Prime ministers master the fine art of the possible

POLITICS is often described as the art of the possible. But when it comes to EU politics there is very little art involved as it seems that anything is possible.

Just look at the current debates, discussions and decisions on the various European Union institutions.

The new commission president was discovered and nominated following a series of one-to-one confessional meetings between the Taoiseach and his fellow EU leaders.

At the end of it Bertie Ahern did the sums in his head and concluded there was enough support for the Portuguese Prime Minister.

The list they could choose from was not very wide. Over the months various leaders had laid down requirements, even though there are no such written rules.

Basically, they agreed it must be one of the 25 prime ministers. That ruled out any women getting it.

The French and the Germans narrowed that further, insisting it must be someone from a NATO member state that was in the eurozone and part of the Schengen agreement. That brought the number down to nine.

Then the majority European Peoples' Party in the parliament said the person had to be one of their members. That ruled out all but five of the 25 members, leaving it between Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and Luxembourg.

Luxembourg's Jean-Claude Junker ruled himself out; Italy's Silvio Berlusconi had the wit not to suggest himself; the Greek Kostas Karamanlis is just three months in the job and the Dutch Jan-Peter Balkenende takes over the EU Presidency tomorrow.

It should have been easy to predict that the last man left standing would be the Portuguese Jose Manuel Durao Barroso. But many foolishly thought the prime ministers would consider the needs of the job, consider the kind of person it needed, and search for that person.

But since it was possible for the prime ministers to create their own fantasy world they did just that, and met in Brussels last night to congratulate their man.

Strange thing is that even though they spent the past five years bitching about the current commission president, Romano Prodi, they made their latest choice through exactly the same methods of elimination from a limited pool.

But this is all water under the bridge as the bidding begins again, this time on who the commissioners will be and what portfolio they will get.

Here the rules say this is the commission president's job and that the commissioners once appointed are not political extensions of their country of origin or their government.

However, that is really just theory as any person watching events will quickly realise.

Germany has said it wants its commissioner to oversee all things to do with competitiveness, and France agrees. This might be seen as a slightly ironic decision given that Germany and France are breaking the Stability Pact for the third year in a row and are having difficulty making their economies more competitive.

France wants the competition portfolio again somewhat ironic as France's state-owned bodies such as the phone company are unwilling to change their monopoly status but are busy buying up companies in every other EU country.

Similar deals are being done at a national level in most of the EU states where prime ministers look into their hearts and choose a commissioner.

Once again for Ireland this appears to be an exercise in the art of the possible, with the Taoiseach's hot favourite for the post, Finance Minister Charlie McCreevy, refusing to vacate his current job to allow room for a Cabinet reshuffle.

Word is the Taoiseach's fellow leaders are grateful he solved the constitution and the commission president difficulties and may promise Ireland a decent portfolio.

With the right commissioner, Ireland could get agriculture with the support of the French a country with a keen interest in keeping a farmer-friendly country in this commission.