As we learned on Morning Ireland's 25th birthday programme, President of Ireland Mary McAleese is not sending Christmas Cards this year to save money, choosing to send emails instead of cards. Perhaps she knows more than us about what lies in wait in her colleague Ebenezer scrooge's (Brian Lenihan's) Bludget in December. For those still contemplating a public postal service in the future you can't go wrong with cards from three of doop.ie clients Christmas card sets now on sale online, the cards will be posted out to you for you to post on to your card list around the world. Temple Street http://url.ie/2tceDown Syndrome Ireland http://url.ie/2tcf ISANDS http://url.ie/2tcg Posted via email from web lab... Similar posts

I came across this quote by Martin Luther King in a book called The Secret History of Cancer. Cowardice asks the question - is it safe? Expediency asks the question - is it politic? Vanity asks the question - is it popular? But conscience asks the question - is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular; but one must take it because it is right.Martin Luther KingSo how do we get from here to the National Asset Management Agency (NAMA). My big concern is that NAMA is not about being right. I'm not sure what it was. The budget (or Bludget as it is called on Twitter) was politic, certainly not popular but not right either.... Similar posts

Hahaha "supply WILL normalise!"Prison Economy Spirals As Price Of Pack Of Cigarettes Surpasses Two Hand... Similar posts

Hello and welcome to the Easter Drinky Link. At present I am at home in my mom’s and this is brought to you on macbook (@fontfiddler’s macbook) so we’ll see if bloging is better by mac certainly there are enough mac bloggers so it cant be that hard! lol Ok on with the Drinky, it being Easter, there is really only one way to go! Easter Bunny 1 1/2 oz Creme De Cacao 1/2 oz Vodka 1 teaspoon Chocolate Syrup 1 teaspoon Cherry Brandy Directions: 1. Shake creme de cacao and vodka with ice. 2. Strain over ice in an old-fashioned glass. 3. Float chocolate syrup and cherry brandy. So here I am watching *roll eyes* Britain’s got talent with my Mum and @fontfiddler so if this seems off kilter but its a bit hard to concentrate, as Britain’s answer to the Kelly... Similar posts

Okay, so it happened. After all that anticipation, we finally got the budget we all expected; a shit one, frankly. Nobody expected it to be anything other than fascistic, nobody can be in the least bit surprised that it's grotesque in the way it victimises people who've got fuck-all money to give. Suffice it to say that a family with a single minimum-wage income, an eight year-old mortgage and two children of preschool age will actually lose more from their weekly pay than a single person earning €50k per annum. We were told it was going to be a tough budget, but people also threw the word "fair" around with gay abandon. Fair? Add the levies and taxes, and the tax rate for incomes over €175k is 48%, exactly the same as people who earned about 40 grand back in 1997; meanwhile, 7% of... Similar posts

With the current decline in the economy, budgets of businesses of all sizes have been hit hard, especially SME’s. Companies will find different ways of saving on costs. Some will cut marketing and advertising budgets, others will regrettably need to let people go. These are unfortunate measures and affect both the businesses themselves and the wider economy as a whole. Dollymount towards Dublin © Darran Morris 2009 In Ireland in particular, after the bludget (as it charmingly got christened on Twitter), things are looking particularly grim. Alexia Golez has great first reactions here and Damien Mulley eloquently handled it in his bludget post. There weren’t any significant measures taken to encourage or even enable enterprise, tech or otherwise, in these difficult times. Not... Similar posts

While the rest of the blogosphere does battle over their Top 50 Irish Acts or the Bludget 09, Pint of Unspecific remains vigilant as ever.A theme of the blog is to be a watcher over humanity. Make sure it doesnt grow too big for its boots. The animal kingdom can be quite the humbler.Well here it is.http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7988169.stmI'd be lying if I said I thought I'd never have my name attached to a website talking about hot-intra-monkey-sex in exchange for... Similar posts

ALONG WITH SEVERAL COLLEAGUES, I watched the excellent broadband coverage via HEANET of an emergency budget unfolding in Dublin yesterday. The emergency measures are needed to prop up the flailing Irish economy. After 25 minutes, I heard a muttering that confirmed chatter overheard in several pubs I frequent in southeast Ireland. The severity of the Irish budget (more taxes and increased levies) heralds a return to form of the black economy in Ireland. This time, more Revenue Inspectors are available for trawling records but off-books accounting is rather sophisticated, even in my little neighbourhood, with several shops using a separate key on their cash tills to record selected transactions off the books. There's a guy making the rounds able to program this as part of the point-of-sale... Similar posts

Myself and John have released a Budget Calculator for this emergency 2009 Budget which you can run here. Your not likely to find good news, so please don’t shoot the messenger! By the way, RedOakTaxRefunds is the relaunched & rebranded version of Tax123.ie. Plenty of disquiet around the country over this budget, a lot of unhappy campers (myself included!): http://search.twitter.com/search?q=bludget http://www.scribblelive.com/Event/Irish_Emergency_Budget_2009... Similar posts

Got asked by a journalist about my take on the budget in regards to technology which I include below. Alexia’s post on it is clearer and better than mine though. Have a look. And bludget? Well that’s what the good folks on Twitter decided to label Twitter messages with that mentioned the budget. Photo owned by MonkeySimon (cc) My own take is that this was a prime opportunity to tell the tech companies of Ireland or those wanting to start one that there is real potential and to take the plunge. A budget, even if it is all about cutting things to bits can still be used to promote business and investment in people and ideas. Instead it’s leaving people with a mostly negative take on the present and the future. This tax relief on IP is also to be welcomed but those getting... Similar posts

Some interesting reactions tot he #bludget: Linda: Okay the #bludget doesn’t seem to have hurt me too much, except that I don’t see how it’s going to help create more jobs. I want a job! David Smith: Overall the #bludget doesn’t affect me too much but I’d hate to be 19, out of work and smoking!! Iain O’Connell: (currently living in Holland) Listening to the #bludget it seems clear that I won’t be un-emigrating anytime soon Karl Deeter: the budget was fair given the state of the economy, what’d you expect?! #bludget Paul Sheehan: all in all, a harsh budget, will probably cost me 10-12% but I think it had to be done, next year will be harsher #bludget #budget09... Similar posts

As I apporached today I was fearful that they would do something that would directly effect me (Im selfish I know). But as someone on minimum wage I thought they might do something to the tax limits, but they didn’t. What did you make of the...... Similar posts

Mini-Brian introduced his bludget, which he told us would be fair. He has achieved this by bludgetting poor people and giving the money to the banks in return for their shit loans. If I was a banker, that would look fair enough.... Similar posts

The Irish sure are hooked up with Twitter. Todays emergency budget is trending on Twitter as #bludget. §... Similar posts

For those interested in following the emergency budget, there are a number of ways to follow. The budget speech will be carried on RTE Radio 1, RTE 1 television, and online at the Dail website. There is also a liveblog at Scribblelive.com If you wish to submit a message, you can send it via twitter with the hashcode... Similar posts

How lovely it would be, to have faith that today will go the way it needs to…... Similar posts

So the bludget is tomorrow and as my boss said, the country is flucked! The Government cannot put the blame for this tough budget on outside forces. They have been in Government now for nearly 12 years and must share some of the blame. I was at a fundraising lunch on Friday for Colm Burke and the Guest speakers were Pat Cox and Brian Lucy. Coming out of that lunch I was depressed. Its not looking good for us. So what should the Government do? Here are my ideas: Cut Junior Minister (I know they are cutting 5, so 3 more wont hurt) Means test or tax childrens allowance (Consider it part of income) Increase top rate of tax Reduce civil service Reduce TD/Senators/Ministers Pay and Expenses (10% seams like an idea) Scrap E-Voting Machines Increase the upper “Lenihan Levy” rate... Similar posts

Thanks to Marian Finucane for coining the word of the decade. Bludget. That’s what we’re facing tomorrow, I’m afraid, and that’s not just a figure of speech.  I really am afraid.  The incompetent, corrupt bastards who got us into this mess are now handing us a tub of Vaseline and inviting us to bend over. They’re looking for €3.5 billion. Here’s my two budget suggestions: take back from the Catholic Church the €1.5 billion this government paid on behalf of clergy who abused children while they contributed almost nothing. Take the €13 billion that the Corrib Gas Field is worth, and which Shell E&P is being given for nothing because of a crooked deal with two crooked government ministers, Ray Burke and Bertie Ahern. Why not?  If all workers have to... Similar posts

The emergency budget tomorrow will be live blogged. After a weekend when Fine Gael began to hammer at the government’s right flank over tax increases (promising not to tax our way out of this problem while omitting to mention the 2%/ 4% ’solidarity tax’ on higher earners in the Leader’s speech), Brian Cowen delivered another video address via the Fianna Fail website and from Prague took a hit at Enda Kenny and Fine Gael. Cowen had this to say in Prague; Speaking to the Irish media at the EU-US summit in Prague, the Taoiseach accused his opposition counterpart of “trying to cod people”. “The deterioration in our public finance position means we have to take some strong actions and it has to be including the revenue side, and any suggestions to the contrary... Similar posts