Madam, - Fintan O'Toole's column of January 3rd was a service to the electorate. By revealing the empty husks of just some of the fruitless promises through which the Government won the last election, Mr O'Toole conquered at least for a short time the amnesia to which we citizens are so susceptible.
Because this Government so strongly controls so much of the news agenda, through hard and soft means, both openly in the light of day and more subtly, there is a genuine democratic need for this form of "recording angel" journalism.
Whether by the selective availability of ministers to journalistic and parliamentary scrutiny, or by bafflement of the electorate through slick and personalised media campaigns, or simply because they have the hand on the tap of official information, the Government generally succeeds in painting the political picture to its own design.
By recalling just some of the firm promises that the Government made in 2002 and artfully allowing the reader to see how they have been brazenly forgotten, abandoned or long-fingered, journalists can clear the PR fog in which the electorate has been enveloped and reduce the sense of democratic deficit in our society.
It would, of course, require some courage for the media to persist with such highly effective journalism, but while it might well amount to a political threat to the Government, it is unlikely that it could reasonably be construed as a threat to the State. - Yours, etc,
HUGO BRADY BROWN, Stratford on Slaney, Co Wicklow.