No way back for Cowen's bunch of Bart Simpsons

By James Downey

Saturday November 06 2010

WHEN you have to go down, you should go down with your guns blazing and your colours flying. That works just as well, if not better, for those in greatest need of redemption.
Charles Dickens's Sydney Carton redeemed himself by an act of heroism at the end of his life. But there are no Sydney Cartons in Brian Cowen's hapless Coalition. Instead, it contains a bunch of Bart Simpsons.
Not even Brian Lenihan can fill the Carton role. If anyone could go down with grace and style as the good ship Irish Republic sinks, it is he. The €6bn "fiscal adjustment" measures he announced on Thursday could be seen as one last brave effort to save the ship. But they are not his own measures.
Are they the right measures? I think not. Leaving aside the suffering they, and the rest of the four-year fiscal programme, will inflict on individuals and families, they will destroy our hopes of economic recovery and condemn us to a 'lost decade' if not a lost generation.
Worse still, in my opinion, is that they signal the end of our economic sovereignty. In effect, the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have imposed them.
People think the IMF is waiting in the wings to see if the European bailout fund -- to which it appears certain we must resort -- can substitute for direct intervention. In reality, the commission and the IMF are evidently working hand in glove.http://www.independent.ie/opinion/analysis/no-way-back-for-cowens-bunch-of-bart-simpsons-2409819.html