Then Independent Councillor, now Fianna Fail TD Christy O’Sullivan from 2002 in Cork South West. (Thanks to Christy for sending me these leaflets in 2002) With Neighbouring Kerry South getting all sorts due to Jackie Healy-Rae, Christy O’Sullivan polled a good 3,609 votes in 2002 before topping the polling 2007 having joined Fianna Fail.

Former Fianna Fail Councillor Paddy Madigan from the 1997 General Election where he stood as an Independent in Dunn Laoghaire. He had also stood as an Independent in the 1994 European Elections. He polled 1082 votes.

Martin Christie was elected in the 2004 Local Elctions for Mulhuddart. However he later resigned his seats under controversial circumstances.

It was quite a coup when Fine Gael secured Journalist and TV presenter, Mairead McGuinness on its ‘East’ ticket for the 2004 European Elections. A hard-fought campaign and rivalry between herself and Avril Doyle led to Fine Gael winning two of the three seats on offer. McGuinness topping the poll with just over a quota.

A Labour Party Leaflet urging a Yes vote for the Good Friday Agreement.
Many of the implications of the ‘Yes’ vote came through.
“A Yes Vote will mean more jobs and prosperity”  The Good Friday Agreement is rarely cited when talking of the Celtic Tiger. It must have had a large impact. Ireland in the glare of the worlds media at the centre of a global good news story. American and other investment must have seen us through green tinted glasses. Of course it wasn’t the only reason for investment, but it shone a positive global light on our country.

 Martin McAneny listed as the “Natural Law Candidate for Dublin South East” ,  it was actually Dun Laoghaire where he stood in 1992 gaining a massive 48 votes.

Former president of the Students Union of the National College of Ireland Bob Quinn from his 2002 campaign. He received  1,377 votes.
The PDs used a lot of these cartoons on their 2002 literature.

1994 European Elections, Fianna Fail and Labour are in coalition and Richard Bruton asks voters to vote no 1 Jim Mitchell, No 2 Mary Banotti.
Vote management for General elections in Dublin can be difficult to manage, however the Liffey provides a perfect boundary in European Elections.
Mary Banotti was elected, Jim Mitchell missed out.
The ‘Recent Events’ refered to, could have been anything from the Tax Amnesty to the Beef Tribunal.

Ennistymon, circa 1900

After ‘The Boys’ had a few drinks, conversation turned to the ‘campaign’ and who did what and who didn’t do that. Sometimes it seemed there was unfinished business from the revolution being settled in the pub. One man, Murt Hynes, used thump the counter and my father would have to tell him to take it easy. In the late afternoon, Murt often challenged his mates to take up the cause again and ‘finish the job for once and for all.’ They stared at the floor in silence, finished their drinks and went home. Alone, Murt would sing a few rebel songs and then my mother made a plate of ham sandwiches to fortify him for the journey home.

‘The Warrior Carty‘ is set on the day of a fair around Christmas time. The character is not directly based on any of ‘The Boys’, but I have always felt he was one of them. The music is by Martin Hayes and Dennis Cahill.

I’ll post another Christmas Story, ‘Time Passes’, in a week or so. Please pass on the links to anyone interested in Irish stories, spoken word, music etc.

Available on itunes or via Feedburner. Click here: Stories from Ireland Podcast

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Dublin Central 1992 leaflet of Niamh Nic Mhathúna, involved in Youth Defence, daughter of Una Bean nic Mhathuna of “G’way ye wife-swapping sodomites’ fame. I gather she was involved in Coir too.
As the General Election was being held on the same day as the Abortion Referendum a higher than usual number of pro-life independents stood. Not many fared well. Niamh Nic Mhathúna polled 514 votes.

The then Taoiseach, Bertie Aherns, brother Noel Ahern from the 1997 General Election where he topped the polled getting over 1.5 quotas.

Emmet Stagg attacks the cuts in the Health Services in 1989.
“If you can pay,
your child gets heart surgery in a week.

If you can’t pay,
join the waiting list or die. “

For those of you like myself who are consumed with all things elections, Benny Cooneys name may ring a bell.
He polled 18 votes in the 1998 Dublin North by-election, 21 votes in the 1996 Dublin West by-election, has stood on at least eleven occasions and in that time has a top vote of 239 votes.
Yet theres not much wrong with his policies….

This story returns to a time when the Revolution was just around the corner. It’s from The West and was recorded in San Francisco. Music is by Martin Hayes + Dennis Cahill and the tune is MacAllistrom’s March.

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A friend who had a radio show on ClareFm discovered that Revolution upset the Ennis taxi drivers for some unfathomable reason. So he’d play it and they’d call the station and scream at him to can the track…it’s 11 minutes approx. He’d let it go for a few weeks and then drop it on them like a bomb, some wet night when they’d all be ranked around the monument in town. One night they drove out to the station and honked until the cops came…I never take a taxi around Ennis…

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Barbara Hyland has stodd multiple times in multiple elections, most notably in 1987 where she along with four other candidates stood for the National Legal Justice Action Group. NLJAG were campaigning against the Law Society, or rather the staus of the Law society as the ‘only avenue of complaint’ if you had ‘Suffered at the hands of the legal profession’.
They wanted an independent ombudsman.
She stood in 13 constituencies top vote of 217 in her home of Wicklow, lowest 33 in Dublin North West.

This is from 1989 where she stood in just Kerry South and Wicklow. She stood again in 1992, 1997 and 2002.  She has various newspaper clips in the leaflet which may give you a better idea as to her motives.

The Clare Crest: Faithful to our Heritage

Ironically, the multi-millionaire, Mr. JJ McCabe, only spent €2,390 on the campaign trail. It was his fifth time going for office and he was eliminated after the 1st count with 239 votes. The 73-year-old McCabe told the media he didn’t want to ‘buy’ the election and that he would never run for office again. He said:
“I have lost nothing. It is the electorate who have lost a man of great ability and skill.”
Fair enough, maybe he has a point.

JJ on the campaign trail

Those in the know say that JJ’s actions made the gods laugh and they showered him with good karma: it seems gods don’t like clampers… The next caller to his house was a developer who wanted to buy his land. JJ said lovely hurling and asked for 20 million. He had bought the holding from Lord Inchiquin for £5,000 some years previously, when the aristocrat was stuck for cash. JJ settled for €18.8 million. It was the biggest land deal in Clare during the building boom and the developer was subsequently refused planning permission. The land will probably be Clare’s biggest NAMA asset. JJ bought a pad in the Algarve, and an estate in France that has a castle, a hotel and ten houses on the grounds.

Now that he didn’t become a councilor, Mr. McCabe spends more time on his estate in France, drops over to the Med when he needs a change of scene. From there he can read what the successful councilors are up to. If he tunes into the news from Ennis town council he’ll learn about the proposal to recruit ‘Urine Wardens’ to police the county town on weekends — a revenue generating scheme like parking tickets for pee-pee violators. He’ll probably conclude that he’s better off being far away from Clare politics and uncork a bottle of vintage plonk from his vineyard.

And if he’s keeping up with local religious affairs, he’ll see that the Bishop of Killaloe, Willie Walsh (who he’d know from the hurling matches) has come out strongly against the recent apparition hysteria in Knock. According to Dublin ‘visionaries’ Joe Coleman and Keith Henderson, Our Lady will appear at Knock Shrine on December 5th next, at 3pm sharp. The bishop said,
“This sort of thing can bring religion into disrepute.”
While he would not normally discourage people from going to Knock, he thought they should stay away on that day. He continued,
“I would be unhappy about people dashing off to Knock just because the rumour goes out that there will be a vision. It has been proven time and time again that there is autosuggestion going on. For instance, like the moving statues — quite intelligent, normally sane people can believe they saw something. It’s like anything… if you look long enough at any object, you’re going to use your imagination and are liable to see something you hadn’t noticed before. If it is already suggested that this is a vision then you can in some way, unconsciously, convince yourself.”

Visionaries Coleman and Henderson

But like it or lump it, thousands will ignore Bishop Walsh and all the other bishops and follow the visionaries to Knock for the Apparition. Our Lady was scheduled to appear there at Halloween, and an estimated 15,000 people came for the event. Some claim they saw The Virgin, others reported seeing the sun change colour and dance in the sky. Skeptics wonder if the holy water was spiked. Others blame the recession for the ‘visions’. The Bishop said, “That view has been expressed before but I don’t know whether this happens in times of depression.”

Ok, Bishop…but what if she does appear…and gives out the winning numbers for the Lotto on Dec 5th? Should we still do the quick-pick or listen to Our Lady? We wouldn’t mind having a châteaux in the South of France and be able to drop in to JJ for an evening of craic in castle. It can be wet and dreary around Clare in the depth of winter, especially when prayer falls on deaf ears.

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John Bracken from 2007, where he got a lot of media coverage due to his posters, literature and a campaign song but mainly because of his looks.
His policies were sensible enough but he didn’t get a huge vote. He failed again to win a seat in the 2009 local elections.

This is from the 1985 Local election,  Ballybrack ward.  Apologies that the scan is so poor. I’ll try and redo it in due course.
Looking back a quarter of a century on, a number of things stand out, amongst them,
‘Stop and Reverse the Growth of Dublin’
A sign of the times too that Acid Rain was seen as the big threat as Global Warming wasn’t known about.
‘Energy Efficient homes- major insulation scheme needed to stop hypothermia, ‘
‘An end to Land Rezoning / Speculation scandal. Tax unused property.’
‘Double Jobbing- Councillors should not also be T.Ds or Euro M.P.s’.
Sellafield still known as Windscale.
Also the reference to Bishopscourt peace camp, which was a camp beside bishopscourt radar base in Co Down that ran from 1983 to 1986.
Theres a pamphlet from Bishopscourt here

Paula Desmond – Labour -1999 Euro Elections Munster.
A stylish Paula Desmond from the 1999 Euro Elections Munster constituency.
Paula was daughter of the late Eileen Desmond and the late Dan Desmond.
Eileen Desmond had served for many years as a TD and had also been elected to the European Parliament in 1979. Eileen Desmond initially won a Dail seat at the 1965 Cork Mid By-election caused by the death of her husband Dan Desmond. Dan Desmond had been a TD for over 16 years.

Diarmuid Naessens wasn’t elected although did outpoll one of the Fianna Fail candidates.
Another thing from that count was that of the SWPs Martin Donohoes 308 tranfers, he got just 84.
Naessens was a very active member of the anti bin tax campaign.

Sinn Fein show off all their female candidates sitting and standing happily with a smiling Gerry Adams. The Back of the leaflet covers issues such as equal pay, childcare etc..

A sorry I Missed you card from a ’stylish’, now Irish Times Editor, Geraldine Kennedy in 1987. Madams profession is listed as a Journalist, Larry Lohans as a Teacher and Helen Keogh as ‘Housewife’.
Kennedy served one Dail term and lost her seat in 1989.

The Art of the Con

The Bull racked up a half-million euro tab over his few years as mandarin for d’Arts and had an extravagant lifestyle, at the expense of the Plain People of Ireland. A martyr for top-shelf brandy, best of wine, fatted lamb, caviar, horses, plane hops, limos, banquets, nothing was too good or too sacred for The Bull. He consumed all before him like a Pac man, while Irish artists waited for the crumbs that fell from his department. How many stories might that half-million euro have helped write? How many tunes could it have composed? How many songs could have it sung? The Bull’s expense account could have kept an artist in clover for 50 years and raised spirits in the process. Instead, it fattened himself and his herd. It’s a triumph for Irish journalism that he was exposed and forced to resign. Take a bow, Sunday Tribune but don’t rest on your laurels.

A long white stretch limo was pulled at the curb outside the Pogues gig and it reminded us of The Bull and how he loved long shiny cars. We suddenly felt charitable and wondered if he should be rehabilitated rather than despised as a parasite. Then we had a brainwave: what if the Bull could drive the Pogues limo!! Maybe Shane would lend his Mexican Air Force cap to him…just while he’s behind the wheel. He could be cured. Cruising a half million miles up highways and down autobahns and boreens, the Kerryman would get plenty therapy from the lads. Plus, he’d still have a touch of the high life, he’d still be rubbing shoulders with stars and starlets…still be supping good grog, but not at the taxpayers expense. He could get really into it…maybe get promoted to roadie status.

Pogues, SF

As the Pogues ploughed through their greatest songs in San Francisco, and Mac weaved this way and that, the idea of The Bull being part of the scene became more clear. The band might even give him a cameo part — take a bit of weight from Spider by having the Bull bang the tin beer tray against his head. And I know this is pushing it a bit, but maybe The Bull could play a bit of bodhran? On say, ‘The Irish Rover’? Would the lads let him join in the chorus? What about ‘Dirty Old Town’? Can’t you just see him on stage, belting out the refrain, sweet Cahersiveen etched on his face? Would he ever get to lash out ‘The Boys of Barr na Sráide’? His very own party piece…

On second thoughts, it may be better to keep him from the limelight for a while. It might be wiser to have him set up the backstage for the band, make sure everyone’s tastes and mores are catered for, and that there’s plenty of everything. He’d be good at that, he’s been freeloading for years and knows every rope in the book. He wouldn’t have an assistant, just an iPhone which he’d have to learn to use…there’s probably a Fás course for that. He’d have to know at any time, where drink, smoke and get-well cards could be got. And he’d have to learn to mix Tequila Dropkicks, Whiskey Windfalls and Brandy Bomb-Bombs…maybe learn how to hand-roll cigarettes. He’d get a much better education with the lads than he’d get hanging around the crowd in the Dáil bar.

We know it’s a privilege to work with the Pogues, and some might say that The Bull doesn’t deserve the chance. We understand all that, but feel it would be for the Greater Good, if he were rehabbed rather than punished or left to waste away on the backbenches of government. As some perverted form of entertainment, the Kerry voters will continue to return his whale carcass to the Dáil, forever more amen. It would take a few Pogues gigs to persuade them to release The Bull for the sake of art and culture. The band could play The Puck Fair, The Rose of Tralee, Listowel Races, Cahersiveen Winkle Festival. The Bull could play support for them at the ’Sive gig — it would be a perfect homecoming for the Prodigal Son.

It’s a win-win situation. The job would be good for The Bull: he’d still be flying around the place, ride limos and drink until maidin geal. He would be indentured to the Pogues. And here it should be said, the band would be better for his rehabilitation than U2. Like, Bono and The Bull could talk shite to each other all night and next morning…but there would be no shite talk with the Pogues. Everything would be straight up and politically incorrect.

The Pogues are The Bull’s only hope. And I know this is stretching it a bit far…but, what about Mrs. Bull doing a bit now and again? Remember, she was also part of his act and liked to jet away too. She’s a lovely singer and maybe she could do the female vox on Fairytale? And when Shane waltzes off stage with her, would The Bull know it’s only rock and roll? Or would he lose the head, like he did in the Dáil, and end up on YouTube again?

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Its usual for a candidate to emphasise their surnames at election time. In this case though, its the ‘Donal’ thats in large letters, due to the fact that both Fianna Fail candidates had the surname Moynihan.

In case people think ‘greedy developers’ are a recent phenonemon, Joan gives them a few mentions here. Also the photo with those glasses and lack of smile! Joan polled a couple of hundred votes and failed to be elected.