AN OBSERVER of the political scene in Ireland could be excused for thinking that Irish politics is all about people and personalities and not at all about policies.
The latest two rows to exercise the body politic have nothing to do with policy differences. Firstly, the Minister for Defence and the Marine, Sean Barrett, gets himself into difficulties with a member of the Garda Siochana on a social occasion in a mess in Cyprus.
Some mess, Drapier hears you say. The phrase that springs to mind is the immortal "thundering disgrace" uttered in another mess closer to home, in a similarly convivial setting, by another Fine Gael Minister for Defence, Paddy Donegan. The use of that phrase had monumental repercussions as it led directly to the resignation of Cearbhall O Dalaigh as President of Ireland.
Drapier wonders if Garda Fitzpatrick's High Court action to prevent his transfer from Cyprus, with his serious allegation against Barrett in a sworn affidavit, will lead to a similarly dramatic resignation. After all, Sean Barrett has the disadvantage of not being in the Labour Party. Because he is not immune from criticism, he may have to follow the path so recently trodden by his colleagues, Hugh Coveney and Phil Hogan.
Eithne Fitzgerald and Michael D. Higgins only lay down rules of conduct for others. Those rules never apply to themselves. Michael D.'s buddy, Niall Stokes, has the great advantage that he can see nothing wrong with what he did, although he is well able to find fault with the less venial actions of lesser mortals.
Drapier does not know what exactly happened on this festive occasion in Cyprus.
But you cannot resort in the midst of such an occasion to your high and mighty ministerial horse, if something that is not purely sycophantic is said to you. If your pride is that easily hurt you are better off out of high public office.
Our other star of the week is a hitherto little known councillor from Waterford called Paddy Kenneally. Paddy, it appears, does not like the travelling people. He expressed his dislike of them in terms that were way over the top.
The most amazing aspect of this affair, however, was not so much the contents of a silly off the cuff outburst by an obscure county councillor, but rather the steadfast refusal of Fianna Fail to condemn him.
If a councillor is widely quoted as having advocated views of this kind in public at a meeting of a county council, one would expect that the party of which the councillor is a member would be able to say something more condemnatory of him and his remarks than the observation that it was a private opinion. It was anything but.
It became a public opinion and an expression of political attitude when it was uttered at a formal public meeting of an elected body.
There was indeed a time when Fianna Fail was less tolerant of views that were perhaps less inflammatory than Councillor Kenneally's.
As well as his suggestion that the shotguns be brought out, Kenneally described travellers as "not our people". Who are our people? Is Irish society so special that if you are not one of the obvious mainstream you are an excluded outsider? Drapier thought Martyn Turner's cartoon caught the point rather well.
In the 1920s here, members of what were seen as the Anglo Irish ascendancy were driven out, often by force, because they were regarded as "not our people". Are we to have a reversion to this now at the other end of the social scale, when the disadvantaged are to be driven out by force because they do not comply with the norms laid down by the Irish rural establishment of the 1990s?
Will we wait in vain for clerical condemnation of what was urged in Waterford County Council, just as we waited many decades for clerical condemnation of what was going on in orphanages and industrial schools under religious control?
MANY members of the House awaited with interest the publication of spotless Eithne's much vaunted Register of Interests. As Drapier expected, it does not give a very accurate picture of the real situation. Some people almost tripped over themselves in their anxiety to disclose everything, whereas the really rich and powerful hardly feature in the list.
The reality of patronage and outside pressures is different from what is reflected in this Ethics Act, but, as was frequently pointed out, ideology took over where the Labour Party was concerned and common sense went out the window.
Governments do not relish by elections these days. The recent two here ended up in wins for Fianna Fail, but what was really significant about them was the strength of support for non party candidates.
In each case an independent was only narrowly beaten and in each case the Fianna Fail victory was attributable to widespread transfers, particularly from Fine Gael voters.
Older deputies think the world has gone topsy turvy, but Drapier sees this as a positive development in that people are prepared to pick and choose. It is astonishing to some that the established parties got less than 50 per cent of the poll in Dublin West. What is even more astonishing is that, not withstanding an intensive canvass, only 44 per cent of the people chose to vote. In more traditional Donegal, the poll was very much higher.
IF the Government here dislikes by elections, spare a thought for poor John Major who seems to lose every by election by a huge margin. The degree of swing in Britain is incredible.
The North is facing an election next month for which there seems remarkably little enthusiasm. Present indications are that the SDLP and Sinn Fein will reluctantly fight the election, but not take their seats. Drapier fails to understand the reasoning for that Abstentionism never achieved very much and is not likely to do so now. It sounds like harking back to the bad old times.