Have low-watt Cowen's bulbs been changed? He used to be so bright

DÁIL SKETCH:If ever a man could inspire confidence in a faltering, worried people, it wasn't Brian Cowen, the muttering Taoiseach in the twilight zone, writes Miriam Lord

SOMETIMES, BRIAN Cowen must wonder what he has to do to get some decent reviews.

Would it help if he wore a bookie's suit and a pork pie hat to Leaders' Questions? What if he lies on the floor and plays dead - a move pioneered by the Green's Paul Gogarty - when Enda Kenny gets up to speak? Maybe if he had the looks of George Clooney, the wit of Oscar Wilde and four All-Ireland medals in the glass case? What if he could just get out there and lead? There must be some way for Cowen to crack this Taoiseach lark.

As it stands, he hasn't found the answer.

Maybe there isn't one - for him.

On the other hand, Brian Cowen has a warm smile. He's loyal and passionate and well able to talk. People like him. He's genuine, and he's a decent man.

Oh, and he's bright. Very bright.

Around Leinster House, that's what people say these days when talking about him. Achievements don't figure.

As in: "What ails him . . . Why is he so grumpy . . . Where's the spark gone . . . Does he not know he's coming across wrong? Because he's very bright, you know." It's a conundrum all right.

Meanwhile, the sums aren't adding up anymore. The economy is on the skids. The latest exchequer figures released yesterday are atrocious. But when he's not in Tullamore (which is to the current regime what Avignon was to the popes) Biffo is mumbling for Ireland in Leinster House - and giving the impression that he would rather be back in Avignon communing with his constituents.

The economy was up for discussion during Leaders' Questions. Enda Kenny, in his usual doom-laden tones, went through a list of our current fiscal calamities. What had the Taoiseach to say? Very little, as it turned out. Cowen favoured Enda with a one-sentence reply and sat down before the press corps had barely a chance to sharpen their nibs.

So Enda tried again. This time, he was favoured with a jargon-laden reply which rendered most of the chamber comatose by the time the Taoiseach finished.

Eamon Gilmore tried his luck. He wanted to know the bottom line in the exchequer figures, which were being released next door in the Department of Finance as he spoke.

Once more, the Taoiseach rose and pumped out another volley of verbal Mogadon.

That man shouldn't be allowed next, near or towards a microphone in the Dáil chamber anymore without a valid prescription for that sort of talk.

Countless GNPs and GDPs and stimulus packages later, deputies on all sides sat slumped in their seats, glazed of eye and loose of jaw.

Labour leader Eamon Gilmore bravely attempted to get a straight answer. He urged the Taoiseach just to say how much money we are out by at the end of the year. "If you could express that in money terms rather than percentage terms," he pleaded.

Please, enough of the "capital expenditure" guff.

Still the jargon came. "How much? How much?" shouted Gilmore, again and again.

Eventually, the Taoiseach muttered something with the utmost bad grace. It sounded like "two billion". Worse off than we thought we were at the time of the October Budget.

If ever a man could inspire confidence in a faltering, worried people . . . It wasn't Brian Cowen yesterday.

The authorities changed the bulbs in the Dáil a while back, switching to long-life, environmentally friendly varieties. It wasn't really noticeable until the winter nights came in. But now, when darkness falls, Leinster House becomes the twilight zone.

It's something to do with the type of light cast by the new fittings. It casts an air of gloom about the place.

Maybe Brian Cowen's bulbs have been changed.

He's a walking twilight zone at the moment.

Never mind the advisers and the media spinners. Is there an electrician in the house?