It may seem like the worst of times to say so, but Enda Kenny was right to call for a vote in favour of the Treaty of Nice in the October referendum. And, in spite of all that's happened since he made it, he should stand by his appeal to the electorate, writes Dick Walsh
Of course, it must have been tempting to use the referendum to drive home the message of Bertie Ahern's confused leadership, as exposed in the general election and, to an even greater extent, in its aftermath.
Of course, Ahern got the second campaign for a Yes vote off to a bad start when he described the treaty's opponents as whingers and suggested that the electorate would know what to make of them.
But Kenny's appeal for a Yes vote was not so much because of Ahern's leadership as in spite of it. And in spite of the lies uncovered when Charlie McCreevy embarked on his post-electoral assault on the public services.
The only Minister who seemed to appreciate what a mess was made of the first Nice campaign was Brian Cowen, who had occasionally looked like breathing life into it and, when it was over, snorted a perfunctory mea culpa for the shambles. As well he might: EU affairs are the Foreign Minister's business.
His admission that the first campaign hadn't been up to much is beginning to sound almost responsible in retrospect, especially when set beside Willie O'Dea's pathetic attempts (the lastest on Morning Ireland yesterday) to spread the blame for the shameless lies and evasions of FF and the PDs to the Opposition.
Enda Kenny tends to ignore such ludicrous efforts. What he seems to have got right, however, is that it isn't the Nice Treaty the Irish electorate refuseS to support; it's the Irish politicians who happen to be in power and are suspected by the electorate of somehow gaining from anything that satisfies their EU colleagues.
Respondents were asked in several surveys who exactly they had in mind when they spoke about "the Government". Their answers were intriguing: they often suggested that there was little difference between those who held office and their opponents on the other side of the House.
The proposal to adopt the Treaty of Nice doesn't carry with it any obvious - financial - benefits for the citizens of this State. And, if the case in favour of the measure is not made clearly enough, consistently enough or with sufficient force, its opponents will be handed a distinct advantage.
It's always easier to say no than it is to say yes. And if this allows you to take a kick at the Government without any risk to yourself, so much the better. The treaty's opponents can always inject suspicions which border on xenophobia while arguing that the motives of those who most strongly favour an enlarged Community - like Pat Cox, Proinsias De Rossa and Mary Banotti - are dubious.
In the general election, those who had doubts about the Government or the state of the economy seemed willing to suppress them in the hope that, somehow or other, Fianna Fáil knew what they were about: give them half a chance and they'd deliver.
They knew what they were doing, all right. So did the Progressive Democrats. They knew they couldn't deliver and that, unless they produced the information the public needed to make a judgment about the state of the finances, no one else could. Neither Fine Gael nor Labour was strong enough or commanded sufficient support in the broadcast or print media to take them on.
The coalition was supported by the big battalions in the media; by the richest and most powerful interest groups in the country and by those outside whose aim was to invest most profitably with as little regulation as they could get away with.
Readers of the News of the World may have been surprised at its glowing support for Ahern and the coalition and the vehemence of its opposition to their critics. But Rupert Murdoch has many interests - not all of which are publicly declared. If Murdoch's most widely read newspaper supports Ahern, should we be surprised if Ahern appears to favour another Murdoch interest in broadcasting and sport?
In the election, those who didn't like the look of Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats had three choices: they could opt for Fine Gael and Labour; turn to the new, or at any rate smaller, parties (the Greens, Sinn Féin, socialists) and candidates promoting specific causes; or they could stay away altogether.
Too many for the good of democracy chose the final option and abstained. They may have abstained already in the Nice referendum and may now feel tempted to do so again. These are the citizens who complain that they know too little of what happens in the EU and, as a result, the Union is remote and inaccessible.
But many of these complaints arise from the actions or inaction of our own administrations.
Information is one of the commodities Irish politicians are least capable of handling, precisely because that's how they choose to see it: information is to be prized and traded like any other. It's not an aid to understanding, freely available to the public, but a private possession to be jealously guarded - bought, sold and traded, if necessary on a black market of sorts.
Eithne Fitzgerald's Freedom of Information Act opened windows which generations of politicians and public servants kept tightly shut. Their aim was to protect powerful political and commercial interests. They, and not the people of Central and Eastern Europe, were served by the poor debate and eventual rejection of Nice. We must see that it doesn't happen again.