Movember 1st

Movember 1st is upon us. It's time to give something back, and by something, I mean cash. Like the cock of a dead Viagra addict: Cold and hard. That's right folks, it's show-us-your-testosterone-for-a-good-cause-month. (Remember when folk used to swim across a body of water to raise money?).

Prepare to be shunned by wider society should you forgo the moral imperative that requires you to give money because a man can grow facial hair at will! And remember, if you choose to donate to another Movember participant then prepare to be shunned by me!

"He's bluffing," I hear you say, but can you afford to take that chance? How much is it worth to maintain your Facebook friend figure, and what psychological damage will it do if you fall below 3,000 friends? Your self-esteem will thank you!

As will I! (Probably)

And to all you guys, don't let jealousy bar you from contributing. After all, it is for you we're raising this money. Personally, I don't understand the need to raise money for guys who can't grow a 'tache but then empathy was never my strong point.

"Ahem...Emmett..."

"Yes?"

"The money doesn't go to victims of upper-lip pattern baldness..."

"It doesn't..? Ohhhh"

P.S. By laughing at any of my comedic gems you tacitly agree to donate!

Poets as Pundits?

For several minutes I have been sitting here, my mind mimicking the blank screen, the cursor flashing expectantly, as though it's jumping up and down in excited anticipation. I envisage it, any moment now, stopping and standing there, waiting impatiently.  Perhaps, tapping its foot? Or worse still, rolling its eyes. There is a perception of the writer as piper, the words dancing to his tune. This, of course, is a fallacy. But there is a hierarchy and if the poet is king, is the sports-hack the peasant?


If asked to sum-up an Irish summer in two words (rather arbitrarily), I would respond without much thought, thus: rain and hurling. Yesterday, the first Sunday of September, we had both. (To those of you who would enthusiastically point out that September is no longer termed summertime, I say to you, piss off!)


The All-Ireland Hurling Final, where the continents of culture and sport,  traditionally separated by the chasmic oceans of class and prejudice, come together, not in collision, more of an unfamiliar, estranged familial embrace. The All-Ireland Hurling Final, diminished only by the plethora of unimaginative clichés that define it.


Admittedly, sport such as this, with its Shakespearian tragedy and heroes forged from Achillian moulds, lends itself to the Grecian heroic tradition. It's how we think of our sporting idols; as warriors on the field of battle. In recent times, our sporting conversations have become more sophisticated. We have borrowed terminology, if not understanding, from the fields of medical science and psychology, and a transcendence of the aforementioned class boundaries has widened our sporting lexicon. But not so much that trite and banal analogies no longer fill our airwaves or newspapers. This is not an attack on journalists per se, but on the culture of the sporting "expert." That we are all experts, armchair (perhaps the pseudo-psychiatrist's couch) or otherwise, has done much to dilute the term in this context.


What good is a painter who merely paints a landscape as it is? Is the real challenge not to show us his vision of the world beyond our own verisimilitudinous imaginings? Should it not be the same for those who are paid, ostensibly to talk? Should their words not echo Homer in density and scale and resonate with us viscerally, as sport itself can. Why, when the oral and written traditions (read: words) have been the lifeblood of Irish cultural life, do we define such a unique and indigenous sporting occasion so prosaically?


One thinks of Micheal O'Muircheartaigh and how, with his imaginative use of metaphor and his innate splashes of linguistic colour, he overcame the limitations of radio to elevate the picture beyond a dull monochrome. The sliotar "never being more than the height of a daisy off the ground" is just one such flourish.

"Pat Fox has it on his hurl and is motoring well now...but here comes Joe Rabbitte hot on his tail ...I've seen it all now, a Rabbitte chasing a Fox around Croke Park."

But why stop there? Why not replace the inane Pat Spillane with Seamus Heaney? Maybe he didn't play corner-back for Derry but when Beowulf says, "Let whoever can win glory before death. When a warrior is gone, that will be his best and only bulwark," he could have been speaking of the Kilkenny hurlers.


For we all saw the fatal slip, the full-back beating his man to the ball, the nervous debutant rising to the challenge, the goal scored with quickest flick of the wrist and the near misses. We saw it all. It's stories we want to hear and it's stories we want to tell. It is the esoteric truths we want revealed, not those that are self-evident. Or tactics, for that matter.

Democratic Ideals Put To The Test

On the morning when Anders Behring Breivik is to make his first appearance in an Oslo courtroom, the news media has turned its attention to the question of whether the proceedings should be open to the public or whether a media blackout should come into force.


In the wake of Britain's recent hacking scandal and the News of The World's disregard for legal or ethical considerations, the question of press regulation arose, which UK media organisations have re-framed in terms of freedom of, or gagging of, the press. This is a debate where views have become polarised and dare I say fundamentalist. That all censorship is bad or anti-democratic is a conviction in which news organisations have a vested interest in peddling. This morning Sky News have played a clip of a survivor of the Utøya atrocity; 'If I had to make a choice right now I would say, "yes, let the cameras be there"'. When asked why, he replied,

"Of course, I'm for democracy. Some other people will think that they don't agree with this man any more."

There are those that would argue that Berveick has had his say. He had it 76 times.


These are difficult questions for any democracy to answer. Especially one as progressive as Norway's. Is this the price we must pay for free speech? And if so are we getting value for money? Is it right that a perpetrator of mass murder should be allowed to justify those actions by espousing his (supposed) political ideology? Bear in mind, the results of any psychological evaluation are unknown. Is it right that a nation should relive the most horrific act in its post-war history, a mere three days after the massacre?


On the other hand, this is an opportunity to expose Breivik and his views and remove the secrecy and mythology that has already arisen around his activities and that of the organisations he has been linked to.


Democracy is not easy and can make its citizens uncomfortable. That Geir Lippestad, Breivik's defence lawyer, has received messages on his website from fellow Norwegians incapable of understanding how he can take the job, is evidence of the discomfort that a democratic principle such as due process can engender. However, as Lippestad himself suggests, the ideals of democracy must be upheld:

"It is important to follow democratic principles. These are the times when we value our democracy most and the administration of justice is an important part of it." **

That leading Norwegian political figures and citizens alike, in such emotive circumstances, are lauding the democratic principles that differentiate us from Breivik and his ilk on the extreme far-right, suggests that Norway may succeed where so often America has failed, in championing democracy as a higher ideal and not a mere tool of oratory.


**This is a Google translation of an original article in the Norwegian daily Aftenposten.

Glastonbury 2011

A ringing, in annoyance more than in alarm, like a child untended, emanates from the dashboard above the vacant driver's seat. But I don't tut or roll my eyes or look over my shoulder or even flinch. I sit still, slumped against the window. I reach into my mud encrusted shoulder bag and root out my tattered notebook and a pen I picked up in a Dublin hotel, it's gold livery diminished by time, Gresham Hotels. As dusk falls, I see a right-handed version of myself reflected, scribbling something unintelligible, a great truth, no doubt.


As we chug over dimpled farm land, I am lulled gently, and like the fading day and burgeoning night I am in a gloaming of my own, between waking and sleep. The old bus struggles up an innocuous incline; gears crunching, cogs grinding, progress stalling.


There are voices of muted protest, an unwillingness to leave is expressed by some. Every corner is accompanied by a glacial creaking as if the rear of the bus is itself a reluctant passenger. A particularly acute right-hand turn presses me further against the window, the impression of my cheek upon the glass more definite.


With blackened fingernails, irradiate skin, soiled clothes and sunken eyes we pull up to the terminus, where five days previously we began our journey. From here, on to a home cooked meal, to a shower, to a bed.


Later that night as I lie, in near silence, just the sound of three days and nights of music ringing in my ears, it feels as though I have yet to fully emerge from a land of mud and rain and sun and cider that I was, initially, so reluctant to visit.


The next morning, breakfast, and then lunch, feel like an hallucination. Now of course, two days on, my memory is like that of a dream but with one discernible difference; I still can't get all the muck out of my fingernails.

Le Mal Crubeen

Oh dear. How different this post could've been. How different I wanted it to be. It was early last Saturday afternoon and I had a good feeling about lunch. To begin with, reviews were positive and as we approached the restaurant, located on Dublin's Talbot Street, the attractive logo with its elegant font did nothing to dent that positivity. Le Bon Crubeen. It's a bloody good name, I thought to myself. 


Immediately, however, alarm bells began to ring. Small ones. Or was it air-raid sirens? Lets just say, as yet, this was not an imminent-threat-of-a-bad-dining-experience-alert, more like an elevated-threat-of-a-bad-dining-experience-alert. Got it? Good.


Initially we were seated in a corridor which linked the main dining room to a smaller ante-room. We asked to move and without much fuss we led ourselves to a small table by the wall, nicely out of the way, in the aforementioned ante-room. I say, out of the way, but at the time there was little to be out of the way of.


As LCB and I perused the menu, we were rather stoical in the face of the choices available to us. You see, we both hankered for fish, which in Dublin City can be rather problematic (much to the City's shame), and though there were two fish options available for starters, and three in the mains section, the obligatory salmon, all but halved those options. What's wrong with salmon? you ask. Consider this; when a friend is heart-broken and of low spirits in the wake of a wrenching break-up, one always hears the mantra, there are plenty more fish in the sea. And it saddens me so, that such advice is not imparted to the chefs and restauranteurs of Dublin, because there are plenty more fish in the sea. Or the rivers and lakes for that matter.


We were engrossed in our respective menus , but not for any reasons you may think. The wall, (remember, the one we are sitting next to) was smeared with what looked like boogers. And grease. Neither of us wanted to draw the other's attention to it, as appetite can come and go as suddenly as a strong tide. It wasn't until after our meal that our altruism become known to one another. So we consulted our menus, though mine wasn't in the mood to talk, and settled on two courses, no dessert.


LCB, whose menu was much more chatty, settled on a starter of Jane Russell Black Pudding with Crab Mayonnaise and Green Pea Puree and a main course of Grilled Hake Fillet with Lobster Crust, Slow Roast Tomato and Champ Mash. Without any help, I plumped for a starter of Smoked Haddock Chowder with Brown Bread and the same hake main course. There was a battered whiting with chips but I wanted something a little more refined and a little less fried. I drank water, infused with lemon and LCB an Atlanta based renowned soft drink. Or Coke to those of us not in the BBC.


Our starters arrived promptly, LCB's black pudding sat atop the vibrant green of the pea purée and looked like the remnants of a bonfire in a lush field. Unfortunately the analogy didn't stop there. The pudding itself was tasty enough, but the texture was that of raw cookie dough. The pea purée and crab mayonnaise were largely tasteless and lacked seasoning and the latter contained a number of fragments of shell. My chowder arrived and looked a little sorry for itself, as if it had been standing for some time (in the bold corner, perhaps?) and it began to develop a custard like skin. To my pleasant surprise, however, it tasted good and was perfectly seasoned. The only criticism I have of it is one that can be levelled at most chowders; the first mouthful tasted the same as the last. It doesn't stop me ordering them, the perfect chowder can be heavenly, but they can be rather boring to eat, though, as a starter this problem was largely negated. The brown bread was average and not freshly baked, though perhaps my expectations were lowered by the wording of the menu. For no mention of homemade read bought-in.


Our plates were cleared away and in no time at all our hake dishes arrived. We exchanged glances. Hmm. The words Lobster and crust, it turns out, were rather misleading. The crust was nothing more that a mixture of breadcrumbs soaked in lobster juice (Stock? Bisque? Flavouring? I am not sure, but the taste was negligible) and then balled up and strewn across the fillet. When treated in this manner, the quality and freshness of the hake itself, is incidental. The chef should be hauled in front of the ICCDR (International Culinary Court of Diners' Rights) and have the book thrown at him (or her). Preferably a cookery book.


The fish was grossly overcooked, perhaps by as much as 10 or 15 minutes. A fillet this size would require no more then 5 minutes, first on the pan to crisp the skin than a few minutes in the oven (but in this case, all under the grill). Alas, the skin was not crisp, how could it be when it was covered in singed (and therefore bitter) breadcrumbs? As far as I am concerned, the chef's job is to butt-out and allow the produce to speak for itself. Most of the good work should be done before he reaches for his skillet. LCB suggested the fish may have been frozen, but frozen or not, it was not fresh.


The champ was the worst I have ever had, though champ is disingenuous as there were two slices of spring onion in mine. There was no seasoning, no butter and more tellingly, no flavour. It was my companion's assertion that the mash was reheated. I could not disagree.  Nor could I disagree with her statement that, "the food was so dry it made swallowing unpleasant!' Or that the "champ was so solid and stolid it could be cut into squares that perfectly kept their shape and could be used to build a small house." Patent Pending ©LCB 2011. I even considered dribbling some of my lemon infused water into my mash to loosen it up. Oh the shame!


There was no sauce except for a teaspoonful of garlic mayonnaise which I am inclined to say was good. Though, perhaps, it is akin to saying PS, I love You  is a literary masterpiece, when for the past year all you've read is Heat magazine. Though I shouldn't take cheap shots at Cecelia, it's not her fault.


Oh, I almost forgot the slow roasted tomato, which in terms of flavour had no business on the plate, but in terms of the moisture it supplied, was like stumbling upon an oasis in the middle of the desert. I recall earlier saying we ordered no dessert, we should have gone for no desert, for this was a dish that was dry and barren.


For those of you in any doubt, this was the worst meal I've had since I ordered plaice and chips in the Kylemore Café on O'Connell Street some years back (those of you who have eaten in Kylemore know who you are).


On the plus side LCB's Coke was excellent.


Perhaps, those reviewers that championed Le Bon Crubeen in the first year or two of its life, should return. Perhaps the chef who cooks beautifully on Friday night is absent on Saturday afternoon. If that is the case, as excuses go, it is not good enough. Our lunch was not just a failure of cooking, it was a failure of philosophy.

The Blue Eyed Monster

It's any number of Sundays over the past six years, the waiter brings us to our seats. I had a bit too much to drink last night and crave eggs. Preferably poached and with hollandaise. Sometimes I wonder about the folk for whom food is named after? Benedict. Some guy, in some hotel in New York. Or New Orleans. Whoever he is, at this moment, like a lot of Sunday afternoons, I am very grateful to him. So it's settled. "I'll have that with an orange juice and a cappuccino, thanks." Perhaps, it is unchivalrous to order first, but the twenty seconds extra it buys LCB to make up her mind is invaluable to her. " Hmmm... I'll have a cheeseburger with fries and a coke, please. Oh and a Bloody Mary to start, thanks."


"I thought you were ordering Eggs Florentine," I say. "I was going to, but the burgers here are so good," she breezily retorts, oblivious to the harm she's done. How can stating the obvious be such a surprise? How diminished my potential enjoyment of this meal has become. A burger and chips versus weeny eggs and a muffin? A bloody Bloody Mary!


And so the story goes; of the green eyed monster that is food-envy. I'm sure we've all experienced it. (Haven't we?) I try to be a good sport about it. I know it is a trait unbecoming of an aspiring gentleman. "Would you like a bite?" "Sure," I reply, the thin veneer of nonchalance, cracking, as I use all my restraint not to open my mouth so wide as to render the word 'bite' wholly inadequate. "Mmm...that's really....good... and so juicy," (think Homer drooling). This, of course, is a meandering. It is a context. If you've ever wondered what colour eye the Twitter-envy monster possesses, be ignorant no more. It is blue. And I guess, this story, is of me blinking first.


I follow (what submissive terminology!) 108 good souls, ranging from individuals to media organisations and in turn have harvested a paltry 19 followers. My GF on the other hand follows 118 but has 56 followers. Why the discrepancy? Why I have I hovered between 18 and 20 followers for months now, never once breaking a score?


We, as a couple, share many interests and therefore follow many of the same tweeps. A Venn diagram of our following patterns would reveal a shaded area of intersection far outweighing our idiosyncratic individual diversities. So it's not who we follow.


Nor do I believe gender plays a factor. Yes, the Internet is mostly horny and therefore probably has a cock, but our avatars are graphical, there's no feminine visage and no cleavage, for that matter. 24 men, 16 women and 14 organisations, three of which are feminist in nature, follow LCB. If you discount the number of fictitious West Wing characters that follow her, those number become 19, 13 and 14 respectively. So nothing meaty there.


I have in the past accused her of being a promiscuous follower, but also calculating. Following merely to be followed. Whereas I, on the other hand, am pure and follow in the pursuit of knowledge. I live tweeted the UK and Irish leaders' debates with one polished quip after another, enriching the information stream, if not my own status in Twitter-land. Though LCB tweets movie-news, gossip and fashion pronouncements from the Go Fug Yourself girls, albeit, in addition to the current-affairs and arts that trickle through my own tributary, neither of us tweet about our lunch, or walking to the shop or our regularity. So, our tweeting patterns are largely similar too. (Give or take a the odd comment about Mischa Barton's latest fashion disaster).


THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPHS (**) WERE ADDED SUBSEQUENT TO INITIAL PUBLICATION. IN OTHER WORDS, THEY'RE FROM THE FUTURE.


*Peruse our respective Twitter homepages and you notice that LCB has tweeted nearly double the tweets I have; 844 to 449. This ommisson was brought to my attention by "Donal," who slipped a comment under the door, late one night. But to shout Eureka! or by jove, I think he's got it, is premature. For I, @pronouncedkwan, reached the 300 tweets mark first. In fact, I knocked 330 tweets out of the ballpark before LCB hit the three-ton mark.


That LCB has upped her TPD (tweets per day) or that mine has decreased can be accounted for.  I had 5 stitches in my hand which kept me out of action for 8 days. Think of Twitter as a dog, or a school-kid who has a week of class before the summer holidays; a week is a long time. And yes, I was feeling a little sorry for myself. My conversion rate from -ing to -er was rubbish, and apathy is a curse to a tweep.


The accusation has also been made that I retweet LCB more than LCB retweets me. Perhaps it is true, but it wasn't always so. She used to retweet me. Nearly every day, at least once. Some days twice, maybe three times. Maybe tweeting is a younger man's game. Maybe I'm just too damned old to perform like I did when we first started tweeting together.*


Oh! how easy it is to cast myself as pure and virtuous and LCB, as a wicked practitioner of the dark art of tweeting. But why do I care? Do I really care? Or have I fallen into the trap vanity has set. In this new sphere without frontiers, status is measured, is quantifiable. 9,963,172. 9,552,114. 3,877,409... Even the fake Leo Messi has 170,000 followers. News media revelled in reporting Charlie Sheen's surge since becoming a tweep and often compile a top-ten of most followed on Twitter. It gives new meaning to the social media term status update.


So, in our Twitter co-existence I am B-list. The camera bulbs don't pop and flash as I walk by, I am the BF of LCB.


But I do not feel diminished. After all, one follower is all I need.

A radio interview with Irish poet Leanne O'Sullivan, winner of the O'Shaughnessy Award for Poetry

MPR Leanne O'Sullivan

Perhaps this post is a case of yesterday's news today but Cork poet Leanne O'Sullivan's success in being awarded the O'Shaughnessy Award for Poetry last month, is worth mentioning. Even belatedly.


Given by the University of St. Thomas Center for Irish Studies, the $5,000 prize was awarded to O'Sullivan in St. Paul, Minnesota, making the 27 year old the youngest recipient to date.


As with many great discoveries, my discovery of O'Sullivan was by accident. Some three or four years ago, I attended a reading of the Hungarian-born British poet and translator, George Szirtes, whom up to that point, I was not familiar with. That night, after the reading, I set out to learn more, and with a keystroke here and a click, click there, I stumbled upon a poem entitled, 'About Midnight.' As it turns out, my mis-navigation was one of Columbian proportions.


Taken from O'Sullivan's début, Waiting For My Clothes, it was revelatory. To me. Hyperbole aside, it was one of those times when you resonate with language beyond the mere meaning of words, where in a poet's recollection, their voice speaks to you, speaks for you, as if your memory up to that point, had been badly dubbed. 'The Touch Of Him' was the punch Ali never threw, only she did and it was a K.O.


O'Sullivan has since released a second collection entitled Cailleach: The Hag of Beara readings from which are embedded below.

Pictures Speak a Thousand Words

I happened to come across this (poor choice of words) deep in the vast chasm of the Interweb. I think they're trying to make a statement about Fox News' mistake. Subtle, huh? A policy of fight fire with fire, I guess. 

Maybe there are some of you out there, who, during an after-dinner game of charades, with the clock ticking down and struggling to come up with an adequate portrayal of President Obama, may resort to the good ol' sounds like... and proceed to mime a bearded gun toting terrorist. But a mere typo? What do Fox take us for? Oh yeah, that's right...


Of course, I'm all for highlighting the belligerent bias of the Fox News network but did they have to go and ruin a perfectly good t.v?

Alas

The clock ticks. T-minus 10 hours and counting. A minute until the moratorium on the broadcasting of election news begins. Relax and gather your thoughts, for what is there left to say?


During the past month we have heard claim and counterclaim. We have heard Micheál Martin time and again borrow from Bart Simpson, I didn't do it, nobody saw me do it, you can't prove anything. Fourteen years, it went by in the blink of an eye.


One can be forgiven for thinking that this has been a one issue campaign. Does policy matter when the narrative inevitably boomerangs back to anyone but Fianna Fáil? Why waste money on glossy election posters when a piece of cardboard with the crudely drawn slogan, ABFF - Vote Fine Gael, will do.


And whilst the issue of the economy is an important one, its singular status has, excuse the pun, short-changed us as citizens. I do not dispute that sovereign debt and the subsequent taxation and cut-backs, are vital components in any electoral discourse, but for it to be so at the expense of other, less tangible but equally important issues, such as national identity and social equality, is a worrying precedent.


I had planned to publish a piece detailing Fine Gael's, and in particular, Enda Kenny's Christian ethos and what we might expect over the course of the next Dáil. In hindsight, I foolishly began my research only yesterday evening. I had expected a deep well of media articles, editorials and analysis to tap, but much to my dismay, such investigations were largely fruitless.


Yes, you can read an article in the Irish Times where Kenny outlines his position on abortion but there is a conspicuous absence of criticism for the Taoiseach-elect prescribing this personal moral view:

"My position is I do not favour legalising abortion on demand. We have a situation where you have difficult, hard cases, and some people have gone through very difficult circumstances but there is an ECHR judgement, there is a Supreme Court decision and there is a constitutional position."

The European Court of Human Rights judged that Irish abortion law breaches human rights. Here, the words "on demand" are key and imply fear-filled banalities such as before you know it.


Before you know it, we'll have abortion drive-thrus, 24-hour termination clinics and 50% off Summer sales.


Perhaps I am being glib but this is the quintessential Irish solution to an Irish problem, which can also be used to describe Fine Gael's opposition to human embryo stem-cell research. (Though an English solution to an Irish problem may be more a accurate appraisal).


Whilst the influence of the Catholic church has waned due to the corrosive effect a decade of child sex abuse scandals has had on the public, its influence on our political leadership is still significant. Only this week, Lucinda Creighton, Fine Gael's equality spokesperson said that she did not support gay marriage as "marriage is primarily about children" and went on to say that the purpose of marriage is to "propagate and create an environment for children to grow up." She elaborated that while she believes gay couples should be treated “fairly and justly” in matters of taxation, marriage is “different.”


Some weeks back Eamon Gilmore, speaking on Pat Kenny's morning radio show, when asked if Ireland was ready for an atheist Taoiseach he replied, "it should not be an issue as it is, essentially, a private matter." As Broadsheet put it, "that'd be a no then."


Whilst it is true to say that #ge11 has gone some way to redrawing the political landscape in Ireland it has not gone far enough.


Lets cross (sorry, atheists) our fingers for 2015.

Election Day 15 - The Morning After

After Ireland's loss to France in the Six Nations Rugby on Sunday, the post game analysis made me wonder if the panel and I watched the same match. So too last night's leaders' debate. Raking through the coals of yesterday's discourse, there is hardly an instance where two commentators agree on the performance of the candidates. The one exception being, that Enda Kenny did well, or at least didn't harm his chances of becoming Taoiseach of the forthcoming 31st Dáil. Opinion. Yours and mine. Hers and his.


One such commentator on Pat Kenny's radio show this morning suggested it was Gerry Adams who won the debate because he made no attempt to engage in real policy and because without pretense he spoke to 'his people.' One is forced to question this logic as, presumably, Gerry's 'people' are already votes in the bag.


Whilst Ireland elects a parliament, the effect of the leaders' debate is not unlike an American presidential debate. The party leaders are not debating merely to ensure their own seats, and are therefore not merely speaking to their own constituents. They, like a presidential nominee, put forth a vision for Ireland on behalf of all the candidates of their respective parties. It is for this reason that I believe Adams performed poorly (relatively speaking). He danced around his podium like a fidgeting child, perhaps a metaphor for his reluctance to engage on specific policy issues.


Early on, it was the Sinn Féin leader, along with Micheál Martin, who traded insults, each calling the other a 'magician' and reference to Paul Daniels was made. But the real magicians of political debates are the practitioners of the dark art of spin.


Spin masks itself as mere opinion, and after all, everyone is entitled to one of those, right? What is striking in the post debate discussion, is how we are unaware of most Irish commentators' political allegiances and as a result their opinions should be treated with healthy scepticism, as if they are dressed in sheep's clothing.


For example, I am surprised by how positively commentators have reacted to the more negative aspects of the debate. Phrases such as 'landed a blow there' or 'had him on the ropes' were used to describe (the albeit rare) personal attacks of one leader to another, such as when Martin reminded Adams that he's not from 'down here.' But in the U.S. participants are warned against such negative attacks as polling data suggests that voters prefer candidates to espouse their own policies in favour of negativity.


Perhaps the most polarising performance of the night was that of Green leader, John Gormley. He was on the periphery of the stage and, for long periods, of the debate. But when he held the floor, he spoke with a coolness that many have misinterpreted as defeatist - as if the nitty-gritty of government has punctured his idealist view of politics. He attempted to engage with the other leaders and his rhetoric was the least partisan of the bunch (what other option does he have). Green supporters may feel aggrieved that Fianna Fáil and Labour borrowed the Green playbook but can console themselves that environmental issues featured prominently over the 90 minutes.


Micheál Martin meanwhile, as the most embattled of all the participants, was bullish and sometimes snide and condescending. But overall he deflected the attacks well and not once did he mention 'Fianna Fáil.' A rebranding has taken place where the tarnished FF has given way to MM.


Enda Kenny, who in his role as Taoiseach elect, looked statesmanlike and calm. He occupied the centre of the stage and visually much of the focus was on him, and as such, reinforced the perception of him as a leader.


The suggestion that, because of a meeting with German Chancellor Merkel earlier that day, Kenny was not coached or 'handled' is preposterous. He stayed on message throughout and mentioned FG's 5-point plan and policy document 'Lets Get Ireland Working' several times and his well judged hand-in-the-pocket-I'm-in-control moment was not spontaneous.


All in all, television debates are a matter of style over substance. I would have preferred if one of the debates was conducted through the medium of radio only. It is a commonly held belief that in the U.S. presidential debate of 1960 between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy that those who listened on radio favoured the former, whilst those who watched on television preferred the latter. Perhaps then, we would have to pay more attention to what was said and not how it was said. Then maybe, the candidates would say something worth hearing. 

*

General Election - Day 7. The First Debate

As I sit down to write this post, Fine Gael's website tells me there are 16 days 4 hours 30 minutes and 56, 55, 54, 53 seconds to election day. For Eamon Gilmore and Micheál Martin a mere thirty minutes stands between them and the electorate, as they partake in the first televised leaders' debate on TV3. In my last post I commented on Enda Kenny's chairman of the board style of leadership, however the joke doing the rounds now is that he is the empty-chair man of the board. This of course is because he is refusing to attend tonight's debate due to personal animosity with Vincent Browne who is mediating. RTÉ announced this morning that, 'Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny is to take part in a public meeting tonight in Co. Leitrim around the time of the TV3 leaders' debate.'

Fianna Fáil have done their best to give this story legs, (the above picture taken from Fianna Fáil's website) and though it is true that for some voters Enda's absence is a grave insult, for most, this story is running out of steam. In the last hour an Irish Times poll suggests that Kenny will not suffer for his failure to attend.


But the media love debates. Heck,  I love debates. Last year I live-tweeted all three UK leaders' debates and found the format conducive to such observational zingers as:

Brown reformats axis of evil: "Chain of terror." Gearbox of fear? #leadersdebate

Clegg: 'can we move beyond this political points scoring?' Someone should remind him where he is. #leadersdebate

But is it important? In 2002 Michael Noonan (then FG leader, now Finance spokesperson) won the debate versus Bertie Ahern but still Fine Gael were brought to its knees in electoral terms.

In 2007, newspaper consensus on the morning after the debate was that it was 50-50 or at worst for Fine Gael,  Ahern won on points. Bertie began nervously; focus on his personal turmoil worried him, but Enda let him off the hook, citing the tribunal investigating Ahern as ongoing. Since then there has been some retrospective analysis done, and it is now the commonly held belief of many that Kenny performs poorly in debates. 

On the flip side, I've heard it said that Gilmore can handle anything Vincent Browne can throw at him. This merely underlines how unfortunate it is that the presenter and chairperson should feature so prominently in the discussion. #vinb must change his style to facilitate a fair debate to inform and benefit viewers. 

The underlying feature of the debate is that there is little or no evidence, at home or internationally, to suggest that political debates change the minds of the electorate at large. However a recent study in the UK of last year's three-way UK leaders' debates suggests there may a price to pay for Fine Gael among younger voters. Edna Kenny will hope that the 18-24 age-group have better things to do this evening and that the symbolic empty chair will will have a negligible effect on voters.

But if the debates themselves fail to move the needle then what of the media reporting of debates and the campaign itself? The Sun newspaper continued to inform the electorate today by sending a chicken to a Fine Gael press conference; a presser that Kenny looked comfortable and performed well in.

Picture from Bryan Dobson

Take this tweet from @RTEElections:

"FF’s Darragh O'Brien says FG has been making increasingly personal attacks on Micheál Martin in recent days. #ge11"

RTÉ are an impartial news organisation and the media outlet through which the majority of the Irish electorate access their information. Why, in that case, report a he said, she said story. All Fianna Fáil have in their locker is to attack and play on the fear of change. Whether or not O'Brien's assertion is true, merely saying it (and subsequently reprting it, verbatim) reinforces the idea that FG are engaged in dirty politics (albeit Irish style, which thankfully resists the poisonouss personal attacks that disenfranchises American voters and was the catalyst for Obama's win for the Democratic nomination and General Election, because of his bi-partisan approach). It brought to mind Newstalk's current advertising slogan, "get the news without the State-run spin."

But then again, FG don't need Enda Kenny or Micheál Martin or the media to look foolish and damage their campaign. Today Fine Gael launched what they call its "Twolicy". To see how they arrived at this public relations car-crash take the words policy and Twitter, watch an episode of The Hills, have a lobotomy and then mash them together. The party has invited supporters to become 'eCanvassers', by signing up to Twitter and tweeting the party’s policies and news. “Help us knock on virtual Irish Doors, simply by accessing your computer every day.” There will be a lot of virtual doors slamming shut in the face of "Twolicy".


In spite of the continuing FG PR gaffs, this time there will be no panic or talk of replacing the leader. Fine Gael will make up the majority of the next government. Fianna Fáil's desperation to cling to power is manifesting itself in what has been a negative and underwhelming campaign to date.


Fianna Fáil have already lost the battle for the hearts of the electorate and if as Fintan O'Toole outlined today, they have also lost the battle for their minds. FF's campaign exists inside of a credibility vacuum, so when Micheál Martin says, 'few parties would have brought in the kind of budget cuts [we] did on the eve of an election,' it smacks of the delusional. The Fianna Fáil government that delivered the budget of December 2010 was like a spokesperson for the IMF/ECB. FF turned the sovereign government of Ireland into a PR firm. Today Martin said of their manifesto:

“In drawing up this manifesto I set a clear limit. There are no new spending commitments, there are no gimmicks and there are no poll-tested sound bites targeted at different sections of the population. The reason for this is simple, the money is not there.”

If the money was there would FF be awash with gimmicks and vote-getters?


On day 7 of the election campaign, the three main parties' focus was reform; political, electoral and public-service.


For Labour "it is time for a fundamental review of our constitution." They are proposing "a constitutional convention, a coming together of all strands of Irish society to redraw our Constitution. The constitutional convention would include experts and specialists, but would also include individual citizens, randomly chosen to serve in much the same way that we choose juries."


Their 90-member 'constitutional convention' will have an 'open mandate', and "thirty of its members would be drawn from the Oireachtas, 30 members would be academic or practicing lawyers and others with experience or expertise from non-governmental associations and organisations and 30 would be ordinary citizens. The mandate would be to review the Constitution and draft a reformed one within a year."


Labour, like Fine Gael, favour a single chamber, directly elected government and both parties outline in detail the reasons for the abolition of the upper house.


Labour also outline how they would increase the frequency with which the Dáil sits, saying there will be "a 50 per cent increase in Dáil sitting days. Dáil Éireann will in future meet four days a week. There will be a summer recess of just six weeks and significantly reduced breaks at Christmas and Easter. We will abandon the practice of providing a “mid-term break” – a full week off at St Patrick’s Day and Hallowe’en."


Other unexceptional reforms such as involving public representatives at an earlier stage of the legislative process and "restrict[ing] the use of guillotine motions" are listed but these are the sort of "reforms" that are more bark than bite. Oh and they will ensure that Dáil standing orders provide a minimum of two weeks between each stage of a Bill," with the caveat,"except in exceptional circumstances." For which I read: whenever we feel like it. And therein lies the problem with electoral reform manifestos. They are bullshit. Real political reform must come from the government of the day. Some of Labour's reforms can be boiled down to, we'll do business with more humility or we'll listen more.


Of all the outlandish promises made by parties during an election campaign, electoral reform is the easiest to abandon when in office. Unlike the UK leaders' debates, where a specific, tangible electoral reform policy took centre stage i.e. voting systems, in Ireland there's a more general, lets reform our broken politics. It is understandable that in the wake of FF's rein, where it is apparent that at Cabinet level in particular, there was either a reluctance or an inability to listen to ordinary people and see beyond their own self importance, that Labour may want to expand the discourse between the body politic and the citizens whom it serves. But that must be balanced with leadership. Many of the electoral reforms contained in Labour's brief are open-ended, talking of a need to consult the public at every turn and are therefore vague. There is, of course, some detail but it s not headline grabbing and refers mainly to the technical day-to-day running of the Dáil. This lack of glamour, though, does not demean it - after all, the more efficiently and transparently our parliament works, the better the chances of restoring public confidence in politics.


There are also policies that will make voters scratch their heads and think, huh? Such as Labour's proposed introduction of 'a role for the Ceann Comhairle in deciding whether a Minister has failed to provide reasonable information in response to a question." They don't already do that? They really should do that. But considering the speaker is usually taken from the government benches one could argue that this is a case of style over substance or good intentions with little practical application.


Within the Labour proposals, there is undoubtedly a sense of the National.

"Government long-term goals will be clearly stated and communicated to the public service and citizens. The factors and factions influencing the formation of these goals will be identified. Actions to achieve goals will be capable of measurement and a midterm report on performance in relation to the goals provided."

When one visits Fine Gael's website, one is confronted with a story, the headline of which reads, "Micheál Martin has zero credibility after he takes €90K to leave Cabinet."


The accompanying video of Enda and Lucinda Creighton holding signs aloft outside Leinster House reading, "DOWN WITH THIS SORT OF THING" and "CAREFUL NOW" respectively, rams home that FG are morally outraged*.


* DISCLAIMER: WARNING VIDEO MAY NOT HAVE HAPPENED.


Stepping back (slowly) from the surreal, one then notices 'The New Politics,' a 101 page booklet published by FG,  which begins by stating; this is the "most ambitious programme for political reform since the 1930s. Fine Gael, the party that created the State and declared it  a Republic, will build a New Republic in Ireland" - at least that will get some of the unemployed construction workers back on the job for a while - "where trust is restored in our democratic institutions and the concerns of the Citizen, rather than the elites, are placed firmly at the centre of government."


They go on to say, "Fine Gael’s starting point is simple: political failure lies at the heart of Ireland’s economic collapse."


FG love 5-point plans. They love them almost as much as they love Collins. That's why I was struck by the following statement: "The New Politics is built on four key pillars:" Four! These points consist of a single chamber Oireachtas, a new Dáil (for those of you without Junior Cert Irish this is not to be confused with FDR's new Deal), Open Government and Empowering the Citizen. In case that's too much for you they even included this graph, to help you visualise the complexities of their 5 point....sorry 4-pillar plan.

Or as Enda succinctly puts it. “the answer for me is both simple and profound. Before we were a Tiger we were a Republic.”


Fine Gael, via twelve appendices, do go into some detail of their plans and identify the specific articles of the constitution they intend to reform. They also include a draft bill, entitled 'Open Government Bill 2010'.


I have outlined two of the three main parties' pledges in some detail. I enjoyed reading them, political reform is an issue I put a lot of stock (beef stock) in, this election. I have no such appetite to discuss Fianna Fáil's plans for political reform, as I believe, more than any other issue, this arena is where they have the least credibility. After 14 years in government, the reason is self evident. If you would like to read about some of Martin's reform proposals you can do so here.

P.S. Since I included screen-grabs from FF's and FG's websites, here's one from Labour's:

General Election - 25th February 2011 - A call to arms

Fianna Fáil were in Mount Street for theirs. Fine Gael were at party headquarters for theirs. And Labour went to the Guinness Storehouse for theirs.

If one were to graphically represent, as a word cloud, Labour leader Eamon Gilmore's remarks this morning, as the three main parties launched their election campaigns, it may look something like this:

Yesterday in the Dáil he used the word twenty times and today it also featured prominently.

In response to questions over Pat Rabbitte's sexist remarks concerning female FF candidates, Mr. Gilmore said publicly, that the comments were 'flippant' and not to be taken too seriously. But privately he will know, in an election campaign, everything you say counts. It's as if words undergo a change of state, a transformation from some gaseous form to dense, dark matter.

But then again, it's difficult to account for the idiosyncrasies of an individual voter; forgotten, as the electoral discussion revolves around the twin suns of polling data and sample sizes.

One man in Galway said he would "always vote for Fianna Fáil, as they had always been good to pensioners." He said it as I have reproduced it here; without an exclamation mark. One resists the urge to quip, à la Grandpa Simpson, where are my teeth, who am I? To do so would commit a grave disservice to the thousands of pensioners who marched on Leinster House to overturn a Fianna Fáil government decision to regressively curtail medical card entitlements. 

But sometimes the mind is impermeable to reason. Loyalty in politics should not be so easily earned and so rarely given away. It is this sort of narrow ideological fundamentalism that has seen Fianna Fáil regarded as the most successful political franchise in Europe, and which gave rise to the arrogance and sense of entitlement exuded by their big players over the last decade.

Enda Kenny will hope that Labour, and in particular Fianna Fáil and Martin, will heed the last Dáil words of Taoiseach Brian Cowen:

“This election will define our economic future and decide whether Ireland moves forward from this recession, prolongs it or succumbs to it. I urge the people to examine the policies being advanced by each of the parties and to cast their vote accordingly.” And pertinently, “this election should not be about personalities but serious debate, reflection and the solemn business of democracy."

 A text to the Lunchtime show on Newstalk said sagaciously of Enda:

 "He simply hasn't got it."

Got what? (Secular lefties look away now). Perhaps Deputy Kenny will prove the antidote to sleaze, to tents in Galway and to policies which maintain the status quo of an economic elite, who acted as lobbyists for their own monetary advancement. Perhaps he will perform to the exulted standard that his supporters have promoted (nay mythologised), that he’ll be a chairman of the board kind of Taoiseach.  So if Enda can’t get the job done he knows a man (sorry Lucinda) that can. It will probably be a man. FG are running a mere 15% of female candidates of a total of 102. [i]

And what of Micheál Martin? For he too seeks to brand himself as the candidate of change, he who has been in cabinet for 14 years. Where do FF grassroots get their motivation from? He will need every last splutter the Fianna Fáil machine, running perilously low on gas, has to give him. Martin will need to win 39 seats or more to avoid being anointed as the least successful FF election leader in history.

Martin has identified Sinn Féin and Labour as his battlegrounds, and if he can attack Fine Gael while doing it all the better. His employment of the term “tug of war politics,” at his party’s campaign launch, neatly highlights the policy gulf that exists between the two would-be government partners, and is perhaps a euphemism for; a vote for Labour is a vote for Fine Gael. This strategy gains credibility in the wake of  both FG and Labour  candidates foolishly attacking one another in the past week.

Normally I would not advocate a pre-election pact, and allow Fine Gael and Labour to battle it out on the merits of their separate platforms, and if the time comes, to negotiate a programme for government and bridge the ideological chasm. But under these circumstances, it is vital that the electorate is presented with a cohesive plan and message; a one-hymn-sheet-only agreed manifesto where economic policy, financial regulation, job creation, education investment and a strategy to rebuild brand Ireland that all the people of Ireland can support, or not.

With these doubts, these unanswerables, Fianna Fáil may gain ground playing on the anxiety such uncertainty fosters. But what Martin is overlooking (publicly, at least - but then, what else can he do?) is that for now the only certainty the country needs is to know that FF will be confined to the opposition benches for the foreseeable future.

This may be an election where anti-government (FF) rhetoric is enough to win, but the electorate should hold the probable usurpers to a higher standard than that. Political reform must feature prominently in the discourse of #ge2011.

As for Sinn Féin, are they going to run a campaign, solely mimicking the anger of voters? Can they afford a leader, in Adams, who is out of his depth economically, when it is an issue of singular importance in this election? Are they capable of shaping a narrative that outlines the political and policy failure of Fianna Fáil's bank guarantee, bailout and NAMA, beyond lip-synching the average coat on a bar stool?

Can Fine Gael outline feasible policy positions that they belive in and resist a manifesto, which has been vetted and combed over by the PR department? Public sector reform is music to the ears of most disgruntled private sector workers but will the detail of such reform stand up to scrutiny?

The axiom, the only poll that counts is the one on the 25th, is true, but only up to a point. In American election campaigns they have a phrase, "the big mo." Opinion polls in the run up to elections can invigorate campaigns deemed to have momentum and cut the legs of those without it.

Does it even matter? Does Fianna Fáil have any credibility when attacking opponents’ policies?  For even when FF receives, what on the face of it seems good news, for example, a reduction in numbers of un-employed, closer inspection exorcises any feelings of mitigation and solidifies what many assert is the total betrayal of their self-aggrandised and readily espoused founding principles. 


Falls in the live register figures, announced today, must be tempered with the ESRI's (Economic and Social Research Institute) assertion that the numbers of Irish jobless has actually risen, whilst the overall decline can be accounted for by a significant drop in non-Irish job-seekers, many of whom are merely returning home.

Will the Irish electorate show the steel at the ballot box that they failed to show in 2007, when the pre-election opinion poll invective, whist not as bilious as now, nonetheless suggested a Fianna Fáil defeat? Fine Gael losing the 2007 election was a blessing in disguise. In 2011, nothing other than a victory which inflicts severe electoral damage to Fianna Fáil can be countenanced.

To meet the enormous challenge facing Fianna Fail, Micheál Martin it seems has borrowed the Gordon Brown/New Labour play book, a word cloud of which would probably feature, solely, the word FEAR.

Some will regard Eamon Gilmore's adamant declaration that we must change the deal with the IMF as primal polemic chest beating, but others will feel he is mirroring their own frustration, and as we struggle to regain some sort of national pride, may clench a fist in defiant unity. Even if we know it's a lie, maybe it's a lie we want to believe.

What is self evident is Gilmore’s observation that this election will be like nothing we have seen before. Does this signify a move from micro to macro, local to national? One can only hope so. We are a single brush stroke on the economic landscape of the world and as such our political institutions must evolve to shape a national vision.


[i] Evening Herald - herald.ie - Family portrait puts women on frontline for Kenny campaign