Bertie does Sisyphus

Bertie’s well crafted speech at Westminster was better delivered than I had expected from him. There was a brief loss of sound on the RTE coverage shortly after Bertie had begun to speak, and the inclusion by the script writer of a reference to the myth of Sisyphus and his rock somewhat taxed Bertie’s “nortside” diction, but otherwise it was well delivered and well received.

And no-one could have received a more generous introduction than that accorded to him by Tony Blair. It is ironic that the genuine diplomatic triumph in Northern Ireland achieved by both men may well prove to be their shared swan-song. Tony Blair will be gone from Downing St by the end of June. Bertie may be gone as Taoiseach, and leader of FF, even before that.

Someone on radio today was quoting Enoch Powell’s famous dictum that all political careers end in failure.

The latest polls suggest that a change of government later this month is a real possibility, but there’s still time for FF to recover and/or for the alternative coalition to blow it. I’ll be hoping for Bertie’s political demise on 24th May, but it would be churlish not to accord him due credit for his achievements in the northern peace process.

Lets’ s hope that, like Sisyphus, FF efforts to recover the situation will be akin to rolling a rock to the top of a mountain, only to have it roll back down again.