Political hypocrisy alive and well

TO quote Shakespeare, “Goodnight, sweet prince” — though CJ was a prince to a few and sweet to many in general — particularly the Keane Edge — the tide of public opinion will ebb and flow.

Was he a man of conviction or convention? On balance, I think that, like most Irish politicians and churchgoers, CJ was a convention politician and religionist.

He liked to say, “I stand on my record.” Indeed! That was his prerogative. For me his greatest crime was that of hypocrisy during the PAYE demonstrations when he warned us we were living beyond our means and needed to tighten our belts — while he was loosening his to gorge upon the hapless taxpayer.

Is there any greater hypocrisy than a ‘leader’ who presides over a tax regime that he himself is evading?

His legacy of unintended consequences is to be seen in his political children, especially Bertie — “the most cunning and devious of them all”.

Post-Enron, Bertie would be struck off as an accountant for signing his CEO’s blank cheques.

Though flawed and vain, CJ was an innovative minister with a Napoleon complex and, if asked directly, would possibly have admitted to such in later years. But for me, the Olympian hypocrisy is that exhibited by the cunning Bertie, the ultimate voter-quota convention politician who condemned his mentor in 1997 for political expediency and is now set to deliver the graveside oration.

While tradition is the spoiled child of bad habit, this hypocrisy is the homage that vice pays to virtue. QED!

David Connolly

312 Brideholm

Commons Road

Cork