There has been an awful lot of balls written about what a sea-change election this has been, and how it has changed Irish politics for ever. Rubbish. If FF are kicked out in the next election for the cutbacks and tax rises, the Blueshirts and Labour will then piss off their voters by having to implement the same cutbacks. In the 2014 Local Elections the furious Irish people will elect huge numbers of Fianna Fail councillors campaigning against the same uncaring cutbacks that they themselves were getting slapped around for five years previously.

Why? Because we have an electorate who are too lazy to bother demanding that their elected officials actually be up front with them, and instead let them pander to them like four year olds. ” Don’t worry pet, I’ll make sure that scary Mr. Cowan doesn’t reach out from under the bed and grab your defined benefit pensiony-wensiony. How will I stop him? Don’t you worry about that.”

We just elected, at great expense, 12 people to a European Parliament without anything other than the most cursory debate about EU issues, and after they made promises to us about issues over which the EU has almost no direct control. Let’s be honest. If a country was looking around to pick a model electorate for itself, it sure as hell wouldn’t pick us.

Asking the Irish people to rationally scrutinise political parties for the most appropriate suite of policy options suitable to our situation is like asking a herd of stray cats to dismantle a 1981 Ford Capri whilst writing a light opera: Spectacular to watch if only to see what gets coughed up at the end.