The DUP deputy leader Mr Peter Robinson insists that he has nothing but contempt for Gerry Adams, Martin McGuinness and David Trimble. But it's questionable which would top his list of political hate figures.
We are in the DUP electoral nerve centre in his constituency of East Belfast. Mr Robinson is sharp, concise and utterly single-minded. He's the party tactician. He will take the kudos if the DUP achieves major gains at the expense of the Ulster Unionists, the blame if it doesn't.
He said he became involved in politics because of Gerry Adams who he personifies as the face of the republican movement from the 1970s to now. "Gerry Adams was the cause of my coming into politics to ensure that people like that would not win," says Mr Robinson. But just as a Sinn Fein or SDLP politician would have a sneaking regard for Mr Robinson as a political strategist, could he not objectively acknowledge the skill of Mr Adams and Mr McGuinness in bringing the republican movement to a stage of relative peace?
"I find it difficult to support the view that we should thank the IRA now because there is less violence, simply because they have stopped murdering people that they were murdering before. You will never get me to say anything kind about Gerry Adams."
Nothing surprising there. But just contrast these remarks with his view of the Ulster Unionist leader. "He has done more to divide unionism and to advance the republican agenda than the IRA."
This is said with the clipped force and assertiveness that only Mr Robinson can muster. It's tactical, of course, but it also sounds deeply personal. The UUP leader has been the main DUP target throughout this entire campaign: Trimble as Pinocchio, Trimble as traitor, Trimble as Methuselah still waiting for decommissioning.
It's been relentless. Obviously the DUP has figured this is the way to make electoral gain. The policy is simple: the DUP you can believe, Trimble you can't. Mr Trimble himself has argued that depicting him in such a consistently venomous manner will backfire.
Mr Robinson does not agree. "Certainly we have been detecting at the door that David Trimble has gone beyond the pale and has lost the trust and the support of the unionist community."
Yet there is no doubting that Mr Trimble by his resignation ultimatum succeeded in undermining the DUP's plan to make this a decommissioning as well as an anti-Trimble campaign. Contrary to DUP predictions, he has fought this election on the stump, even in difficult constituencies such as his own in Upper Bann.
Mr Robinson is dismissive. "He is always bullish. He always does his tough man act during an election campaign, but it is meaningless. It is an act."
Even when he's ruminating on how well the party will do on Thursday Mr Trimble is on his mind. Mr Robinson says the DUP could win up to 30 extra seats in the council election, and if it does so at the expense of UUP councillors those councillors might be to the fore in the next attempt to oust Mr Trimble. He is confident the DUP will hold its seats in his own East Belfast, the Rev Ian Paisley's North Antrim and the Rev William McCrea's South Antrim. In terms of the pecking order of other opportunities he says: "On the basis of the 1997 Westminster election results East Londonderry would come next and then Strangford, then East Antrim and then Upper Bann. Those are the key constituencies and the reports are good in all those constituencies."
Most of the negative campaigning is focused on Mr Trimble, but in this election one also detects a shift to the positive. There is evidence that the DUP is confronting new realities that may require a softening in its overall stance to the agreement.
Diehard unionist agreement opponents argue that the DUP, if it were truly a No party, could have destroyed the Good Friday deal by withdrawing from the Assembly and refusing to participate in the Executive.
Mr Robinson says this would only have served the Ulster Unionist Party, notwithstanding the reasonable point that without the DUP the Assembly would have been depicted as a mainly nationalist puppet parliament.
Mr Robinson, however, will allow that the DUP is sold on real-politik. There is increasing evidence of that pragmatism, in the party being willing to stretch its principles in order to hold and gain power. For instance in this election on at least two occasions it shared the same TV studio with Sinn Fein.
DUP language also appears to be modulating, as if it is acknowledging greater unionist acceptance of the Good Friday deal and a firmer commitment to devolution. This is Mr Robinson on consensus politics: "Unless we have a structure that can enjoy the support of unionists and nationalists alike it is not going to last."
On North-South co-operation: "If it's a matter of having good co-operation for practical purposes, then I'm your man, but if it's a matter of advancing the nationalist agenda I'm against you."
But nationalists, for emotional more than practical reasons, want an executive structure to that North-South dimension of the agreement? "Well you negotiate on every point if there are negotiations," says Mr Robinson. He couldn't envisage any reason why there should be such a structure but if some reasonable argument for it were advanced by the SDLP he would listen to it at least, he indicated. It's not the language one would expect from Dr Paisley.
Mr Robinson insists however there will be no retreat on arms. But just as Mr Trimble stretched his own people on how to handle the issue of IRA weapons will the DUP eventually do the same? The party will not abandon the "holy grail" of IRA decommissioning, says Mr Robinson.
Yet, something beyond electoral tactics appears to moving at the DUP centre. All this apparent moderation could be exploded by one thunderous "No, No, No" statement from Dr Paisley. For the moment, though, Mr Robinson is keeping it steady.
The British and Irish governments could make great propaganda on the apparent DUP ambivalence to the agreement, but they have more wit than that. They know that if the DUP remains partially signed up to the agreement, in time it may become a full signatory. How or whether the DUP will be fully involved in the post-election talks is another matter, however.
Ultimately Mr Robinson would like to see a unionist realignment - without the current UUP leader, needless to say. "I think that if we can dispense with the Trimble era it will be necessary for unionism under solid leadership to start working together."
And would he like to lead and direct a realigned unionism, as he is leading and directing the DUP electoral strategy? As long as Dr Paisley wants to lead the DUP he will be content as his deputy, says Mr Robinson. "As far as my future's concerned I didn't enter politics for any personal advantage whatsoever. Who leads unionism is not the concern, where they lead unionism is the concern."