Cannon catch better than Lenihan kicking to touch

AN ELECTRIC buzz pulsed through Leinster House as an ecstatic looking Enda Kenny announced he had captured a member of the Government.

Had he snared a Mary? Bagged a Brian? Netted a Noel? The anticipation was intense — and then the moment of truth came as paraded before our very eyes by Enda the hunter-gatherer was none other than the big beast of Irish politics... er, Ciarán Cannon.

Yes Ciarán Cannon! The man who would be famous for being the most invisible leader of a government party in the democratic world if anyone outside of his immediate family had ever heard of him.

Oh come on, you must remember the PDs? Shouted a lot, blamed poor people for making the country look untidy, kept unusually quiet and gazed down at their hands when Bertie got into all that trouble at the tribunals?

Well, apparently this Mr Cannon, sorry Senator Cannon, has been leading them all along, except now he has decided Fine Gael is “the party of future”.

Perhaps it would be kinder not to tell Senator Cannon that Fine Gael fibs about its age and is believed to be somewhere between 76 and 86 years old, having been born in rather unfortunate circumstances after its natural parents had a shotgun divorce in the Civil War, but after a regrettable brush with fascism in its adolescence it has sufficiently rehabilitated itself to be occasionally allowed by a desperate electorate to briefly take over the economy when Fianna Fáil has made an utter mess of things.

Best keep Ciarán in the dark about all that, as according to Cannon: The Future’s Bright — The Future’s Enda.

After politely introducing himself to the assembled press, he vehemently dismissed claims he’d been “thrown out” of the last PD executive meeting. The strength of his denial was palpable, and indeed, you would have to be a sorry piece of work if even the lingering PDs — Political Dregs — of Irish civic society didn’t want you.

No, they had just “asked him to leave” — a totally different matter entirely. The senator explained that at the same time he was not being thrown out of the room he casually tossed over the leadership to Noel Grealish — apparently it was offered first to the work experience boy, but he turned it down as demeaning.

At least Mr Kenny now has the trophy head on his wall — all rather different from the big talk and little action from the Minister of Finance and his promise to hunt down that e1 million bonus paid to Nationwide boss Michael Fingleton — or “Fingers” as he was rather distractingly referred to in the Dáil by Labour leader Eamon Gilmore.

It looked very much as if Mr Lenihan had put Fingers onto, well, the long finger.

Unfortunately, it all left the Greens out on a bit of a limb as John Gormley was still insisting Fingers was effectively giving the finger to taxpayers and should resign as his position was “untenable” — a stand rather compromised by Mr Lenihan’s decision to kick everything into the long grass and just forget about it.

Fingers may have been defiantly clinging on, but despite his moment in the spotlight, Ciarán — never a loose Cannon — was still more of a who’s Cannon?