There are times you would almost feel sorry for the politicians. It's not all State cars, handsome salaries and civil servants at your beck and call. Now and again there are tough decisions to be made. And I don't mean closing a school or phasing out some under-performing State programme.
The decisions I am talking about are on a higher plane altogether. They are quite literally a matter of life and death. One that comes to mind was sending civil servants to the so-called "bunker", the Anglo-Irish Secretariat at Maryfield, outside Belfast.
This meant putting Irish officials seriously in harm's way, but it had to be done as a matter of public policy under the terms of the Anglo-Irish Agreement.
Happily, in the case of Maryfield, nobody got hurt and the worst security nightmares were never realised. Sadly, however, this was not the case with Irish troops posted on United Nations peacekeeping duty overseas. Since Ireland's first foreign venture in this respect in 1958 there have been 86 fatalities: 85 soldiers and one garda.
No fewer than 47 Irish soldiers died while serving with the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil). This is a large number for a small state with a history of neutrality.
There was an audible sigh of relief, therefore, when at long last the Irish role in Lebanon was scaled down to a tiny contingent and the Defence Forces could focus on fresh challenges elsewhere.
But like a bad dream, Lebanon's troubles keep coming back. Like Luxembourg in a previous era, it is the "Apple of Discord" in the Middle East. The warring parties have gotten themselves into a mess and, as usual, the United Nations is being called in to sort things out or at least calm the situation and halt the killing.
There are certain member states who are model pupils in the UN classroom. Broadly speaking, Canada and New Zealand and of course the Scandinavians come into this category and so does Ireland. From the moment we were admitted to membership in 1955, Ireland has been to the fore in promoting the values of the UN Charter.
It's the only option for small states - sensible ones anyway. And when the time came to give practical expression to those values, Ireland was not found wanting. That's how 86 of our young people ended up making the supreme sacrifice for world peace.
Speaking by phone to various UN officials this week, it was obvious that they were near the end of their tether trying to get member states to commit troops to the beefed-up peacekeeping mission in Lebanon. A large shears had been applied to the red tape normally associated with UN missions but still the offers of troops were slow to materialise.
Indonesia and Malaysia were offering but there was a major complication: they don't recognise the very state of Israel whose border they would be policing. France, the biggest player in the current game, appeared, in American parlance, to be "wimping out".
Having made so much of the running diplomatically in recent weeks, the French are merely offering to double their contingent in Lebanon from 200 to 400. It's not the kind of grand gesture we expect from them, although there are historical factors that may be holding them back.
At this rate the target of 15,000 Unifil soldiers will be very hard to achieve. The French were meant to be the "spinal column", although they were careful never to make any such commitment themselves.
A certain reluctance to commit troops to "the Leb" is understandable. Security Council Resolution 1701 is long on aspiration and short on detail about the enhanced Unifil operation. One of the key issues is the disarming of Hizbullah guerrillas.
This is supposed to be done by the Lebanese armed forces, but wait a minute, isn't Hizbullah part of the Lebanese government?
When I visited Lebanon for 10 days in late April-early May this year, the issue of disarming the factions came up from time to time. It hung over the conversation like a summer mist and then disappeared. The best analogy in an Irish context would be Eamon de Valera's longstanding and never-fulfilled commitment to draining the River Shannon.
Realistically, it looks like the Unifil force, along with the Lebanese army, will act as a buffer between the Israelis and Hizbullah. In many ways it will be a re-run of the previous peacekeeping experience. The Irish are old hands at all this, making them obvious candidates to return to Lebanon.
But before that can happen, there has to be a Government decision which must, in turn, be approved by the Dáil under the "triple-lock" mechanism for overseas military missions. Slap in the middle of their summer holidays, the politicians may find themselves with the lives of our young soldiers in their hands. Not only are they faced with possibly sending Irish troops into a highly-volatile and dangerous situation, but the Government is still trying to evaluate the detail of how the operation would work on the ground.
Grander and more imposing member states of the European Union may hesitate, but it would be surprising if Ireland failed to make a modest but significant commitment to the new peace mission, provided greater clarity can be obtained. Given the urgency of the situation, it would probably mean recalling the Dáil, which is not meant to return until September 27th. There are also cost considerations and the people in Finance won't be ecstatic about it all.
Given the level of hatred between the Israelis, on the one side, and the Hizbullah and their foreign backers on the other, not to mention the lack of operational precision and the disturbed state of affairs in southern Lebanon, it would be naive not to allow for the possibility of casualties among Unifil troops. It's a sombre reality that has to be taken into account in the decision-making process.
How will you face a grieving or angry relative at a funeral in some country churchyard in six months' time? It's a tough call and rather them than me, but our traditions and values leave the politicians with no alternative but to put Irish boots on the ground one more time, because basically it's the right thing to do.
Deaglán de Breadún is Foreign Affairs Correspondent with The Irish Times