Irish Examiner view: Ireland needs a new kind of opposition

Success might encourage a happy union, failure might make a marriage the shotgun option of last resort

Taoiseach Micheál Martin and his Cabinet ministers.

Even if the significance of Taoiseach Micheál Martin’s decision to find a place for a portrait of Michael Collins in his Leinster House office does not resonate too deeply with most people born, say, after Liam Cosgrave replaced Jack Lynch in that very office in 1973 this recognition of a new reality has renewed speculation about a marriage between the two grande dames of Irish politics.

No matter how rational, no matter how obvious a fit, and no matter how inevitable that consummation might seem it requires confidence beyond prudence to set a date for any nuptials. That prospect might today cheer more people than it offends but it will be utterly irrelevant to others.