Article 45

So, what's the joke of the day? Yes, you've guessed it. Brian Cowen's bro, Barry, being made Spokesman for Social Protection in Mickey Martin's new front bench which he announced today. Plenty of jobs for the boys now with so many to go around and so few to choose from. And not a woman between them. Hardly contemporary is it?
Joan Bruton V Barry Cowen. I suspect Joan will win that one hands down.

I think Fine Gael have found a new chief spin doctor in Brian Hayes and one would suspect that tonight's appearance on Vinny Browne will be one of his last. Not that he won't be invited on, but at some stage as this crisis goes on and on, I'm sure his Party elders will pull the plug on Vinny just like the Failers did with their hierarchy.
Burning bondholders? No more money into the banks? Reduction in the interest rate? There's a few more, but why bother?

Bottom line is that the promises Fine Gael made as they swept to power are slowly eroding away with each passing week of their tenure. I wonder how Labour will stand when it comes to the time discussions are held into how much to further implode the standard of living of the ordinary-joe-soap.
The disgusting pay paid to the top tier in this country who 'serve' us throughout a host of state bodies is obscene when you consider the misery placed on people here over the past two and a half years. This has to stop because more and more people are wising up to the fact that they have been shafted time and time again by those they trusted with putting their best interests at heart over the course of the current Dáil. There are exceptions to every rule, but one feels those out to do some good with that trust don't have much of an ear when it comes to dealing with their parties 'important people' or our European and IMF overlords.

Equality in society has been the goal set out in many a countries constitution. It's promise has set many a revolution on the road, launched many a political career and been the foreword to many a speech. Yet we never get there. We never even get close. Even countries who would have a genuine interest in the welfare of their citizens fall short.
Here in Ireland the best words of our constitution have been largely ignored and we failed miserably in any attempt at closing the gaps between the many tiers of our divided society. Time and time again failures of epic proportions. First the Church and now the State. A State is run by people and their the blame must lie, but as citizens if all is fair in love and war, then perhaps those who put them there must shoulder some of the blame. Men died for these words.

DIRECTIVE PRINCIPLES OF SOCIAL POLICY

Article 45

The principles of social policy set forth in this Article are intended for the general guidance of the Oireachtas. The application of those principles in the making of laws shall be the care of the Oireachtas exclusively, and shall not be cognisable by any Court under any of the provisions of this Constitution.

1. The State shall strive to promote the welfare of the whole people by securing and protecting as effectively as it may a social order in which justice and charity shall inform all the institutions of the national life.

2. The State shall, in particular, direct its policy towards securing:
i. That the citizens (all of whom, men and women equally, have the right to an adequate means of livelihood) may through their occupations find the means of making reasonable provision for their domestic needs.
ii. That the ownership and control of the material resources of the community may be so distributed amongst private individuals and the various classes as best to subserve the common good.
iii. That, especially, the operation of free competition shall not be allowed so to develop as to result in the concentration of the ownership or control of essential commodities in a few individuals to the common detriment.
iv. That in what pertains to the control of credit the constant and predominant aim shall be the welfare of the people as a whole.
v. That there may be established on the land in economic security as many families as in the circumstances shall be practicable.

3. 1° The State shall favour and, where necessary, supplement private initiative in industry and commerce.
2° The State shall endeavour to secure that private enterprise shall be so conducted as to ensure reasonable efficiency in the production and distribution
of goods and as to protect the public against unjust exploitation.

4. 1° The State pledges itself to safeguard with especial care the economic interests of the weaker sections of the community, and, where necessary, to contribute to the support of the infirm, the widow, the orphan, and the aged.
2° The State shall endeavour to ensure that the strength and health of workers, men and women, and the tender age of children shall not be abused and that citizens shall not be forced by economic necessity to enter avocations unsuited to their sex, age or strength.

Some great words there. If only we had the calibre of man who helped write them among us today, I wonder just how great our little island nation might have been. Before we sold it off first chance we got. Very sad for a nation of so few, and fewer to come, as a generation braves the outside world in search of a future.