I didn’t see the general election debate on Virgin Media (could there possibly be a more ironic name for this multi-services trollop?) on Thursday, but from watching clips I gather there were two points which got viewers sort of excited.
The first and biggest was Pat Kenny asking Leo and Micheál if they’d ever taken illegal drugs. Micheál immediately said no; Leo stared at the camera in silence for around three seconds before conceding that yes he had, several decades ago.
There are two points worth making on this. What should be to Micheál’s credit – that he kept the law – is more likely to be to his detriment, casting him as a simpering goody-two-shoes. Leo, more a civilized man of the world, reminded us that he did stuff when he was young that an awful lot of us will have done as well.
But, why the question? What the hell has smoking a joint (or whatever) several decades back have to do with becoming Taoiseach? How will it add to or subtract from his political skills? Is Pat Kenny suggesting that somehow Leo is likely to be a bit woozy the next time he meets Boris and may present the twenty-first century version of the drunken paddy? Kenny might have asked him if he’d ever broken the speed limit (no, Virginia, the road speed, not that speed) or if he’d ever told a lie or if he’d ever cheated at chess. Get a grip, Pat. We’re talking politics here. Or should be.
The second stand-out moment was when Kenny asked if either man would form a giant coalition with the other. Leo said that he’d prefer to have a majority (imagine!), or failing that a confidence-and-supply such as he currently has, or failing that a formal coalition with Micheál. As for Micheál, he said he wouldn’t be forming any grand coalition.
That, Micheál probably figured, was the right thing to say – tough, uncompromising. One problem: it clashed with the public appetite in the south for change. The present confidence-and-supply arrangement no doubt has its merits, but it has screwed up big-time on the two issues that are agitating southern voters: health and housing. Waiting times, hospital trolleys, homelessness, mortgage shut-downs: Fine Gael and Fianna Fail have had plenty of time to do something about these and they haven’t.
The public know, or should know, there’s only one way to get change: vote for parties that will effect change. If they do, Leo and Micheál can kiss goodbye to their feverish dreams of coalition once again.
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