Elections hinged more on swings than roundabouts
World of Politics with Harry McGee – [email protected]
There were a couple of big swings in last week’s elections and they were not all for Maria Bailey’s delectation in the Dean Hotel. It left Fine Gael’s candidates struggling with a question they weren’t anticipating on the doorstep – one plucked from the Sound of Music.
How do you solve a problem like Maria?
Her interview with Sean O’Rourke was a car crash on the airwaves. She did herself no favours, showed no humility or remorse and presented herself as the victim. She also refused to say what happened and had to correct part of her claim.
Her Fine Gael ministerial colleagues did not exactly come sprinting to her support. Simon Harris and Regina Doherty both chastised her for doing the interview. And now the Dean Hotel is querying some aspects of her account of what happened.
Miriam Lord had a great line to sum it all up: “The Sultana of Swing left the radio centre in the company of PR man Paul Allen.
“Watching them on the news leaving RTÉ, the words of Fr Ted after the disastrous visit of three bishops to Craggy Island came to mind: ‘Went pretty well, I thought.’”
There were some unforgettable cringy lines – such as describing her injuries: “Seán, Seán, I was hurt. I was hurt and I’m a citizen of this State too.”
Or her refusal to answer his questions that is she had a bottle of beer in one hand what was in the other hand?
“I believe in our judicial system in this country and I believe the proper place for that is the Four Courts.”
Quite.
The interview was another ‘look no hands’ escapade. They never end well.
It was a little like the way Ivor Callely’s ill-fated interview with Pat Kenny about repainting his house in 2005 shoved Brian Cowen’s first ever post-Budget interview down the pecking order.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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