IS IT any wonder Enda Kenny’s spending so much time in America? The Fine Gael leader visited Philadelphia and Cleveland over the weekend, his sixth visit to the US since being elected Taoiseach just 18 months ago.
For Mr Kenny, it must be like entering a parallel universe. Selling Ireland to the Americans is a chance to float above the negativity, austerity and unpopularity at home. It’s a world of relentlessly positive mood music that drowns out the grim realities of budget cuts, emigration and political strife at home.
Each speech has the same message: Ireland is open for business. Irish exports are at an all-time high. The cost of doing business is falling. There’s never been a better time to invest in Ireland.
All in all, it’s a shameless sales pitch, generally finished off with a Yeats or Heaney quote (lest the whole enterprise be regarded as too grubby).
At a function for the Mayo Society Ball, he goes as far as listing individual events taking place as part of the gathering festival next year.
“We’ll have the ‘love in the loom’ project, which invites you to weave a thread on a special ‘gathering 2013’ hand loom in the Foxford Woollen Mills,” he says. “And there will be a reunion for past pupils of the Claremorris rural home economics college . . . ”
You almost expect him to sell plane tickets from the stage.
The Taoiseach’s officials are also on-message. When Mr Kenny arrives late to a function at the prestigious Cleveland Club, the lights dim and the audience is fed an extended Discover Ireland commercial on giant video screens.
It’s an orgy of images: wind-swept beaches, gourmet cuisine, Riverdancing and thriving cities; all put to a furiously-paced traditional music soundtrack. In the meantime, leaflets of the Gathering 2013 and Tourism Ireland brochures are quietly circulated around the room.
But what’s most striking is the exceptional warmth of the welcome he receives wherever he goes. No protests here. Just glowing tributes and standing ovations for the man “leading the Celtic comeback” and posters of his cover appearance on Time magazine.
Once the functions are over, Kenny is his his element. For anything up to an hour afterwards, he’s still working the room with two-handed handshakes, bear hugs or winking theatrically.
In cities like Cleveland, which has strong Co Mayo roots, Kenny has serious pulling power. At a small morning event at the Irish cultural gardens, for instance, the city’s elite – mayor, congressmen, a former senator, chiefs of police and members of the judiciary – turn out in force.
But there’s also a reminder that the message of the trip is carefully calibrated for a US audience. What goes down well in the US, might not translate well at home.
When a cameraman tries to set up an interview with the Taoiseach for Irish TV – with a poster of his Time cover in the background – Mr Kenny’s aide tells him to get it out of the way.
Today he heads to Brussels in an attempt to persuade European leaders to ease Ireland’s bank debt burden. But another US trip can’t be all that far away.
