It's not often Morning Ireland (RTE Radio 1, Monday to Friday) manages a moment of deep irony, of reflexive postmodern self-referentiality, of gleeful deconstruction - not before the 8 a.m. headlines, anyway - but there it was at 7.50 on Wednesday, when Richard Crowley interviewed DCU's Dr John Horgan about the Government's approach to the Hugh O'Flaherty debacle. Horgan's point, coming from an experienced politician and journalism lecturer, was straightforward enough: members of Government, Fianna Failers and PDs alike, have been exercising the eternal political maxim that concludes "stop digging".
There was another good metaphor, too: faced with a media feeding frenzy over the O'Flaherty case, the Government was withdrawing the food; if no one could get an interview that spelled out the Government's views on the matter, it was less likely to feature in endless tit-for-tat media setpieces. "And so," Richard Crowley interjected triumphantly, "we end up interviewing Dr John Horgan." OK, so maybe it's just the media-studies wonk in me - whose wonkery was nurtured by the same good doctor more than a decade ago, it should perhaps be disclosed - but I love that sort of sinew-baring stuff. Brilliant entirely. First-class honours to Crowley.
Meanwhile, Maura O'Neill's mastery of irony is either seriously sub-par or way beyond me. The latter, for someone who cut her teeth subbing for Gerry Ryan, is a distinct possibility, but Gerry himself couldn't have matched the apparent credulity of the same Maura in the company of "spiritual healer" Mary Meade, who, on the evidence of this programme, earns her crust more as a would-be medium for communication with the spirits of the dead.
This sort of thing is classic late-night filler on radio stations all around the world, but on the flagship programme on the flagship station, perhaps O'Neill shouldn't have left her objectivity - even rationality - at the studio door. But that's what she did: evidently emotionally involved with Meade's performance, she went on and on about the extraordinary coldness that had filled the studio as Meade communed with callers' dead relations.
The most banal comments from Meade about how the spirit world "fills your heart with love" met the warmest (and most banal) possible response from O'Neill: "That's good, good to know." When one woman phoned in looking for an "accredited" course in this sort of carry-on - really, you'd think the National Council for Vocational Awards would have been on to this by now - O'Neill let Meade away with: "Follow your heart and let your [spirit] friends lead you."
Meade's psychic score, by any sensible measure, was roughly zero: none of the would-be "specifics" she threw at the callers actually tallied - the grandfather's pipe? No. The father's love of dancing? Not especially. O'Neill wasn't about to apply such reductionist logic, however. It was all "absolutely amazing". Notwithstanding his extravagant words of praise on Wednesday for Gilbert O'Sullivan on Pet Sounds (Today FM, Monday to Friday), when GOS's Himself turned up at number 11 on the programme's 50 greatest Irish albums list, presenter Tom Dunne definitely has street cred. No, he hasn't got the most scintillating on-air manner, but Dunne knows his tunes - and his own track record (pun kinda intended) brings a little extra to his interviews. As a disc-spinner he's not in the Dineen, Kelly or Fanning class, but he can usually be counted on for something tasty. So what in heaven's name was he doing in the Peter Sellers back-catalogue on Tuesday, digging out a grossly racist old "comedy" record?
No Radio 1 listener can have managed to remain ignorant of the silly Sellers record, Goodness Gracious Me, in which he's an Indian doctor doing a heart-skipping examination of Sophia Loren's - ahem - chest. On the far-more-offensive, far-less-funny Would It Not Be Lovely? he's an Indian man again, this time explaining his patently ridiculous adaptation of My Fair Lady - Eliza as an untouchable - to a Beebish interviewer, also voiced by Sellers. (Sample dialogue: "Have you a good cast?" "Oh yes, I am of a very high caste." No kidding.) If this was an attempt at light-hearted inclusiveness by Dunne, whose playlist is generally low on pigmentation, maybe he should just stick to the rockin' white boys.
When the rocking wears thin, for alternative evening entertainment you could have done worse than the discussion on Chris Barry (Dublin's 98FM) on the World's Dumbest Criminals, namely Phil Babb and Mark Kennedy. (Or if you like, Dumb and Dumber, with Kennedy scooping the latter title on the basis of his being a Dub and knowing all his life who dwells in that imposing edifice on Harcourt Street.)
Barry continues to sound like the rather hyperactive spirit of Gaybo (maybe Maura O'Neill could organise some healing), and his repeated assertions that thousands of young people look up to Phil Babb - perhaps the most booed footballer in England for the last couple of years - only spotlighted his football ignorance. But Barry's best caller found the gist of the story, especially in light of those recent Dublin assault statistics. Pat said, simply, Dubly, "I'm surprised the guards caught 'em."