Even the pie-throwers got an easy ride during this campaign, writesPaul Cullen, who believes the election was as much a disaster for the mediaas it was for Fine Gael
It was bad enough that the media were played for a patsy during this campaign. Worse, when this realisation sank in, they - we - effectively threw in the towel and carried on regardless.
Journalists, who should be setting the agenda on behalf of the people, ended up running around helplessly after the politicians, falling for their cheap publicity stunts and failing to ask the hard questions.
Newspapers relied more heavily than ever on opinion polls which, in spite of the protestations of those who carried them out, provided a misleading impression of what was going on among the electorate. Virtually every poll overstated the support for Fianna Fáil, some by a margin of 10 per cent.
The Progressive Democrats deftly profited from this distortion by claiming they were the only bulwark against a single-party government.
Then there were the local polls based on tiny segments of the electorate, presumably to keep costs down. Not all of these were misleading and unscientific, but many of them were.
In relation to some, we still have to hear who carried them out, what questions were asked and who commissioned them. At least one poll carried out for a political party was selectively leaked and blatantly misused.
The pollsters rightly point out that their work is subject to margins of error and other caveats. But who reads the small print when you trust the doctor delivering the medicine? As a colleague has pointed out, some reporters talked about "discrepancies" between the polls, as though they were statements of fact.
From the start, as Fianna Fail's über-spin doctor PJ Mara declared "it's showtime", this campaign was run as a piece of entertainment, and journalists were just bit players. Hither and thither they were led on false trails, meaningless photo opportunities and endless high-speed canvassing.
Manifestos that were released "by instalment" - why? - and policy documents that were blatant re-heats were treated with undue reverence.
This paper and other media gave ample treatment to the main issues in the campaign. Individual journalists tried to scratch the surface. But few were encouraged to grab an issue by the scruff of the neck and really run with it.
The space that could have been allocated to graphic illustrations of, say, the failings of the health service were filled instead with the aforementioned manifesto launches and opinion poll results.
Meanwhile, increased competition within the media is breeding growing superficiality. A story is barely born before it has to be "developed" or "brought forward". This hour's headline must be different from the last hour's - even if nothing has happened.
Fianna Fáil's phenomenal media machine understood this trend best. You want instant rebuttal? You got it! This election even saw the birth of the "prebuttal" - a term even George Orwell would have found difficult to imagine.
To take one example, the print was barely dry last week on Michael Noonan's 10-point plan to deal with corruption and sleaze before Fianna Fáil was scoffing in soundbites. The content was lost in a welter of claim and counter-claim and the public learned nothing. Not that Fianna Fáil should have worried, as the next day's papers were more interested in their respective opinion polls.
Another major fault was the inordinate amount of publicity given to certain candidates. We got Michael McDowell up a pole, McDowell pushing a bike in St Stephen's Green, McDowell binning a copy of Magill magazine, and McDowell linking Bertie's pet project to Ceaucescu in the same soundbite (even after the pair spent years together in government).
Mr McDowell - who wasn't even a TD - got 27 mentions in The Irish Times during the election campaign (not including picture captions), a rough count shows. His rival in Dublin South East, Frances Fitzgerald, got six, and his namesake, Derek McDowell, got seven. Both lost their seats.
The explanation is clear: the media consider that people like Mr McDowell and Pat Rabbitte are "people like us" who deserve to be promoted. At the very least, we reason, they'll liven up our lives and our copy.
In this new personality-driven world, there was massive treatment of specious internal "rows" within the parties.
So Seán Haughey complains about Bertie going walkabout with his running mate Deirdre Heney in Dublin North Central and she accuses him of paranoia, and they both end up on the front of the Herald.
Meanwhile, those with questions to answer got off lightly. Everyone knew Michael Lowry was going to top the poll in Tipperary North, but that was no reason not to quiz the tax-evading TD on his home turf.
Martin Ferris was the focus of massive media attention, yet turned it to his advantage.
It was the same with a host of other characters who were given a clear run; even Liam Lawlor must be regretting that he didn't throw his hat in the ring.
The standard explanation for what happened is to say that the public are not interested in complex issues. They just want the good times to continue.
But then why not ask hard questions of the electorate? If people are voting out of self-interest, isn't it time they were confronted with the consequences of their opinions?
Even the pie-throwers in this campaign got an easy ride. Would a threatening-looking young male have received the same treatment as the two women who dumped custard in the faces of two party leaders and could barely explain their actions afterwards?
As editors around Dublin are already saying, roll on the World Cup.
Paul Cullen is an Irish Times journalist. His recent book on corruption in Irish politics, With a Little Help from my Friends, is published by Gill and Macmillan