Brian Lenihan and the pariah state

Close Anglo and become “a Pariah state”. Lenihan

This is the exact and most revealing phrase I have read in the past two years from a government minister.

It seems that Brian Lenihan has been sucked into the club. – Don’t rock the boat. That is why we are into Anglo for €24 billion – and that is simply a black hole with an invisible bottom. Clubability is a Jesuit trait and is apparent in the majority of Jesuit educated school students. The psychological need for approval and being surrounded by approval and mentoring is part of all this. The end result is that the hard objective cold decision is rarely made. I may be wrong but Brian Lenihan is a nice guy. Just look at the deification of him in the newspapers post Beal na Blath!

That is the reason that there never has been a chance of liquidating Anglo which should have been let go. Professor Holohan in his report writes about a disorderly collapse of Anglo. Talk of contagion to AIB and bank of Ireland is ridiculous when both could have been nationalised in toto or in part.

I believe that the 30 September 2008 policy was excessive and wrongly elaborated in the follow-up. Anglo should have been wound up. With nationalisation, the bank guarantee and promissory notes, I am not in a position now to say whether it should be let go now. I have no doubt that this bank should be long gone however. But my guess is that Anglo will survive as BankCo and muddle on to be taken over in the fullness of time.

I am waiting for Professor Morgan Kelly’s verdict on the pariah state.