It appears that nothing can go wrong for the Taoiseach these days. Quite apart from his and his party's soaring popularity (according to the polls, that is) he is winning money on the horses. It seems that even at the Listowel races he can do nothing but win.
As Drapier always says, it is at times like these that the ever popular politicians should be wary. There are a number of issues which are causing the general public difficulties, such as house prices and traffic. Although at the moment they may not be blaming the Government, this could change quite easily. For instance, the Government bought some time in the house prices area by implementing the Bacon report proposals. But as was pointed out at the time, their action could lead to difficulties in the private rented sector, and this turns out to be the case. Indeed, it has even been suggested that the implementation of the Bacon proposals may have been effective for a few months, but now the spiral of upward prices has started again. What looked like drastic measures a few months ago may not be enough.
The Government can claim that it reacted more quickly than some commentators or opposition spokespersons, but Drapier can sense that the pendulum has swung, again, away from the Government. The difficulty is that intervening even further in a free market situation could have extremely negative effects on the economy in the longer term.
An issue which is even as difficult as the housing crisis is the traffic situation, although the Government may be able to implement more effective measures in this regard but not so politically palatable, such as banning certain types of vehicles from the city centre at specific times.
But one only has to look at the public reaction to a day-long car ban in France this week. Sheer anger.
The issue which is helping to make this Government very popular may ultimately turn out to be its Achilles' heel, and that is the economy. The Government is between a rock and a hard place in that it is being suggested that in order to keep the economy in good order there must be no giveaway Budget, whereas the demands of the public are insatiable.
Every week more and more lobby groups are coming forward, demanding their entitlement and referring at the same time to the £1 billion extra tax take available to the Government.
This type of issue was very much in the mind of the Opposition parties when they had their think tanks this week. Labour and DL were love-bombing each other. In this context Drapier heard many Viagra and Bill Clinton jokes.
Drapier was somewhat surprised to hear Ruairi Quinn coming out forcefully, suggesting a merger with DL in that he understood that the normal procedure in the Labour Party would be that a special delegate conference should be called in order to decide their future.
This was the case every time Dick Spring was enticed into government. They were obliged to go to a special delegate conference to get the grassroots' consent. Then the Labour leadership made out that it was the delegates and not the parliamentary party which took the decisions, even though to the outside world it always seemed as if the conference was merely a rubber-stamp exercise. With Ruairi Quinn's leadership it seems to be somewhat different in that he is attempting to assert his leadership (and his view that this should take place). Maybe he is being somewhat more upfront than before.
The reverberations from the Labour Leinster Euro election convention were still around late in the week, with Michael Bell, the defeated candidate, lashing out at the leadership. He lost to a hitherto politically unknown young man.
Such was the scale of his defeat that some suspect that other dark hands were at play behind the scenes. Bell's star had fallen in recent years, but it must have been a bitter pill to swallow for him and his supporters. Time will tell if he will be a focus of malcontent sniping at the leadership.
Fine Gael, after an extremely bad poll result at the weekend, must be wondering how the tide can turn in its favour. Previously, before it was in government, it was in the doldrums, and after the highs of power it seems now to be back where it started.
John Bruton will have a job on his hands re-energising the party. The mutterings which surfaced after his comments about Sinn Fein seem to have died down. It, too, is focusing on a number of issues which it feels are the key ones occupying the voters, a "new agenda".
And yet this new agenda is more or less what all the other parties are trying to come to terms with: house prices, traffic, social exclusion and the economy.
Speaking of the economy, most of the interested public will recall that the Irish Independent immediately before the last election declared "Pay Back Time". Basically, they were stating that it was their opinion that the tax reductions which had been promised over the years had now to be delivered. Yet this week Drapier notices that, again in an editorial, the paper was going back on that. It was suggesting the Government should "play it safe" and stall some of these tax reductions in order to "weather the storm" of the expected world recession.
While it may be legitimate for the Independent to change its mind, Drapier feels it should probably have been aware of the possibility that this could happen when it first made its "payback" call.
To a certain extent calls like this helped build up the public's expectations to the pitch they are today and, as always, it is extremely difficult to damp down such hopes.
The Competition Authority came out with all guns blazing against publicans this week. Its declaration that anyone should have the right to sell drink subject to normal planning regulations sent the existing licence-holders into sheer despair.
On top of that Mary Harney, the champion of free enterprise, totally backed the report. Drapier thought her immediate reaction was strange, given that the Government apparently had not decided its attitude.
Even more surprising was Tom Kitt's interview in which he said the report should be implemented, the sooner the better. Was he speaking for the Fianna Fail party? Drapier thinks not. He surely will get his wings clipped by the party hierarchy because without doubt the most powerful lobby (apart, perhaps, from the farmers) is the publicans. Drapier cannot see his comments being accepted by the majority of the party.
Drapier wonders why Jackie Healy-Rae, the unavowed standard-bearer of the pub-owner, is so quiet. He may be shellshocked at the report and more than likely at the reaction of the two Ministers to have commented on the matter so far. No doubt we will hear from him presently.