Shaun Connolly Politics

By Shaun Connolly

Enda Kenny bit off more than he could chew at The Crusty Corner.

The Taoiseach hit the Meath East bakery at some speed during what is known in the business as a “shake’n’fake” — when a politician suddenly appears, faking interest in local problems, shaking hands, and then gets out of town as quickly as possible.

Sleepy Dunboyne was the first of four stop-off points for Mr Kenny’s sweep through the constituency, and he burst into The Crusty Corner like jam out of a doughnut.

However, there is always an element of risk with shake’n’fakes, as was proven when the first two customers approached by Mr Kenny refused to have their Taoiseach-on-toast and politely declined his interest.

Undaunted by the rebuff by the bun-eaters, Mr Kenny spotted four women in the corner. The Taoiseach, one of the few people in public life to still use the term “housewives”, must have thought he was on a winner as he zeroed in on them with the opening gambit: “What are you talking about?” as if ready to riff with them about the aul’ knitting, or Daniel O’Donnell, or whatever it is “housewives” chat about.

Instead, social care worker Bridget Cash told him she was telling her friends how tired she was after finishing a 24-hour shift because she had to work extra hours to keep things on an even keel, as her garda husband’s pay had been reduced.

Mr Kenny shook their hands and left.

There was an equally chilly reception in the freezer section of Supervalu in the neighbouring village of Ratoath, where the Taoiseach was verbally frisked by an off-duty guard.

The officer pinned Mr Kenny to the spot for nine minutes. It was the PR handlers’ worst nightmare — an articulate guard with an even temper and a very big axe to grind about Croke Park as he lambasted the Taoiseach for failing to tax the better off instead of the squeezed middle.

“Some have got a lot more to contribute, and others haven’t got a lot left to give,” he told Mr Kenny.

The flunkies were beginning to panic at this point and pulled out the ultimate excuse to try and break the garda’s grip: “The children, Taoiseach, the children! They’re waiting to have their picture with you!”

To be fair to Mr Kenny, he handled the tricky situation well and did not hide behind the kids to escape, or turn his back on the guard, but politely listened as the man talked out his grievances. The pair parted amicably after the Taoiseach was warned in no uncertain terms he’d be out of office at the next election.

Mr Kenny had a much better time in Ashbourne, where happenstance brought him across the path of Kelly Petit outside AIB: “I’m going in for a mortgage, any tips?” she asked.

“I’ll come along with yer!” offered the Taoiseach as he whisked her through the doors and Mr Kenny asked the rather baffled assistant: “Can you give her a mortgage?”

Ever the optimist, Mr Kenny clearly has not heard the bailed-up banks merely suck up our billions, but are not too keen on handing it out again.

But, looking very pleased with his afternoon’s work, the Taoiseach turned to Ms Petit, saying: “Here’s my card.” Perhaps the guard’s warnings were still going around in his head and he was positioning himself for a post-election job as a mortgage broker?

With the major talking point of the day being, not Cyprus, but rather whether teenagers should get advice on threesomes from a HSE-funded website, somebody had to ask the relevant question at the media scrum, but it was clear no one wanted to use the actual word around poor innocent-looking Enda. So when the query did come, it was slightly reminiscent of those clipped British newsreels of the 1930s and could be summed up as: “I’m afraid there has been a spot of unpleasantness on the internet, Mr Taoiseach. Would you care to remark on this unpleasantness?”

Equally keen to avoid the word ‘threesome’, Mr Kenny referred to “sexual practices”, saying he was vaguely aware of the unpleasantness in question, but could not comment as he was not familiar with this specific unpleasantness — but added intriguingly: “I haven’t looked at it, and I’d like to see the site first, what the words in question actually mean.”

Maybe he should just ask Eamon Gilmore about it, because Labour would love to be involved in a threesome in Meath East, but now look destined to be screwed into a humiliating fourth place by the voters.

By Shaun Connolly

WELL, that’s certainly one way to put the ‘riot’ into Cypriot.

Oh, how quickly an alleged ‘game-changer’ in Europe can soon dissolve into a blame-changer. Is it just a week since the Government was leaping all over the deal to raid Cypriot bank accounts, and hailing it as a good move for Ireland and the Eurozone — and yet another triumph for Dublin’s rotating presidency of the EU?

For ‘rotating’, now read ’rocky’, as we tremble on the edge of an emergency exit from the euro by the island state, and face the certainty that the confidence that European savers had in the bank guarantee only days ago is now shot through like Swiss cheese.

Fans of Greek mythology might be tempted to believe Enda Kenny, self-styled King of Europe, was befallen by hubris. There he was, lording it in Washington DC, spouting on about how he was the Irish president of Europe, meeting the Irish ‘president’ of America (as Barack Obama looked on, suitably bewildered), while back home all was turmoil.

How fitting that this was the week the Dáil’s Public Accounts Committee warned the Department of Foreign Affairs to spend less time on Ferrero Rocher receptions and focus more on financial management.

While it is all very lovely that Ireland has the six-month-long nominal presidency of the EU, the way Mr Kenny & Co have tried to large it up has been more than faintly embarrassing. Irish ministers do not even chair most of the relevant summit meetings and have minimal influence over the agenda, yet Dublin grandly claims credit for anything that has moved on the European stage since Jan 1.

While the Government may be smugly pleased with itself at the way it has been ‘running’ Europe, does anyone remember from whom we took over the presidency of the European Council?

Oh, yes, that’s it, it was Cyprus — and what did they claim as the big success of their six-month run?

Oh, yes — that’s it, it was a magnificent deal to secure the banking system.

I wonder how that striking success is working out?

Though blindingly obvious to ‘the real world’, from-the-off, that the ram-raid on Cypriot bank accounts would never work, once sanity finally dawned on the euro heads that this was a non-starter, Dublin was quick to try and unscramble itself from the mess, suddenly pointing out that all the big countries were still in charge, not them — but, by that stage, the damage had been done.

Cyprus was previously only known for two things: being a shining example of British post-colonialism — as, like India/Pakistan, Palestine/Israel and dear old Ireland, it had been left partitioned, divided and in a state of constant political tension; and being the birthplace of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love.

Aphrodite, was, of course, born as a result of Cronus of the Titans ripping off the genitals of his father, Uranus, and throwing them into the Aegean Sea. Aphrodite grew so beautiful that Zeus, king of the Gods — or, to put the Irish Government’s spin on the current power play in the EU, let’s rename him Enda — had to intervene as he feared her charms would unleash war among the gods, and so made her marry the ugly occupant of Mount Olympus, Hephaestus.

Not that Aphrodite let that stop her, as she soon took up a passionate affair with Adonis (after acting as his surrogate mother — Greek mythology makes even the plot lines of EastEnders look vaguely believable, by comparison).

Now, the two great gods of Europe, Germany and Russia, rage over who will win the financial heart of Cyprus once more.

It is easy to understand why Frankfurt is very reluctant to underwrite a Cypriot banking system so twisted out of shape by Russian mafia money — but why was this off-shore hot-cash stash allowed to join the EU in the first place?

But making the little investors pay for the pain with a ‘levy’ of up to 10% of their savings showed the lowest form of emotional intelligence. Who across Europe will believe the bank-savings ‘guarantees’ now?

Irish ministers were quick to insist that such a thing could never happen here — but it already has, and at their own hands. This is the Government that raided pension pots with a similar ‘levy’, and Finance Minister Michael Noonan shows no remorse for ripping 15m out of the accounts of credit unions with the liquidation of Anglo.

The Taoiseach, and others, were quick to fall over themselves, insisting the situation in Cyprus is “unique” and “unprecedented” — but everything is unprecedented until a precedent has been set.

And that precedent to rob the bank-savings of ordinary citizens, in order to pay for the greed of the capitalist casino cowboys, was set at 4.30am in Brussels last Saturday, when Ireland and the rest of the Eurozone insisted the little people had to stump-up for the sins of others.

It is not as if the EU did not have forewarning of the crisis, as Cyprus first announced it would need a bail-out last June — which is exactly the same time Mr Kenny and Co insisted they had achieved a “game-changer” deal and would soon deliver a massive write-down on Ireland’s 60bn bank bail-out debts.

A huge question mark now hangs over that — especially as Dublin has shot itself in the financial foot by accepting that Cypriot debt would not be divided between sovereign and bank liabilities, as it insists ours should be.

If Mr Kenny fails to deliver the deal, or comes up with a dodgy fig leaf effort like the one on Anglo promissory notes, the issue will become a blame-changer instead. In the public’s mind, it will switch blame for the unsustainable banking bail-out debt legacy from the last Fianna Fiasco administration to this Slump Coalition.

If that comes to pass, the legacy of not-so-mighty Aphrodite will leave Enda: King of Europe looking as (politically) castrated as Uranus.

By Shaun Connolly

AFTER giving God just two weeks’ notice that he was quitting his job, Pope Benedict then had the nerve to blame the ‘Big G’ for everything that went wrong during his papacy.That’s gratitude for you.

Saying that “the Lord seemed to sleep” at times of crisis over the past eight years struck a very odd note from a man leading a Church that is meant to believe God’s divine hand is everywhere, at all times.

But, then, its been that kind of week. Take Pat Rabbitte, for example. While he is hardly in the same league as the Pope — although both believe themselves to be infallible — the Cabinet member also raised eyebrows with an unusual observation.

Showing a distinct lack of communication skills for a minister for communication, Mr Rabbitte used a book launch to make a rather off-key joke on the day the Croke Park 2 details emerged, details that will, once again, lash into the low-paid, while those at the top get a much easier ride. “Another busy day diminishing the living standards of our people,” Mr Rabbitte mused to a rather mixed reception.

Mr Rabbitte clearly did not get as much laughter as he expected, which put him at odds with Fianna Fáil leader, Micheál Martin, who provoked hoots of derision across the Dáil chamber when he expressed outrage that a politician may have misled a tribunal of inquiry.

Oh, Mr Martin, pass the smelling salts! Could such a shocking thing ever really happen in dear old Ireland? And, thank heavens you are there as the moral backbone of the Dáil!

Mr Martin was referring to claims that disgraced deputy, Michael Lowry, may not have been as open as he could have been with Justice Moriarty’s probe. Mr Martin revealed he had “a very, very uneasy feeling” about the whole thing and called on Enda Kenny to re-open the tribunal.

This would be the same Mr Martin who provoked a very, very queasy feeling in many people when he joined his then Cabinet buddies in fanning out across radio and TV studios, like sheep, to bleat their belief in whatever incredible — as in ‘just not credible’ — stream of consciousness Bertie Ahern had verbally vomited at the Mahon corruption probe that day.

Ahern was an unbelievable Taoiseach — as proved when the tribunal judges refused to believe his evidence. Now exposed as a liar, Ahern has since gone to ground, unable to comprehend how the judges, whom he once branded “low-lifes”, could not believe his “explanations” for the dollar and sterling lodgements sloshing about the ‘23’
bank accounts he operated while minister for finance in the early 1990s.

Oh, you remember them, Mr Martin: ‘I won it on the gee gees’; ‘These men I didn’t really know made me take it in Manchester’; ‘It was from two spontaneous digouts a year, from two separate sets of friends who had no knowledge of each other, but wanted to give the finance minister enough for a deposit on a house.’

Bertie has yet to reveal where the money really did come from. What can he have to hide?

And, given all that, wouldn’t Mr Martin make better use of his time concentrating on the man he defended so slavishly for so long, before commenting on Lowry?

Mr Kenny had no intention of getting back into the Lowry affair — the deputy is, after all, a former Fine Gael minister who then traded his support for Mr Martin’s last FF government in a still-secret deal. Lowry’s seen a lot of things go down in his time. They all know that.

And, anyway, the Taoiseach was far too busy doing what his Coalition does best — terrorising the disabled. Albert Einstein famously defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results — and this Government’s treatment of the disabled would seem to bear that out.

The beginning of the Dáil term was marked by disabled people sleeping rough outside Government Buildings in protest at a nasty, needless attack on their quality of life, which saved the Exchequer very little in relative terms, but ripped a massive hole in the lives of those affected.

Health Minister and stroke specialist, Dr James Reilly, said he had learned his lesson and would treat disabled people with more respect and humanity, in future, but, instead, has treated them with contempt, yet again, over the incredibly cack-handed withdrawal of the mobility allowance.

There is no replacement scheme ready to go when the funds are cut off in June, as health, once again, proves itself to be the dysfunctional department of government, whose ‘experts’ cannot work out an alternative themselves and will farm the project out, while ministers insist they cannot even assure the people affected that they will be entitled to the same transport provisions when their payment stops in four months’ time.

The allowance only goes to 4,700 people, with the full grant standing at a hardly extravagant 208.50 per month. The Government has known, since it came to power two years ago promising a “new people-centred politics”, that its age cut-off limit broke equality laws, yet, despite all the warning, they just ripped it away in what looked like a chaotic lash of financial vandalism.

Ministers even had the nerve to claim they “agonised” before plunging the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in the State into uncertainly and fear. The mother of teenage disability campaigner, Joanne O’Riordan, who was born with no limbs, put it into context. “Agonise? We’re on call with the car for Joanne 24/7. I don’t go outside the door. I haven’t been outside the door since Joanne was born. I’m there for Joanne 24/7. I’m not complaining. I’d do it all over again, but don’t talk to me about agonising,” said Ann O’Riordan.

It was a rare expression of sanity in a week of nonsensical and offensive statements from the people in charge. Mr Kenny and Dr Reilly should reflect that God is not the only one guilty of falling asleep at the wheel.

By Shaun Connolly

WE have been assured the  Anglo prom note deal is an unsinkable “ship” which has now left “port“ – let’s hope it is not the Titanic leaving Cobh, heading for an Iceberg.

This column received a very frosty look when it put just that analogy to the Taoiseach. But perhaps Edna Kenny’s angry glare was because he had a momentary movie flash-forward to an image of himself as the abandoned blond in the freezing waters, drifting away on a piece of old wardrobe amidst the wreckage as Michael Noonan ducks beneath the waves to the tune of a reworking of the Celine Dion dirge: “My Debt Will Go On”.

With Oscar weekend upon us once more the self-loving, back slapping by Ministers over the Anglo prom note move has almost rivalled Hollywood in its political onanism.

Then along pops European Central Bank boss Mario Draghi to stop the premature after-party in its tracks with his deliberately ambiguous remarks on the viability of the Anglo deal which immediately plunged a feel good plotline into a cliff-hanger/horror film of epic proportions.

Indeed, movie metaphors could easily cling to this Government as we focus our attention on the shiny, little bald fellow – Oscar, of course, not Mr Noonan.
Clearly, if the Coalition’s Programme for Government – with its pledges to transform Irish democracy, end stroke politics, and Lincolnesque ideals to set the people free from dodgy bank deals – was to be turned into a film it would have to be a remake of “Pulp Fiction”.

And let’s not forget the outrageous comedy of Fianna Fail being confirmed by two opinion polls as the most popular party in the country.

The plot of “The Hangover” would seem to fit the FF-ers to a tee.

The gang wake up dazed and confused amidst mass destruction of their own making, and some of them are missing (most of the parliamentary party in fact).

Slowly they piece together the events that led them to this squalid low as, after initially – and conveniently – forgetting everything, they remember the wild party they threw for their buddies which left a trail of despair and chaos all around them.

But the FF-ers did not care, they were nice and tight in their own golden circle and living high maxing out someone else’s credit card.

Unfortunately that credit card belonged to me and you and they, literally, urinated it up against a wall and then fell about laughing at our expense.

In the film they even wake-up with an angry (celtic) tiger that they have lost control of, and which then turns on them in ferocious anger. Spooky.

And now Fianna Fail are topping the polls once more, so it looks like “Hangover 2” is coming down the tracks. And, as everyone who saw the disappointing, unfunny,  sequel to the Hollywood version knows, it is just the same plot, with the same cast, set a couple of years later.

But who is up for the awards tomorrow (Sunday)?

Labour’s deputy leader Joan Burton – given her repeated, protestations she has no intention of toppling her under performing boss Eamon Gilmore – must be a shoe-in for Best Actress In A Supporting Role.

When Ms Burton does do the inevitable and seek the lead in Labour’s often tragi-comedy it could merge two of the narratives up for gongs at the Oscars in an interesting hybrid noir.

The sheer raw energy of “Joan-Go Unchained” would make Quentin Tarantino’s blood-bath fight-fest look like a Pixar children’s flick by comparison.

And to oust Mr Gilmore, Ms Burton could ape the plot of Argo. In the Ben Afleck film those branded capitalist stooges help smuggle hostages out of Iran during the revolution. Ms Burton could argue, via Argo, that Mr Gilmore has become an austerity stooge and is guilty of smuggling Labour principles out of the country during a right-wing take-over.

Best Adaptation Form A Foreign Language is always a tricky award to predict, but this year Independent TD Mattie McGrath should have a clear run at it.

Suddenly promoted to rotating voice of the Technical Group he now gets to take part in Leaders Questions, and while his accent is not so much the problem, it is the often bizarre stream of consciousness exploding from his mouth at scatter-gun speed that makes observers wonder if they are indeed listening to the English language at all.

For the second time he returned to Croke Park and garda pay this week, but as with his last intervention, events took an unusual twist, as once again he concentrated on inadequate toilet facilities within garda stations for no apparent reason. This revelation was followed by: “To make matters worse, we have heard of detectives leaving the scene of a crime because they have had to return to the garda station to have their sandwiches.”

Whatever is going on in the Tipperary police force it is screaming out for a TV spin off – “CSI:O’Brein’s”.

Though once banned from speaking on TV, Gerry “Army Council? What Army Council?” Adams is more than making up for that imposed silence via his  role in a reworking of “Ted”.

In the Hollywood gonzo comedy “Ted” Mark Wahlberg plays a man unwilling to get rid of his past, clinging onto it in the shape of a foul-mouthed, beer swilling, not very cuddly toy.

Mr Adams’ version of “Ted” – as trailed endlessly on his Twitter feed – shows a man desperate to get rid of his past and invent a new, cuddly version of himself by constant, and rather odd, references to taking a bath with a rubber duck and playing with teddy bears who are in a same sex relationship,

Simon Coveney may also be up for a Life Time Achievement award for his role in The Horse (Meat) Whisperer, which has so far seen him evade capture in the mystery of why his officials kept so quiet about the food scandal for a full month before telling him – and via him, us the consumers.

But Mr Draghi remains executive producer of Ireland’s future productions and if he turns the Anglo drama into “Skyfall”, it casts all of us into the wretched crowd scenes of “Les Miserables”.

However, Mr Kenny will not be singing in that role – he’ll be crying more buckets of tears than Gwyneth Paltrow at an Oscar acceptance speech.

By Shaun Connolly

THEY’RE back. The Leinster House Of Horrors presents: The Creature From The Black Slump Lagoon — Fianna Fáil, the great beast of Irish politics, has risen from its shallow grave and now threatens to join a future government near you.

That is, if you believe one opinion poll, but inching ahead is remarkable in itself just two years after they led this country to economic disaster — though it says more about the despair of voters than any renewed faith in the FFers.

The single-point lead was well within the sample’s margin of error, taken before the inevitable post-prom note-deal FG bounce, and put them on an historically modest 26% — but it still sent a shock-wave through the body politic.

Let us not forget, Micheál Martin was a key member of the government that allowed the economy slide into chaos, mass unemployment, resurgent emigration, and national humiliation as we were reduced to an economic colony of Brussels.

We are all too ready to forget, highlighting how different the goldfish bowl of Irish politics is from the ‘real’ world. In that ‘real’ world, career experts have issued a warning to young people to be careful on social media, as pictures, comments and carry-ons, on sites such as Facebook, could haunt them later and derail their job searches.

But that rule seems not to hold sway in the Dáil, where FF are not the only ones with a notorious past they no longer need to apologise for.

It is the same with Gerry “Army Council? What Army Council?” Adams. Look, here he is being tagged in a photo with the British oppressors who let him out of jail to negotiate despite his claims he had never been in the IRA. There he is being poked by Tony Blair, who believes Mr Adams has extraordinary influence over a paramilitary organisation of which he was never a member. There’s the Sinn Féin leader being ‘favourited’ because he apologised 17 years too late for the killing of garda Jerry McCabe by Republicans during a ‘conflict’ with ‘State forces’ — yet he does not tell us what legitimacy he has to offer such regrets, nor on whose behalf.

It was a similar story with presidential candidate, Martin McGuinness, who, as everybody knows, left the IRA in 1974, never to return.

During a lengthy interview with Mr McGuinness last year, he became tetchy when I questioned him on this extraordinary turn of events. Mr McGuinness said he quit the Provos and nobody tried to talk him out of it.

He did not find it funny when I said I had more hassle switching gyms than he had leaving the IRA. Who would have thought the Provos would be so cuddly and understanding about someone telling them: ‘It’s not you, it’s me’ and walking away?

You have to laugh when these people expect us to believe what they say about their non-involvement with the IRA and then swallow all their election promises.

Look at the Labour Party scrap book — isn’t that Eamon Gilmore and Pat Rabbitte in the dear old Workers Party, smiling under the red flag? Yes, the same Workers Party that enjoyed such fraternal relations with its charming namesake, which has been running that socialist paradise on Earth, North Korea, for so long.The same Workers Party that was famed for its interesting fund-raising techniques.

But Enda Kenny stands as a man apart, because he does not seem to carry any baggage, ideological or political, or have left any foot-prints. Mr Kenny seems to have spent his career in a political Bermuda Triangle, because he only appears on the radar for two years in the mid-1990s — and that was in the less-than-stellar post of tourism minister.

How different from the train-crash wreckage of FF — but now the dominant party of the last slump coalition is more popular than the leaders of the current slump coalition.

How?

It would seem a relentless pursuit of the politics of hypocrisy by FF, coupled with the ease with which Fine Gael/Labour have aped the air of arrogance and out-of-touchness that marked their old enemy, has created a dystopian synergy in Irish politics.

FF attacked Mr Kenny for failing to apologise to the Magdalene Laundry survivors, yet they deliberately and cruelly excluded the same victims from compensation, while in power in 2002. FF attacked the Anglo deal as too little, too late, yet show no shame for agreeing to the madness in the first place.

FF attacked the unfairness of the property tax, yet were the ones who promised the charge to the Troika in the first place, just as they flushed this country’s economic sovereignty down the toilet. Yet, despite all that double-dealing,

FF are, however briefly, top of the pops once more — and have even been handed the bonus of seeing their former leaders get away scot-free from any censure in the upcoming inquiry into the financial collapse. Brian Cowen, the calamity clown of Irish cowboy capitalism, will not be criticised, nor will Bertie Ahern, whom you will remember was a truly unbelievable Taoiseach — as confirmed when the Mahon corruption probe ruled they could not believe his evidence.

And how did they escape any scrutiny of their role in the economic disaster? Well, because the very people angry at such a turn of events are the same people who voted down the Dáil inquiries referendum, which would have allowed the Oireachtas to retrieve the parliamentary probe powers it lost after the Abbeylara ruling.

That constitutional poll, restoring the Dáil to the watchdog role of Westminster and the US Congress, should have been an easy win, but an arrogant Alan Shatter lost control of the narrative and allowed the issue to be hijacked by scare-mongers spouting spurious emotional arguments.

So, with one bound, FF are free, and attempting to become ‘soldiers of destiny’ again, rather than prisoners of the past. But then, don’t despair, there is always the hard-left to fall back on.

But, unfortunately, it is called the hard-left because it is so hard to believe there is anyone left who can take it seriously.

The collapse of the (Dis) United Left Alliance has been as spectacular as it has been bitter and embarrassing.

FF is back and the Government is hated — even though they both espouse the same ‘Tory’ austerity agenda. It is like Irish politics is on one long, permanently scary, loop. Sadly, it is always the ‘Politically Rocky Horror Show’ playing here.