all accounts the visit was a success (aren't they all?). Skepticism aside, the Wall Street Journal's recent long profile article about Xi  was accompanied by only one photograph of him: a  picture of Xi kicking a Gaelic football at Croke Park in Dublin. The picture emphasized Xi's political skills, but also the success of the Irish in entertaining the future leader of the world's largest nation.

At the time of his visit Xi was only in line to be China's next leader, but now it has been confirmed that Xi will be at the top of the Chinese government for the next ten years. He was important then; he's more important now.

During Xi's time in Ireland the NY Times commented on the fact that Ireland's transformation from a poor, agricultural nation into a rich, high-tech one "fascinates Chinese officials." Xi too, apparently, as he spliced in technology and education deals with the Irish government when he wasn't charming the Irish and being charmed by them.

Those few days in February may well turn out to be the most important visit by any current foreign leader, including President Barack Obama's. Xi's visit to Ireland was longer, lower key and much more substantive.

Next year Xi will be in Northern Ireland for the G8 summit. It would be a real coup to lure him south for more "getting to know you" time. More pictures of Xi in romantic Irish settings will do no harm for the exploding Chinese tourist trade. Barack Obama may have hold of Irish heartstrings and Angela Merkel Irish purse strings, but Xi controls both Chinese heartstrings and purse strings and that makes him the most attractive candidate for Irish pandering. Let's get to it.

The Mets are too dumb to win

Jeff Wilpon, son of the Mets primary owner
Fred Wilpon. The Wilpons just don't
know what they're doing.
{Photo from - SportsBusinessDaily.com)

I'm a Met fan and there's nothing I can do about it. I moved 3,000 miles away and still I'm a Met fan. I spent years with no television or radio coverage of the Mets, with not even a newspaper that covers the Mets and still I'm a Met fan. It's a life sentence.

At this stage of my life I know it's pointless to say anything like, "That's it. This time they've really gone and done it and now I'm done with them." It's pointless because I know that no matter what stupidity the team's front office engages in that when Opening Day comes I'll be transfixed, rooting for whatever collection of players is wearing the Mets' uniforms.

But let's get this out there right now: if you're a Met fan and a parent and you have a child young enough that they haven't yet selected their baseball team you should, no you MUST think long and hard before you start showering them with Met caps and shirts and other paraphernalia that will lead them down the same baseball path as you've trod. Why? Because the Mets are run by stupid people and they ain't gonna be gettin any smarter any time soon.

Yesterday the Mets released their schedule and announced their single game ticket prices for the 2013 season. Tickets to Opening Day against the San Diego Padres on April 1 are on sale starting at $63. Sixty-three dollars.

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For your hard-earned $63 you'll gain entrance to Citi Field with a seat in the upper deck in left field, which is almost within visual range of home plate. The game sounds great out there. Of course, the $63 doesn't get you a parking space or a scorecard or a box of cracker jacks. Or, remembering it's April 1 in Queens, you're more likely to want a hot bowl of soup. That'll cost you too.

Given the quality of the team the Mets are going to put on the field next season this is arrogant. Given that the Mets have shown a willingness to trade or simply lose the two most loved players left on the team - David Wright and R.A. Dickey - this is contemptuous.

Yet, if I thought they were going to sell those tickets and that this wasn't a policy that will have a long term negative impact on the franchise I'd say it's annoying, but good business.

However, they are not going to sell those tickets for far away seats at $63 a piece or many of the other seriously overpriced tickets on sale now. That they put single game tickets on sale before Christmas is an indication of how badly their season ticket sales campaign is going. There will be thousands of empty seats at Citi Field come April 1.

That's my biggest issue here. This ticket pricing strategy is an indication that those in charge of the Mets as a business, Fred and Jeff Wilpon who own most of the team, don't know what they're doing. The owners don't know how to maximize the value of their investment.

They don't know how to run a baseball team and they don't know how to run a business. For a few brief years the Mets had a good team thanks to the munificence of Bernie Madoff. The Mets' owners were one of the beneficiaries of Madoff's Ponzi scheme and those ill-gotten dollars helped build a strong team.

Now Madoff is in jail and the Mets owners are repaying a huge chunk of the profits they got from Madoff's funds. They actually have to run the Mets as a profitable business and they don't know how. Oh, and they have repeatedly vowed not to sell the club.

So the Mets are stuck with the current owners and, of course, we fans are stuck with the Mets. This nuclear winter we currently find ourselves in is going to get a lot darker and colder before there is any upside in Flushing. So think long and hard before you buy that newborn that Mets onesie you saw. Your son, your daughter or even your niece or nephew might have a winnable lawsuit against you in twenty years time.

Irish citizens voting in American elections? Better if Irish Times focused on disenfranchised Irish emigrants

Over 40,000 Irish citizens emigrated last year.

The Irish Times calls for "four more years" in its editorial today with its endorsement of the Obama Presidency. "Barack Obama can’t walk on water, but this global village is a safer, better place for his years in office."

The Irish Times editorial is completely unsurprising. I doubt there's a newspaper in Europe endorsing Romney. Still, there was one line in the editorial that really got to me: "The truth is, however, that in this shrinking, interconnected global village, the occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue will affect our lives more directly than most of our own politicians – if we don’t have a vote, perhaps we should."

It's an absurd view, but one that will be expressed many times today throughout Ireland, Britain, probably all over Europe. Everyone seems to feel that America exerts such influence over their lives that they should have a say in who runs the country.
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It's silly, but it's kind of grating too. Why America? What about Britain? Britain exerts more influence in Ireland than does America. Why doesn't the Irish Times suggest that Irish people (not talking about Northern Ireland, of course) should have a say in who runs the United Kingdom?

Or what about Germany? The German government has more influence over the lives of the people of Ireland than does the American government. Angela Merkel is a much bigger presence in our lives in this little Eurozone nation than is Barack Obama.

That's all by the by to be honest, but I am interested in the Irish Times's suggestion that non-citizens should have a vote in a country's election. What's interesting about it is that Ireland is a nation that has no problem disenfranchising a bloc of Irish citizens - emigrants.

Ireland has a lot of emigrants. There may be all sorts of reasons why Irish citizens choose to leave Ireland, but it's not a coincidence that the largest emigrant groups are those who leave during economic downturns. Many of those harbor dreams of returning to live in Ireland someday. They would like to have a say in how the country is run, maybe help lay the groundwork for their return by voting for candidates who support policies that make their return more likely.

They're not allowed to be involved in Irish politics, however. Instead, for Ireland's emigrants it's a case of 'of out of sight, out of mind.' "You left so you have no say in how the country's governed. Get over it."

I don't recall the Irish Times demanding that this denial of the rights of Irish citizens to a say in how their own country is run be corrected.

This is a legitimate issue for the Irish Times to editorialize on - disenfranchised Irish people. They should get off their hobby-horse about America's election and actually urge a meaningful change in the Irish system, one that will actually reinstate the legitimate rights of some Irish citizens.

The Irish Times needs to get real, stop fantasizing about Irish people voting in America's elections and campaign to change this real denial of Irish voting rights.

Following the election from New York no different than from Ireland

Debates between the candidates are on TV in New York, but
neither candidate is campaigning in the state. 

Wow! Election season in America is crazy, but by crazy I mean weird crazy, not exciting crazy. I can't get over how much things have changed since I was last in the country for an election.

I've spent last six weeks in America, upstate New York to be exact. It's the first time I've been in the country during election time since 1990 and the first time for a presidential contest since 1984. {That realization has taken my breath away. I was only once of voting age and in the country for an election for President.}

A lot has changed since '84. I was a student that year and I remember the campaigning on the campus and off the campus in New York. People were pushing their candidate. I remember ads too, particularly Walter Mondale's "Where's the beef?" ad. There is none of that in upstate New York this time.

In upstate NY voters can follow the campaign, but they are not engaged in it. I saw no campaigning for President and there are virtually no television ads for either candidate. The reason for this is clear — it's because the state of New York is not a "battleground state." Let's face it, if New York is "in play" Mitt Romney has won. So neither candidate is spending money on ads in this area.

Still, it's odd that there are no ads for President. It wasn't like that in 1984. It isn't just television (or radio) ads either. There are very few yard signs or bumper stickers or anything associated with the vote for President.
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Obviously you can follow the campaign, but it's not much different than following the campaign from Ireland. In fact it is just like being in Ireland because everyone in upstate New York is watching what is happening in Ohio and Florida and Iowa and Nevada and anywhere the contest is close. In other words, they're watching what's happening elsewhere because it's not happening where they are.

Of course, people in the area can read about the campaign, follow the candidates closely (and endlessly) on cable news channels, watch the debates, etc just as you can in Ireland. But it's not really participatory democracy.

New Yorkers will vote for the candidate of their choice, but everyone knows that the vote is pretty much meaningless. I don't remember that from 1984, but again I was a student. My memory is that people in New York State were urging voters to choose one of the two candidates (Reagan or Mondale). Today neither candidate makes any effort to woo New York's voters.

Maybe the people of New York should count themselves lucky based on the political ads I have seen. They're atrocious. I didn't watch a lot of TV, but I couldn't enjoy a baseball game without being assaulted verbally and visually by ads for congressional candidates and the occasional state government candidate. The ads are loud, inane, annoying, but, most of all, insulting. They insult your intelligence. All the candidates are for "jobs" and against cutting medicare. Meaningless, childish nonsense.

Those are the positive ads. The negative ads are far worse. One ad I saw spoke about how the other guy "worked in Manhattan." Oh my! Not that! Another ad mentioned how the candidate is backed by President Obama who got campaign funds from someone who behaved a lot like ... (forbidding music) Bernie Madoff. Again, I shudder.

Actually, it's a total turn-off. I can see why so many people are alienated by politics. I can only imagine what it must be like to be living in Ohio where President Obama and Mitt Romney are spending their hundreds of millions of dollars on ads, positive and negative.

Is any of this new? I don't know, but it's new to me. If it was like this in the 70s and 80s I don't remember. Maybe because there are so many channels there are more political ads? Maybe it's the fact that I'm mostly tuning into the news or sports? Maybe it's because there is a recession and the political money is buying more ad time than it would if the economy was doing better? Maybe it's all of the above; I don't know.

What I do know is we don't get these kinds of ads on Irish television. They're not allowed. Same goes for Britain. Maybe that explains why during Irish elections the resources go on leaflets and posters and door-to-door campaigning. During an election campaign Irish people like to tell you they get fed up with political campaigners calling to the door, but that is far, far better than having to endure the constant barrage of TV ads American campaigns bring.

I would much rather have two people ring my bell every night, endure posters on the lampposts and leaflets through my door than bear the repetitive, ridiculous, repulsive television commercials. I really don't understand how you Americans put up with it.