The Presidential election in Ireland and the racist bump
Channel: Workers Solidarity Movement
Date: 31/10/2018

Last weekend saw a presidential election in Ireland where the clear victor was a left wing poet called Michael D Higgins who got 56% of the vote.  However a no hope candidate who was, 1 of 3, yes 3 hosts of the TV show Dragons Den running for president managed to boost his vote from close to nothing (2%) to 23% through the simple trick of Trump like racist remarks directed at the Traveller Community, a very small ethnic group who until recently were nomads but were forced to all but bandon that life by the Irish state over the last couple of decades.  

In the aftermath of the result the media reached for the same sort of lazy analysis about 'econoic anxiety' and people 'left behind' that was seen in the US after Trump was elected.  In this video Andrew argues that the exit poll data tells a very difrerent story.

I'm going to have a look at the actual evidence of who voted for Peter Casey and why they did so as found in the RTÉ / RedC Exit poll. In doing so I'm disagreeing with the emerging media narrative which speak's of 'economix anxiety' and 'silent majorities'.  Instead the poll suggests a voter base of older rural men who want to be able to say racist stuff about the Travelling community without 'fear' of being told they are racist asses but who also probably voted agains the removal of the ban on blasphemy from the constitution.

The RTE / RedC data is to be found at https://redcresearch.ie/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/296718-RTE-Exit-Poll-Oct-2018-Final-Report.pdf

Eileen Ní Fhloinn piece for the Journal is well worth a read https://www.thejournal.ie/readme/opinion-travellers-ireland-4309098-Oct2018/
"Activist Eileen Ní Fhloinn says it worries her as a Traveller woman “to see the brazen and openness of anti-Traveller sentiment that’s out there on social media and political forums”."