ON POLITICS
Harry McGee
I opened my email inbox on Thursday morning and a wave of nostalgia washed over me.
There it was, the present we had been months waiting for, the sorcerer’s magic bag of dirty tricks and the propagandists guide to the dark arts of spin.
Like all the best surprises, the packaging gave little clue of what was to come.
"Fine Gael and Labour fail the Economic Test – Minister Brian Cowen", read the title.
I could hardly contain my excitement as I tore off the packaging like a kid on Christmas morning. I wasn’t disappointed. It was chock-a-block with colourful graphs, charts, figures and sums. It was obvious that they had spent weeks and week working on the magic potions and dark spells.
And Eureka, in the best tribute outside JK Rowling to Lord Voldemort, it contains dark spin that distorts over 100, yes 100, of the Mullingar Accord promises and casts them off into the abyss.
And its no Brian ‘prudent to the point of boring us all to death’ Cowen that we have here. It’s biffo in best biffing mode.
He is unsparing in his claims. Fine Gael and Labour, he contends, would plummet the country back into the red, and would be running up exchequer deficits of E5 billion by 2012.
(And the really mysterious thing about all this is that the equally extravagant promises made by Fianna Fail will somehow magically produce a break-even situation. Why? you may ask. Well, silly, because FF have ‘costed’ them! and they also have a more powerful magic wand).
Yes, after a five year absence, the Fianna Fail ‘rebuttal unit’ has swung back into action with a vengeance.
In a gleeful example of the dark arts, its release was timed for a few hours before Fine Gael and Labour launched their joint economic manifesto, thus giving us our first example of ‘prebuttal’ for this general election.
The moment that Fianna Fail begins to get its retaliation in first, you know that an election is on.
And for the first time, we got our first real sense during this week that the election campaign is in full hue and cry, that battle has been joined.
Remember, the Dáil is still in recess until next Tuesday but it’s clear that all the parties are on amber alert. There were a couple of ready reckoners for that. The week was swollen with press conferences and announcements (on the economy and jobs), by claims and by counter-claims.
Anyway, the revival of the ‘Rebutall Unit’ brought us back to this time five years ago. The election was called on April 25 with Bertie Ahern choosing the shortest possible election campaign of three weeks, with polling day set for May 17.
Within a 12 hours of the Dail being dissolved, Fianna Fail had launched its manifesto, majoring (unsurprisingly) on the economy. For the next week, there were exhaustive (and ultimately pointless) debates about whose figures best stood up to scrutiny. And of course the ‘Rebuttal Unit’ was busily fact-checking, claim-countering, and prebutting from the off.
Not that it mattered. If the campaign had lasted three days or three months, it would not have made a difference. The Government parties dominated the agenda throughout.
Fine Gael was on a loser going in. The party compounded its difficulties with moronic and meaningless promises on taxis and to reimburse Eircom shareholders. As leader, Michael Noonan was a 100% charisma free zone until the last televised debate. But by that stage it was all over bar the shouting.
From the off, the question was not about Fianna Fail winning but about how big the winning margin would be. In the event, a rout was prevented only by the intervention of a big bespectacled child. He shinned up a lamp-post with a catapult in his back pocket and took a couple of pot-shots at Bertie Ahern.
But this time it’s different. One of the things that’s disconcerting though is that so many of the issues and the problems (quality of life; transport, health, and crime) are exactly the same. And four years ago we all made the mistake of believing promises that could not be fulfilled. We learned from our mistakes. And it’s clear from the spate of crowd-pleasing promises made already that we will have to learn from our mistakes again.
But this time it’s different. Fianna Fail sense some trouble ahead. That’s why they were panicked into bringing their manifesto launch forward to the Ard Fheis.
With good reason. For when you lick your thumb and raise it in the air, we can feel the first few gusts of more bitter winds. This campaign will be sharper, closer, more brutal, more verbose, and more gale force than five years ago. But from which direction is change coming? Is it from the west (Kenny and Rabbitte) or will the prevailing easterlies (Ahern and McDowell) continue to prevail?
This is my column from today's Irish Examiner
Showing posts with label Michael Noonan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Michael Noonan. Show all posts
Saturday, April 21, 2007
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
INSIDE POLITICS - THAT Trevor speech
We all have had a couple of days to reflect on Trevor Sargent's unforgettable speech to his Ard Fheis in Galway.
Sadly, tragically, it just doesn't get any better with the passage of time.
The script was passable, though with far too much name-checking of candidates.
The sentiments were fine, laudable even when he started talking about children at the end.
But the delivery. Jesus Mary and Joseph.
What could you compare it with? Mayo in last year's All Ireland? Ireland's dismal victory over San Marino? Worse if anything. Britney shaving her hair off? That bad.
Sargent bounded onto stage like a tele evangelist. With his arms aloft and booming voice it looked like he could maintain the illusion, perhaps even perform a miracle along the way.
But after that it was downhill for most of the way. There were bits of random roaring followed by bits of speed-whispering, like a racing commentator who has lost his voice. The effect was disconcerting and a little weird.
He rallied a little towards the end. But compared to his strong and even performance in Cork last year, this was not his finest half hour, his delivery being weak and ropey.
When I asked one of his colleagues later, he said that it was probably a mixture of nerves and too much adrenaline and an uncertainty over the timing.
The thing is, however, that it won't make much difference ultimately. Speech-making in Ireland doesn't have the power it has in the US or, arguably, in Britain.
Sure Pat Rabbitte had a great speech this year - it was rightly lauded. But in the normal course of events, a leader does very well if he or she gets through their half hour without fluffing their lines or gaffing or swallowing their glottises.
Bertie Ahern is a poor speaker. His leader's address can be purgatory to listen to. He sometimes sounds like a man who is slowly choking to death. And he is never helped by the script that isn't suited to his style of delivery.
Enda Kenny can be surprisingly good - Kenny's big problem is when he doesn't have a script, or hasn't been fully briefed, and needs to think on his feet.
Gerry Adams is good, though he has an annoying habit of sometimes being ultra patronising, sometimes being cloying sentimental.
Mary Harney never used an auto-cue; she learned her speeches de ghlan-mheabhair - like an actor remembering her lines. That added an edge to her speechifying, made them interesting, unpredictable. Michael McDowell - for all his panache as an orator - delivered a pedestrian first speech as leader this year.
Albert Reynolds was not great either, though his folksiness got him through those long half hours. John Bruton wasn't bad, except for the time Twink spoiled the national conference. Haughey wasn't the Mae West - his nasalised drone couldn't sustain a half hour or hour-long script.
For all his other abilities, Dick Spring was no Bill Clinton when it came to addressing the faithful. The alliterative cluster that comes to mind is dry, drone, dreary, dead.
Either was Michael Noonan whose sharp wit never came out in his leader's speeches, which always sounded creepy enough to come straight from the cemetery.
One veteran Fine Gael TD told me that Liam Cosgrave always sounded and looked like a man who had just swallowed a bottle of rat poison.
Before Haughey it's a bit vague for me. I remember seeing some archive footage of the late Michael O'Leary in the late 1960s or early 1970s; probably before he became Labour leader. He was in full flow and seemed angry, impressive.
Who's good? Clinton obviously. Obama is, definitely. I remember seeing Chris Patten - the Tory Party chairman - speak at one of their Brighton or Bournemouth conference. He was electrifying.
Just a small note on Leaders Questions today. Enda Kenny brought up the results of this survey that suggested that a high number of Irish teenagers have experimented with drugs, tobacco and alcohol (see the debate here).
Leaders Questions allows opposition leaders to ask a question without notice. That means that Bertie Ahern does not have a clue what he will be asked about.
But he has very diligent and very prescient civil servants who prepare for all eventualities. In front of him each day is a big ledger-like book indexed from A to Z. So if somebody is asking him about a relatively obscure subject like a survey on teenagers he just flicks to T for Teenager or D for drugs to find the relevant details.
The most impressive use of the A to Z was when Pat Rabbitte asked a question about a family with autistic children in a week in which they were nowhere near the news. The Bert had the family's case history at his fingertips. It was impressive but also very weird - almost as weird as Trevor Sargent's speech this week.
And just to remind you of Sargent's other great performance this year, here is his unmissable guest appearance on Podge and Rodge.
Sadly, tragically, it just doesn't get any better with the passage of time.
The script was passable, though with far too much name-checking of candidates.
The sentiments were fine, laudable even when he started talking about children at the end.
But the delivery. Jesus Mary and Joseph.
What could you compare it with? Mayo in last year's All Ireland? Ireland's dismal victory over San Marino? Worse if anything. Britney shaving her hair off? That bad.
Sargent bounded onto stage like a tele evangelist. With his arms aloft and booming voice it looked like he could maintain the illusion, perhaps even perform a miracle along the way.
But after that it was downhill for most of the way. There were bits of random roaring followed by bits of speed-whispering, like a racing commentator who has lost his voice. The effect was disconcerting and a little weird.
He rallied a little towards the end. But compared to his strong and even performance in Cork last year, this was not his finest half hour, his delivery being weak and ropey.
When I asked one of his colleagues later, he said that it was probably a mixture of nerves and too much adrenaline and an uncertainty over the timing.
The thing is, however, that it won't make much difference ultimately. Speech-making in Ireland doesn't have the power it has in the US or, arguably, in Britain.
Sure Pat Rabbitte had a great speech this year - it was rightly lauded. But in the normal course of events, a leader does very well if he or she gets through their half hour without fluffing their lines or gaffing or swallowing their glottises.
Bertie Ahern is a poor speaker. His leader's address can be purgatory to listen to. He sometimes sounds like a man who is slowly choking to death. And he is never helped by the script that isn't suited to his style of delivery.
Enda Kenny can be surprisingly good - Kenny's big problem is when he doesn't have a script, or hasn't been fully briefed, and needs to think on his feet.
Gerry Adams is good, though he has an annoying habit of sometimes being ultra patronising, sometimes being cloying sentimental.
Mary Harney never used an auto-cue; she learned her speeches de ghlan-mheabhair - like an actor remembering her lines. That added an edge to her speechifying, made them interesting, unpredictable. Michael McDowell - for all his panache as an orator - delivered a pedestrian first speech as leader this year.
Albert Reynolds was not great either, though his folksiness got him through those long half hours. John Bruton wasn't bad, except for the time Twink spoiled the national conference. Haughey wasn't the Mae West - his nasalised drone couldn't sustain a half hour or hour-long script.
For all his other abilities, Dick Spring was no Bill Clinton when it came to addressing the faithful. The alliterative cluster that comes to mind is dry, drone, dreary, dead.
Either was Michael Noonan whose sharp wit never came out in his leader's speeches, which always sounded creepy enough to come straight from the cemetery.
One veteran Fine Gael TD told me that Liam Cosgrave always sounded and looked like a man who had just swallowed a bottle of rat poison.
Before Haughey it's a bit vague for me. I remember seeing some archive footage of the late Michael O'Leary in the late 1960s or early 1970s; probably before he became Labour leader. He was in full flow and seemed angry, impressive.
Who's good? Clinton obviously. Obama is, definitely. I remember seeing Chris Patten - the Tory Party chairman - speak at one of their Brighton or Bournemouth conference. He was electrifying.
Just a small note on Leaders Questions today. Enda Kenny brought up the results of this survey that suggested that a high number of Irish teenagers have experimented with drugs, tobacco and alcohol (see the debate here).
Leaders Questions allows opposition leaders to ask a question without notice. That means that Bertie Ahern does not have a clue what he will be asked about.
But he has very diligent and very prescient civil servants who prepare for all eventualities. In front of him each day is a big ledger-like book indexed from A to Z. So if somebody is asking him about a relatively obscure subject like a survey on teenagers he just flicks to T for Teenager or D for drugs to find the relevant details.
The most impressive use of the A to Z was when Pat Rabbitte asked a question about a family with autistic children in a week in which they were nowhere near the news. The Bert had the family's case history at his fingertips. It was impressive but also very weird - almost as weird as Trevor Sargent's speech this week.
And just to remind you of Sargent's other great performance this year, here is his unmissable guest appearance on Podge and Rodge.
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