Can Mary Lou whip Sinn Féin into shape after recent election losses?

It will be a pity if Mary Lou McDonald does not pull Sinn Féin together, or if her effort to do so is hampered by those in the party who think they know better than she does. Mary Lou has a lot to offer. She is bright, articulate, funny, and likeable. These are all important in the political game.

That she leads such a macho outfit makes her all the more intriguing. She has much more to give, but only if she has, as she said herself, “the cop-on and humility” to learn the lessons of the recent electoral drubbings — local, European, and presidential.