On the Town: Olivia O'Leary was hailed as "a particularly shrewd and careful observer of the politician scene", by Pat Rabbitte, leader of the Labour Party this week.He spoke about the broadcaster and journalist when he launched her book, Politicians and Other Animals in Dublin.
"She's a masterful observer of the deviant behaviour that is politics. She details our strange obsessions, she punctures our pomposities, ridicules our vanities but at the same time, the book demonstrates a great respect for the institution that is Dáil Éireann."
According to Gay Mitchell TD, who recalled O'Leary's Dáil Sketch in The Irish Times when he first became a TD in 1981, "she could be quite stinging at times, and always very decent".
Other faces in the crowded downstairs suite of Buswell's Hotel, included Eamon Ryan TD, of the Green Party, Patricia McKenna MEP, Proinsias De Rossa MEP and Des Geraghty, of SIPTU.
"She was the only interviewer I ever really feared. She was the best interviewer because she was always very well briefed and she was very good to switch her line of questioning," recalled Prof Jim Dooge, the former Fine Gael minister. "She'd ask innocuous questions and then switch," he said.
Then more friends from came across the road to the party - including Roscommon senator Terry Leyden, who joined his twin daughters, Máiréad and Sinéad,at the reception; Senator Paul Coghlan from Killarney; Joan Burton TD; and Senator Mary Henry, who praised O'Leary's role in helping overcome the difficulties of getting women into politics in the 1970s and 1980s.
"Without women journalists, we'd have got no coverage," she said.
Senator Mary O'Rourke, fresh from giving testimony at the Mahon Tribunal in Dublin Castle, came to congratulate O'Leary also.
"Any book launch that I can pick up is one less for Bertie," said Rabbitte. "I'm indebted to the doyenne of broadcasters for giving me this opportunity," he continued. "It's a little book of epiphanies about politics and politicians and all their faults and failings, strengths and achievements. It's a most amusing and carefully observed picture."
Politicians and Other Animals by Olivia O'Leary is published by O'Brien Press