• 11:13 PM Simon McGarr - Radical move tonight. Abandoning the traditional Questions and Answers liveblog to try out a TV3 Vincent Browne alternative.
• 11:17 PM Simon McGarr - Panel today- ESRI reliable Hairy Economist.
• 11:20 PM Suzy Byrne - Ah ireland’s only academic expert in Banking – Brian Lucey
• 11:21 PM Suzy Byrne - Mentions of icebergs are apt tonight given meltdown in Iceland…
• 11:25 PM Suzy Byrne - Norah Casey from harmonia publishing
• 11:31 PM Simon McGarr - Ms. Casey could at least have read our ESRI guy’s article in Saturday’s Irish Times when she found out that she was going on the show with him. It’s only manners.
• 11:33 PM Simon McGarr - Lucey not selling me on this idea that Anglo was just being quietly killed for our own benefit.
• 11:35 PM Simon McGarr - (Scribble live, btw, has undergone a facelift since the last time I used it. This has added all sorts of bells and whistles, but seems to freeze up both Internet Explorer and Firefox at a whim)
• 11:37 PM Suzy Byrne - precipitously…
• 11:38 PM Simon McGarr - Some lovely ads. I’m starting to wonder if Q&A might have been a better bet after all. I’m not getting enough blame poured out to satisfy my blood lust.
• 11:39 PM Simon McGarr - John Fitzgerald is the Hairy Economist, by the way
• 11:39 PM Suzy Byrne - Wait for Brian to offer to cut his salary again..and everyone elses!
• 11:40 PM Simon McGarr - Vincent Browne has decided to point out that COs and Nurses don’t get paid very much to start with. Should poor mini-wages be sliced?
• 11:42 PM Simon McGarr - John Fitzgerald says that the Social Welfare recipients are getting the best deal this year.
• 11:42 PM Suzy Byrne - Norah runs to defence of poor and nurses etc. John Fitzgerald lives on another planet!
• 11:43 PM Simon McGarr - Meanwhile I’m writhing with fury.
• 11:46 PM Simon McGarr - Hooray! My faith in the Hairy Economist is rewarded. He is just taking the long view.
• 11:47 PM Suzy Byrne - Brian has more time to explain his thoughts on pay cuts – he offers to run the Vhi for half the cost.
• 11:48 PM Simon McGarr - Dammit! It turns out that Solicitors are making loads of money. Where is my load?
• 11:50 PM Simon McGarr - Time for tax increases, says Mr. Lucey. We don’t have the super rate for mega earners.
• 11:51 PM Suzy Byrne - suddenly realised that this is an extra long programme – and who is Ciaran hancock? Irish Times newbie?
• 11:52 PM Simon McGarr - He’s been writing a series of opinionpieces on the Irish Times Business Section.
• 11:52 PM Suzy Byrne - Oh a special page 1 comment in tomorrow’s Irish Indo – I. can’t. wait!
• 11:53 PM Simon McGarr - Gibberish Ahoy. I ‘m tempted to hover around the Indo Website to see what kind of insights they’re offering the nation.
• 11:54 PM Simon McGarr - I’m guessing its the urgent need for Civil Servants to be fired without heed as to what they’re actually doing.
• 11:55 PM Suzy Byrne - it won’t be on the indo website till very late this morning – well 3 or 4 at least
• 11:55 PM Simon McGarr - Curse you inefficient Private sector!
• 11:58 PM Suzy Byrne - bad bank is new description for toxic bank i see
• 11:58 PM Simon McGarr - Having heard the headlines from tomorrow’s newspapers I now know I don’t want to buy any of them.
• 12:00 AM Simon McGarr - How could Vincent think there was a lack of expertise in the Department of Finance? Don’t they have both Arthur Cox, acting from beyond the grave, and Merril Lynchacting to help them.
• 12:02 AM Suzy Byrne - ESRI man says ‘we told you so’
• 12:03 AM Simon McGarr - Sudden burst of clear speech. John Fitzgerald says that we’re going to have to raise our taxes to pay for the public service we want, which we build on the back of Property bubble money.
• 12:04 AM Simon McGarr - They did tell us so. Their 2004 report was pretty clear.
• 12:05 AM Simon McGarr - “[The ESRI say] “unexpectedly sharp corrections have the potential to reduce Irish growth rates substantially”. Current housing stock output is well above the amount required to meet long-term housing needs, estimated at 30,000-50,000 units a year. At some point, output will have to fall to those levels, whether suddenly or gradually… It is difficult to engineer a soft landing, the ESRI warns.” From the tiny Indo report on same.
• 12:06 AM Suzy Byrne - and if I remember Bertie and others told us to stop talking down the economy and others generally laughed at them for pessimism
• 12:07 AM Simon McGarr - I kind of wish they had gone for headlines, just a little bit.
• 12:08 AM Simon McGarr - And We’re out of here.

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