Time, please . . . Taoiseach the face of 'Celtic Comeback'

HOW DOES that great song go again? “Wanna see my picture on the cover.

Wanna buy five copies for my mother.

Wanna see my smiling face on the cover of the Mayo News . . . ” Hard luck, Enda. It’s only Time magazine. But while it might not be worth as much as a front page spread in the Connaught Telegraph, it’s quite an achievement nonetheless.

We hear the Taoiseach’s chuffed to have made the cover. And why wouldn’t he? He’s the first Irish leader to make the cover of time since Seán Lemass, in 1963. We’re delighted for him.

The Tánaiste is too, in his own way. “I think a cover of Time magazine with the Taoiseach of this country and ‘The Celtic Comeback’ as the title of the article is a tribute to the fact that we have worked in that intervening period of time to restore our reputation,” said Eamon Gilmore effusively.

Enda looks great in the photo – all rugged and masterful, giving it loads with the piercing eye action.

So that’s a significant second Irish person to make it on to the cover of a mass circulation American magazine. First we had Roseanna on the front of Playboy. Now Enda on the cover of Time. What next? Jackie Healy-Rae on the cover of National Geographic? But you’d be wondering. What sort of strokes were pulled to get the Taoiseach such great coverage? They must be raging in Fianna Fáil.