Ó Cuív buried his principles in cabinet

Ó Cuív defended Ahern’s Manchester whiparound, in which Ahern claimed that a group of Irish millionaires passed him eight grand for himself.

Reinvention is the secret of longevity. In a world with a short-term memory and an even shorter attention span, the capacity to reinvent oneself is a great career asset.

Look at Madonna. Thirty-odd years down the line from when she made her debut album, she is still hard at it. In terms of her image, fashion, and even the music, the Material Girl keeps changing to present a different persona to the public.

The former strongmen of the old Soviet Union demonstrated a similar capacity after the Berlin Wall came down. In their original incarnation their principals were guided by communism. Any abuse, any outrage, was justified if it furthered the aims of the state, and the collective.

Then, when a light was shone in, they reinvented themselves, emerging as champions of democracy. Their principles were no longer acceptable, so they sought refuge in the great political slogan: If you don’t like my principles, I can change them.

In the wake of the bubble bursting on the Irish economy, many in our body politic are showing an equal capacity for reinvention. Last week, two men have got their skates on to present new faces to the world, faces which are a surgical lift away from those that they previously possessed.

Éamon Ó Cuív has, in the eyes of some, shown himself to be a man of principle. His resignation as Fianna Fáil deputy leader was based on a policy difference with Micheál Martin. Dev Óg disagrees with the party’s stance on the forthcoming referendum. He wants conditions attached to any yes vote, in order to alleviate the State’s debt burden.

Resigning on a matter of policy is a unique departure for an Irish politician. It’s also a departure for Ó Cuív in his personal conflict over his party’s policy on Europe. In 2001, when he was a junior minister, he publicly made known that he had voted no to the Nice Treaty.

He didn’t resign on that occasion. Instead, Bertie Ahern promoted him to a full ministerial portfolio. When it came to a rerun of the vote, Dev Óg looked into his heart and came to the conclusion that the Irish people wanted him to vote yes. Yes to Nice. Yes to his ministerial career. Yes to Advancement. Yes, yes, yes.

The alternative would have been to walk away from cabinet with his principles unchanged. What kind of a fool would do that when there was money to burn in the State coffers?

Dev Óg was well suited to his portfolio of Arts, Heritage and the Gaelteacht. He has a genuine interest in all three areas. And much of his work consisted of doling out grants to organisations which came under his department’s remit, particularly along the western seaboard. That in turn did no harm to his popularity, and his political persona, as a born again man-of-the-west. Not bad going for a scion of south county Dublin.

Meanwhile, he sat at the cabinet table through the worst of the excesses. He may have held the agrarian principles of his grandfather. He may have been a terror for hip hopping at the crossroads. But he bought in completely to a system of governance which looked to bankers and developers for leadership.

Then, when Ahern ran into problems over stacks of cash, Éamon stepped up to the plate. He expressed no reservations about the evidence that was emerging from the Mahon Tribunal. His principles didn’t permit him to wonder about the manner in which Ahern was leading the beloved party. Dev Óg never opined on the difference between the values of leadership held by Dev, and those that were informing Ahern’s stewardship.

In fact, he went out on a limb for Ahern, lowering himself to the role of a clown. On radio. Ó Cuív defended Ahern’s Manchester whiparound, in which Ahern claimed that a group of Irish millionaires passed him eight grand for himself.

“With emigrants, there was a culture of supporting people in need (back home)” Ó Cuív told the lunchtime show on Newstalk. He was comparing the grubby image Ahern projected to the sacrifices of the dead generations of strapped emigrants, and the grinding poverty of an earlier era.

Later, under Brian Cowen, Ó Cuív continued to keep his lip buttoned. The policy of acceding to whatever Frankfurt demanded was followed without dissent.

Now, all has changed. Dev Óg is back on his horse. He is standing on principle against a man who is occupying his grandfather’s seat. The timing of his brave stance is curious. There is no ministerial gravy to be had right now, nor for a long time to come. Even if his principles were for sale, there is nothing with which to buy them. The party in its current incarnation could be heading for the knacker’s yard. There has never been a better time to project yourself as standing up to the powers in Frankfurt. He has looked into his heart and emerged with the Mattie McGrath answer. Get out while the going’s good.

Another man busy reinventing himself is Ó Cuív’s old chum from primary school, Michael McDowell. Last week, Big Mac told a conference that current events were opening up a political vacuum into which a new party could leap. He is even willing to “put his shoulder to the wheel”.

His vision suggests that such an entity could position itself in the terrain formerly occupied by the Progressive Democrats, the outfit he guided to oblivion at the 2007 general election.

Then he went and spoiled it all by reminding everybody who he had been in a previous incarnation.

Referring to the National Women’s Council and the Irish National Organisation for the Unemployed, Mickser said there was hardly a major voluntary organisation in the country that didn’t have its hand out for cash.

This, he said, was because Ahern brought dissent into the semi-state world by “subsidising interest ground to beat their own drums from public money”.

At least he hasn’t reinvented himself completely. He still finds it in his heart to have a pop at those representing the disenfranchised, like the unemployed. But what of his charge that Ahern went mad with the money?

McDowell sat at the cabinet with Ahern for eight years with, three as attorney general and then as minister for justice. He presented himself as a disciple of fiscal rectitude, somebody who treated public money with the greatest respect. And now he wants us to believe that he looked the other way while Ahern threw cash at all comers. Was he beguiled by Ahern’s charm? Where were his principles when the cash was being thrown around? Is he suffering from repressed memory syndrome?

As with many others, McDowell appears to be using public antipathy towards Ahern for his own ends. He wants us to believe that Ahern ran the country like a dictator, while those around him looked the other way, resembling a cabinet of dummies, oblivious to what was going on.

Maybe Ó Cuív and McDowell should get together and form a party dedicated to reinvention. It could position itself as a neo-liberal socialist vehicle that would cater for the individual needs and principles of both men. What should they call this bright, shining party? Bertie Nua.