Who’s fit for the áras?

So here we are, sliding past the equinox. Migraineurs fear the lowering rays of the sun. We’re well used to chills, especially this year, but now, unlike spring, we know it’s a steady slide into darkness. Students are back, so are politicians. The beauty parlour’s filled with sailors, the circus is in town…

What a time we live in. Thankfully, our athletes and sports stars, amateurs and professionals alike, give us cause for pride, such immense pride. They remind us of the good things we can do and are. They represent the opposite of so much that we have become chained to over the last three years. No wonder we love them.
Meanwhile, over in the big top…
It says something for the politics of the day that even as the interest rate on the IMF/EU loan declines and we’re saved billions, one of the big stories of the last few weeks was to do with the teaching of mathematics in our schools. For some reason known mainly to themselves, it seemed of especial significance to the Irish Independent…

At the risk of really boring you, I’ll explain… A central aspect of the brouhaha was the fact that a survey was conducted by the Teaching Council into the qualifications of those teaching maths. There was a one-in-three response rate, which the Indo said raised questions about ‘the validity of the findings’.
Ehhh, actually, a 35% response rate is really good for a postal survey. Like, it wasn’t an audit, for which you’d expect a 100% response. Shouldn’t journalists know these things? So, this wasn’t really about education, it was about politics.
Well, thankfully the race for the Áras has suddenly become really interesting and we should be moving on from non-stories like this.
First up, Fianna Fáil decided not to run a candidate. That was followed, by all accounts, by internal strife. Labhrás Ó’Murchú went looking for support. Probably safe to say that if he’s in then Dana’s out. They’d be drawing water from the same well.
Then the circus spotlight moved to David Norris who confirmed that he’s back and hunting for the nominations to put him in the race. But that was aced, and pretty quickly, by Sinn Féin’s decision to nominate Martin McGuinness.
What’s going on? Well, firstly there are issues within Fianna Fáil itself. It now seems possible that the trauma of the last election may have fatally wounded the party. For all the talk of regrouping, it seems internally riven, possibly fatally so.
Secondly, if the internal dissensions were just the shock stage of post-traumatic stress disorder, they could be dealt with in time. But now there’s an external threat, in the form of a buoyant Sinn Féin.

By entering a candidate when Fianna Fáil declined to do so, Sinn Féin has outflanked the (still) senior party. So now they’re getting stuck into the Labour part of the coalition on one flank and on the other they’re elbowing Fianna Fáil.
It’s fascinating. You can see their logic. Even if they lose, they’ll at least have put one over on their historic rivals on the anti-Treaty side. And if they win? They’ll have a Shinner in the most central position for the 100th anniversary of 1916.
Taking a longer view, the Shinners may now fancy their chances of permanently scuppering and maybe even enveloping Fianna Fáil. A generation ago such a prospect was impossible to consider, but not now with FF in existential crisis. An alternate prospect is that FF might implode, with some members hiving off to Sinn Féin, others to Fine Gael and Labour.
Much hype is yet to come. Some will emanate from the candidates themselves. Many, quite probably including McGuinness, will promise to challenge the cosy mainstream consensus and be a voice for the people, even though they know they can be no such thing. Some candidates will try to suggest that this is a crusade against… well, all the things we’re against…

One hopes that McGuinness will be given the same level of direct enquiry as Norris. There is a view that there’s more rattling around in his cupboard than in that of the Trinity Senator. But whether the wolves that circled Norris will have the balls to go digging into northern Ireland’s history is another matter.
There’s a massive challenge now for the media. Kingmakers and kingbreakers they may fancy themselves, but their stupid and self-serving campaigning for a ‘people’s champion’, someone who will swiftly don the tights and cape and solve all our problems, has brought all the characters to stage for what could turn out to be a farce worthy of de Boucicault.
The thing is, the President is politically neutral. This isn’t going to be an opportunity to pass judgement on the government, even though Sinn Féin and the press will say that it is. It’s about electing a person to a role that is at once both powerless and yet significant.
Yep, the circus is in town and we’re all expected in the big top. Grab your hat…