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With the legacy being debated, Bertie Ahern’s chosen successor has become the leader in waiting. Brian Cowen now has less than a month to decide how best to fashion the future cabinet in his visage. For my two cents, here’s what I’d do, if I were the man who caused 3 days of vote-transfer in the 2007 General Election:

Taoiseach: Brian Cowen
Tánaiste: Brian Lenihan

Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries & Food: Billy Kelliher
Minister for Arts, Sports & Tourism: Trevor Sargent
*Minister for Communications & Technology: Conor Lenihan
Minister for Community, Rural & Gaeltacht Affairs: Eamon Ó Cuív
Minister for Defence: Willie O’Dea
Minister for Education & Science: Mary Hanifin
Minister for Energy & Natural Resources: Eamonn Ryan
Minister for Enterprise, Trade & Employment: Micheál Martin
Minister for the Environment & Local Government: John Gormley
Minister for Finance: Brian Lenihan
Minister for Foreign Affairs: Dermot Ahern
*Minister for Heritage & Culture: Seán Haughey
**Minister for Health & Children: Dr. James Reilly
Minister for Justice, Equality & Law Reform: Mary Couglan
Minister for Social & Family Affairs: Pat ‘The Cope’ Gallagher
Minister for Transport & the Marine: Noel Dempsey

* New Portfolios
** Crossing the floor to poach from Fine Gael

I propose two new portfolios for the Government. These limit the powers of conflict from the Green Party and gives them a third Portfolio to soften the blow. Those losing out include: Séamus Brennan, Mary Harney and Martin Cullen. (Expect offers of Junior Ministries for Mary Harney if she doesn’t reisgn, and an offer to join Fianna Fáil to Noel Grealish.)

diarmy

Early last week, when things were quieter and the world was still spinning, allegations and remarks were abound as they have been for some time. The evidence of Gráinne Carruth was being lamented as a bad day for Bertie in the newspapers as they executed their never-ending campaign of vicious and snide comment on the proceedings and revelations being uncovered under the nose of Judge Alan Mahon. Each had their part to play, with the main contenders being newspapers I dare not read for fear of the anger it may spark. The “opposition” too were guilty of pursuing a negative agenda towards the Taoiseach with their chief brooder Leo ‘the pussycat’ Vardakardarkar being the most vociferous of the feral weasels on the opposing benches. Enda was quiet but everyone knew he was back in Mayo trying to string a sentence together that wouldn’t be lost in the eves of Leinster House as is his monotony. Gilmore too was out an about, but they all paled in comparison to new-found follower and Senator, Eoghan Harris who came to Bertie’s aid on the airwaves, pulling off a mighty coup of being on RTE’s Pat the Plank one minute and TV3’s Nightly News with secret Bertie-lover Vincent Browne the next.

Overall though, everyone was doing the same as they’d done before. Pat the Plank even had sports ‘pundit’ Eamonn on to do some gaffs about how he thought Bertie measured up to Dunphy’s unquestionable standards (he failed on that note). John Waters was there too, although he failed to make a single point worth noting.

And throughout the weekend, everyone was gearing up for the spectacle of Enda making a piss-poor attempt at leading an opposition attack on the Taoiseach on Wednesday as the Dáil came back to work. But Bertie was busy in background. The master strategist had one ace in the hole that no one, including Bertie, could believe.

I was busy that morning. It was a damp morning as April began to test my patience with the weather. I’d just started to re-install a Microsoft Windows PC (what’s new there then!) when I heard the phone beeping in my pocket. “Bertie’s gonna resign - press conference called” came through. It wasn’t the only text I got, but the same line was apparent in all. Within minutes, several people in the office where I was working came in to say the same. My heart sank. I lost track of what I was doing and ignored the risk of viruses and spyware and went on the internet without protection to find out about this.

But it was too late. By the time I hit the refresh button a second time, the pigeons in RTÉ had spread the word. The greatest politician in living memory was resigning, giving his month’s notice to his boss, the people of Ireland. In what I have only seen parts of (as I’d be too emotional to watch the full speech) it was said that the Bert was very moved and emotional when addressing his critics and vowing to set the record straight on his messy affairs of some 15 years ago. I sat in the chair motionless. I was sad. I was depressed. I was sympathetic. I was angry.

For years I’ve been a staunch defender of Fianna Fáil. I first met Bertie Ahern at the age of 13 when he came to officiate at the opening of my local supermarket, where I was employed. I was the third person in the row inside the ribbon-clad door. He was a newly-elected Taoiseach and I was an impressionable young man. The warmth of his presence resonated with all the staff as he breezed through the civic duties and went on his way as quickly as he’d arrived. That was 1997. It would be a full 5 years before I’d meet this man again.

In the meantime I’d met Charlie Haughey who frequented my subsequent workplace several times. Although then he was in a frail state, the man was none-the-less a presence. When the time came again to meet and greet the Taoiseach, the white FAI shell-suit didn’t detract from the leader of the Irish Republic’s impression on me. Here was a man few tourists recognised, who slipped without cortège through the hotel and within hours was mingling with the townsfolk. When a group of American tourists asked me who the “popular guy in the sweat-suit in the bar” was, they found it incredible to believe that this was the Prime Minister of Ireland. “He’s so real” they gasped as they returned for a better look at him. Sure enough, Bertie was enjoying his pint of Bass from the freshly installed barrel fitted earlier that morning as he laughed and joked with the locals.

This was a man without heirs and graces. As an indifferent child of the 80s and early 90s, I had little to inspire me by way of politics. It was a polarised time, and the staunch support for Fianna Fáil in Kerry at the time was nothing by way of inspiring. But the chance encounters with this man made me realise that there was someone who could wrestle with the Unions by day, and drink with the people by night.

In the years to come, as I became more supportive of his fascinating régime, I would conclude, that it would be no challenge whatsoever for any citizen to wake up one morning, decide that in that day they would see the Taoiseach and fulfil that ambition without hindrance. Ireland has one of the most open political establishments in the world. Countless stories of how people met Bertie on nights out have been told and retold many times. He was genuinely a man of the people. Of course, the odd plain-clothes Garda was present at all occasions, but Bertie was free to move throughout the cities and towns throughout the lands in a way no politician in the world could enjoy. Friend and foe alike lined the streets and the bars when he came to town. There was always a magic. An enigma. A curiosity. A yearning for a glimpse of the man who gave us so much.

But on Wednesday last, all I felt was anger. We had betrayed him. Despite the allegations and the circumstantial evidence, it was the testimony and torture which Gráinne Carruth gave and received in the Tribunal that caused a stir in Bertie’s heart. As he pondered the anniversaries of peace approaching fast and the trip to America to speak to Congress, he decided he’d had enough. And on the steps of Government Buildings on Wednesday morning at 10:46am on the second day of April 2008, Patrick Bartholomew Ahern tendered his resignation to the people.

I felt sick. We have lost a great and truly magnificent leader.

Within minutes, Enda Kenny was on the steps of the Oireachtas calling for an election, flanked by his mob of gombeen-men. A vision that could only be described as the sorriest bunch of low-life scum in Ireland today. Kenny called for a ‘new mandate’ from the people of Ireland. This wasn’t just foolish - this was representative of exactly what is at the core of Fine Gael - no fucking heart. I rarely curse on this blog, but this time I feel I must make an exception. Right across the country, people who voiced their support for Fine Gael in the past were aghast at the Mayo man’s gaff outside Government Buildings. He nailed his colours to the cross, and looked like a failed and stupid man in doing so. At least Gilmore the Great had some kind words for the man who has been wronged and wronged badly.

As the country mourns the loss and the body-blow suffered by Bertie’s surprise resignation, let us hope that a candle will be held to the shadowy figures who plotted his demise. Editors and Blueshirts beware. The tide is out and now we see you. And as Bertie prepares to round off 11 years of Fianna Fáil unity and coalition government in a flurry of pomp and historic ceremony, I can only hope that the evil and sour bastards in the media and opposition are found out. Kenny’s card isn’t the only one marked and marred by this past 7 day’s events. It’s time to call time on these doom-sayers and bring Ireland back to the mighty country it once was. A place where people were inspired by politics and not disgusted by it. A time when true leadership went un-noticed amid our success. We’ll notice it now. And we will regret what we have done.

diarmy

Regular visitors to DDN may have seen the ‘Account Suspended’ notice over the past few weeks here in place of the lovely attractive and divisive blog. This was all my own doing, in order to protect against the most evil of modern day recruitment processes - the online search.

Background checks are common in all facets of modern living, but the internet provides the one true means of freedom through expression. The downside is, with masters of search such as Google caching everything as you go, you end up with a digital footprint that even Bigfoot would be proud of. These days you can’t be too careful and the online world is certainly no exception. I know of many people who were refused interviews for positions in companies based on what they wrote online. It’s sad, because in my opinion, individuality is the greatest source of strength in a business.

Opinion, assertiveness, leadership and personal growth seem to be the most hated of weapons in an employee’s arsenal when reviewed by the human resources ‘managers’ of this world. It is indeed a difficult job, compounded by fractious laws and tort which solicitors, lawyers and attorneys love to exercise our memories leading class action suits, libel cases and other such maddening weirdness.

‘Teamwork’ seems to be the buzz word of the last few years. But teamwork is a fallacy. Human beings are unique creatures. We all have differentiating characteristics. Together we can make a difference, but the majority of global progression can be lead to a few individuals - Alexander Graham Bell, John Logie Baird, Isaac Newton, Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Frank Lloyd Wright and Steve Jobs. Sure, others were involved, but the driving enthusiasm and passion for exploration of human abilities is what forced changes throughout the world.

Today’s corporations pride themselves on competitive advantage and ‘leveraging’ and all those other words. But the real innovation, the real progression, comes from people, not collective groups of individuals labelled ‘teams’ in which inevitably, one or two members do all the work!

diarmy

There’s quite a bit of talk of late about the sate of the economy, the future of our infrastructure, the ever-worsening immigration issue and of course, the housing market’s collapse. All of this bad press is contributing to a visible and tangible mist of depression among Irish people these days. Gone are the smiles of optimism and ostentation and donned are the faces of gloom and doom. Perhaps the most apparent cause of this sadness lately is due to the atrociously shi**y weather we’ve had since 2008 started.

But this is merely the sheep’s clothing of the issue that people are waking up to. Like the hangovers of years gone by, this headache we’re collectively nurturing is painful and sore. But what’s different about this one is the fact that there is no forgetting what caused it. We’re all guilty of the perils of riches – spending. I’ve done it, and you’ve probably done it too. We had it so good. We had a great 10 years of it, thanks in part to stable government and a favourable global economic climate. But the clouds have been here for a while now, and it’s starting to rain – quite heavily.

Make no bones about it, we’re headed for a monsoon of bad news in 2008 as a torrent of workers are left behind in the wake of the mass exodus of our biggest employers as they transport themselves in this ‘mobile’ economy to warmer climes and subsequently cheaper workforces. Today, Costa Rica, Mumbai and Shanghai are the Ireland’s of the 21st century. We’ve become a casualty of our own foolish belief that it would never end. Sadly it has, and we’re paying for it big-time.

HOUSING

We’ve long since known that our housing market was the driving force between our recent economic growth. In the early days of the Celtic Tiger (see the references to ‘Síbín’ as I call her on DDN) the focus was on industrial property. This lead to masses of employment and the steady rise in perceived wealth by our nation’s brightest of offspring – the college dropout. These people saw fit to pack it up and go off working in the building trade and reap the massive rewards that existed for the fortunate few who could make it on their own. Now, the teat has dried up and the sucklers of constructions are suckers for sure, as they find themselves out in the cold, looking for work in a bearish market of torturous proportions.

The graduate doesn’t escape lightly here either though. If you had the misguided misfortune to go to college to pursue something like Information Technology or Commerce in the last 10 years, and then shot yourself in both feet by staying here on some two-bit Graduate Trainee Programme, congratulations on falling for the modern equivalent of slave labour. I know your pain.

If on the other hand, you left Ireland and came back for the boom, you’re probably thinking of where you were and wondering why you bothered coming home.

EXPENSE

We really blew it. How many people went out in the last 5-10 years and bought a house in a newly developed estate built by companies they never heard of in places promised to be ‘tranquil but with all the facilities of a modern town’ and are now sitting on nothing more than a shell of badly built quality, built by the lowest bidder on ground that was probably reclaimed from boggy marshland in an area you now wouldn’t stray into without some form of blunt instrument for protection after dark. The answer is thousands. And now, those people who when they eagerly battled for the reasonably priced speculative 2-bed apartment and signed their lives away on 100% mortgages are living with the realities of negative equity, life-long repayments and the prospect of selling up just to get out of debt. They’ve been screwed by the unscrupulous oligopoly that their builder, solicitor, bank manager and developer all operated to maximize profit and minimize effort. And now they’re just living to scrape together enough money to pay huge service fees, interest repayments and loan agreements.

I’m not guilty of this in a roundabout way. I bought a car – ok, a modest price of €10,000 two years ago. Now, a college graduate with an honours degree in nothing, working 40 hours a week on less than the average industrial wage, I’m faced with the prospect of never being able to buy a house without drastic action somewhere along the line.

PUKE

We’re all suffering. The cocktail of our economic prowess however has a bitter aftertaste and we’re no better for buying into it. It made us feel powerful and garnered glances of envy from every corner of the globe. And as we drank it, we like its tingling impulses and warm fuzzy liquidity. But as we get to the bottom of the glass, we’ve realised that the things we’ve tried to avoid are now sliding down our throat. The bits of sediment that we didn’t realise were there until it was too late. And as we look at the Martini glass in which this cocktail of money and credit was served upon us, we realise that it sits on a very narrow foundation that could snap at any given moment.

AWAKE

Unfortunately, we’re still not actually awake from this nightmare binge session. We’re still being peddaled the lies about how the property bonanza is just resting for a while, and that now is a good time to buy. We’re being told that while you can’t have a 100% mortgage, you can have a mortgage intermediary take control of your house for a modest rate in excess of the legal blood-alcohol rate. We’re being screwed and squeezed for every cent we’ve got, until the companies who’ve wrung the towel dry move on to greener pastures.

Ireland needs to wake up, sit on the toilet for a good think and smell the coffee. We live in the second-most expensive country in Europe, relying on foreign direct investment from the USA, competing on nothing but an ideal against countries who can offer the cost-savings that companies want, and being asked to pay more for a litre of water from the local valley than a litre of petrol from the Gulf.

Emigration is now our only option. Let’s hope the Jihadist’s don’t turn us into Britain while we’re gone.

diarmy

With the dust settling on the 2008 MacWorld event in San Francisco, attention is being turned back on Europe this week, with the news from unofficial sources that Apple has failed to garner the huge numbers anticipated to adopt the iPhone in the UK. Word on the street too is that Europe is beginning to show some interest in the attitude-changing device, but is it a success in Europe?

To be frank, the iPhone is a nirvana-esque type of device. It is without doubt the most beautiful embodiment of that holy grail of the mobile communications device that so many actors in the technology field have spent 10 years trying to bring to market. Combining the phenomenally successful iPod platform, with a cellular telephone, WiFi-capable device with full and unbridled internet abilities and an email client that brings email to the masses in a way people can understand is amazing. Giving the opportunity to people to ‘touch’ their email and music is also a huge achievement for metaphor. But the device, while revolutionary in its abilities, is a bit of a lame duck in the hands of Europeans.

While it’s certainly not the case in Ireland (where we pay the highest prices for mobile phones and services in Europe), the UK has a thriving and highly-competitive cellular phone industry. With a population of almost 80 million alone in the UK, the phone market there reached saturation some years ago – yet people continue to adopt the latest phones for the best prices. When visiting Cardiff a few years ago, I was shocked to see the latest models being flogged by mainstream carriers for almost nothing (and some at £0). But the reason is simple – competition has driven down the price of the devices and the marginal profits gained from the competitive advantage on contracts yields massive revenues for the companies involved.

Contrast this with the Apple iPhone – a device which combines so much into a device that it does indeed warrant a high-price, and people will run like hell from it. The simple fact is the iPhone is just too expensive. It’s irrelevant whether it has an iPod or email in it, for the average consumer is concerned with things like ‘What kind of camera is in it?’ and ‘How easy is it to text with?’ and ‘Is the battery good?’. The consumer isn’t going to pay top dollar for a product that they perceive to be just a phone with an iPod stuck on. However, the iPhone is more iPod than phone. It was designed as an iPod, and phone features were added to the mix in order to consolidate a user’s physical digital footprint into one single device.

The main reason therefore that the iPhone is failing in the UK (and Europe too) is its price. And as we enter a huge recession in the EU, the iPhone’s luxury must-have appeal will be sacrificed due to its costly yield. Which is a dramatic change from the years when phones such as the Nokia 8800 was the must-have device because it was more expensive than the rest (and was a crap phone to boot). Now people want functionality over form, reliability over ergonomics. And while the iPhone is a revolutionary product, it will suffer from its futuristic design.

Europeans, and none more-so than the Irish, are a text-loving breed. On average, I send over 100 SMS messages per day. This is not uncommon in Ireland, and given that I’m a man, you can imagine that the number of text messages sent by women is a multiple of that. In fact, we’re so good at ‘texting’ each other here that we can type better on our phone’s twelve-key layout, than on a 105-key keyboard. The iPhone lacks this fundamental feature of tactile touch and connection with the phone. It has a beautiful and extremely clever QWERTY keyboard. But the problem is that this keyboard is a touch-screen keyboard, which relies on super-human hand-eye co-ordination to hit each key every time. This is no good to people raised on a diet of 4-3-5-5-6 (H-E-L-L-O) keystrokes. I’ve frequently sent text messages to people in my pocket while not looking at the keys. It’s great when you’re at a funeral and someone has a funny story to tell you right at that moment. It’s not that it doesn’t happen! So imagine remembering the x-y co-ordinates of the letter ‘M’ on your iPhone keyboard when it’s in your pocket on a freezing wet November day? It’s not going to happen. The fact is, we need keys to feel our way around. Most people here text without even thinking about which buttons to press, similar to how we now type on our keyboards at work. In fact, some of the stupidest people I’ve ever met who can’t type their name on a keyboard without looking, could write a 160-character text message faster than you could say ‘What kind of phone do you have?’.

So what of the Irish situation. Well, the iPhone still hasn’t beholden itself to being sold here yet. Still no announcement from Apple as to when this might happen, despite everyone and his dog predicting it’ll be in February of 2008. But the problem is, given that there’s only a population of 4 million on this island, and about two-thirds of our population are either too old or too young to adopt the iPhone in their droves, the device will be the target of the adoration of the middle-classes. These are the people who stupidly bought houses in the last 5 years and didn’t sell them when they had the chance. They’re now poor, struggling to make ends meet and not entirely aware of the fact that they’ll spend every day until they’re 90 years old working to pay off the debt they owe to the banks. This narrows the gap to fewer and fewer potential buyers of the iPhone. To be honest, if you take the ratio of 80 million in the UK buying only 200,000 iPhones, that means that in Ireland, Apple could only hope to sell 10,000 iPhones here. At a price tag of about €300 per iPhone, that’s only €3,000,000. Apple takes only 25% of that, meaning the company will make only €750,000 for ploughing iPhones into Ireland. Think about it, how much money will actually make it back to Cupertino? And then wonder why you’re asking yourself why Apple haven’t launched it here yet??

The answer is simple. If it’s not catching on in the UK, it’ll never catch on here.

How do Apple rectify that? They really cannot. While things might work in the US for the iPhone, Europeans want a phone that is easy to text with, can take reasonably good pictures and costs nothing to own or run. The iPhone is the antithesis of this. More is the pity.

diarmy