DRAPIER: What a most curious week we have just had. It started with the publication of the Ansbacher report, ended with Bertie Ahern's direct intervention in the FAI/Sky fiasco, with occasional detours to the Nice Referendum, attacks on the President and the 12th of July. And they call this the silly season?
Enough has been written about the Ansbacher Report and Drapier has little more to contribute to the sum total of man's understanding of this scandal.
As Mary Harney pointed out, it would be naive to believe that this was the only such scheme operating, although given that it attracted the patronage of no less a figure than Charlie Haughey it is hard to believe that it was not the premium one. Charlie knew a good scheme when he saw one: ask any writer or artist.
As is usual nowadays, the only surprising thing about the Ansbacher Report was the total lack of surprise. There were no new names, no shocking revelations. The nation was not rocked to its core or shaken to its foundations. All that was laid bare was the blatant venality of some of our merchant princes.
The siren voices demanding greater regulation and stricter controls will have to be heeded, but Drapier would caution against the presumption that every self-employed trader or business person is up to something hookey and must be watched like a hawk. This point seemed to be lost in Thursday's debate as the voices of outrage competed in ever-spiralling outpourings of indignation and righteous anger.
When it comes to indignation and righteous anger, no one does it better, or to less effect, than Ruairí Quinn. With two outbursts this week, Ruairí showed that Mr Angry of Sandymount has not gone away.
His latter one, accusing the Government of being reluctant to act on the FAI/Sky deal because it is indebted to Rupert Murdoch for its election, was good old political fare and a classic Quinnism. The fact that this is an accusation made against many of Ruairí's Labour leading colleagues in other jurisdictions seemed somewhat lost on Ireland's keeper of the socialist flame. It was a good political punchline and Ruairí was determined to use it.
The problem for Ruairí was that the political point it was designed to punch home had been disproved in less than 24 hours when Bertie Ahern called in the FAI bosses to tell them what Attorney General Rory Brady had been working on behind the scenes since the news of the deal broke.
As John O'Donoghue pointed out, very few issues in recent years have generated as much public passion and furore as the FAI/Sky deal. Ruairí may have an eye for the eye for the good one-liner, but Bertie has an eye for the public mood and like Robert Frost's less travelled road, "that has made all the difference".
Ruairí's other pronouncement followed the President, Mrs McAleese's comments in Greece. Drapier is still at a loss to know what point exactly Ruairí was making, but it was measured in comparison with the Greens.
Drapier will admit to visibly cringing upon hearing that John Gormley had told the President to "butt out". Is this how we can expect public figures to talk about our head of State in future? Has the vocabulary of political discourse in the country become this sparse?
The President did nothing wrong and anyone who has ever read the Constitution knows it. She did not attempt to influence how we will vote; she merely answered the question put to her. Does the No campaign not agree with her reply that the Nice referendum is an important and pivotal issue? If not, then why all the sound and fury?
THE leaders of the No campaign who once claimed that the big political machines were trying to silence their voice now seek to muzzle everyone else's. Does Drapier detect some of Sinn Féin's more robust tactics rubbing off on others in the No camp? Why do they object to the IDA boss and others adding their voices to the Nice debate?
It is still early days, but Drapier suspects that the No camp's jitteriness and sensitivity is because they, like Drapier, are sensing a small shift in momentum towards the Yes campaign.
Mario Cuomo's observation that you campaign in poetry but govern in prose is being daily proven correct. Drapier suspects that Charlie McCreevy is more comfortable with prose than with poetry. He has been busy over the past few weeks pruning the public spending plans of his colleagues.
The cancellation of helicopter purchases and a myriad of other restrictions are clear demonstrations that he is determined to bring in his predicted Budget surplus, despite the prognostications of George Lee and those other practitioners of the dismal science.
Charlie's long-term reputation as the most successful Minister for Finance since the foundation of the State is already secure, but he is not prepared to allow any oversights to damage it in the short term.
Drapier knows that Charlie has the resoluteness for the tough job ahead, but he should not lose sight of the needs of his Cabinet colleagues.
There is a public perception that we pay too much for inadequate services. This must be addressed. We still have a 21st-century economy running on barely late 20th-century infrastructures.
Looking North, Drapier is relieved to see how each year the tensions accompanying the marching season seem to ease slightly. But we should not let this mask the insidious sectarianism that is creeping across the North.
The antics of extremists on both sides may not make the headlines as much as they used to, but they are still at work. The attacks on Catholic recruits to the PSNI and Sinn Féin's less than full-throated condemnation of them does nothing for the cause of normalisation.
With only nine months left before the Assembly elections, Drapier does not expect to see any major improvements there but the process continues relentlessly and that is probably as much as we can dare to hope for. Maybe the silly season will start next week.