Some random thoughts on the week in politics. As Fine Gael was politely tearing itself apart on Wednesday, I found myself leafing through my old copy of Macbeth, for the first time since the Leaving Cert. In case you're not familiar with the play, it's essentially about a leadership challenge in 11th-century Scotland. As the action opens, King Duncan has occupied the throne for several years, but Scotland has been faring badly in the polls. Everybody agrees Duncan is a decent man, with great personal integrity. But he has a problem getting his message across, especially to the Norwegians, who keep invading. There were no market researchers in 11th-century Scotland, so they had to make do with professionally-qualified witches, or "weird sisters", as Shakespeare called them. These would mix various body fluids and animal entrails in a cauldron and, after drinking the brew, make predictions about the political and social issues of the day. Some critics would say modern polling techniques are not entirely dissimilar, and a clear majority of me would have to agree.
Anyway, in the play, Macbeth, a charismatic frontbencher in Duncan's cabinet, meets the weird sisters on a blasted heath (sorry about the language, but that's what it says). They inform him that, according to the latest entrails, he looks set to be the next King. But there is an element of equivocation in their predictions; or, put another way, a margin of error of plus or minus three or four per cent.
This sets the scene for what follows. On the basis of this one poll, Macbeth throws his hat into the leadership ring, by the traditional 11th-century Scottish method of murdering Duncan in his bed. Then things turn ugly. Lady Macbeth loses her head, metaphorically. Macbeth loses his, literally (and thus emerges from the whole episode, like Fine Gael, deeply divided). A compromise candidate from the Duncan camp goes on to win the leadership and the two sides are reunited; or at least the curtains are, because the play ends at this point. Meanwhile, the weird sisters insist that the figures were right all along, it was just a question of how you interpreted them.
Is there a message in all of this for Fine Gael? I'd be very surprised if there was, frankly.
Nothing highlighted the divisions in the party this week like the case of Jim and Gay Mitchell. Traditionally, it takes a civil war to divide brother against brother. Yet the sight of the Mitchell boys, politely but irrevocably opposed to each other in that impeccably civilised Fine Gael way was, if anything, more poignant. I think we all felt their pain.
Fraternal tensions among politicians may be yet another symptom of the stresses Ireland's economic boom is placing on family life. Only recently, the Taoiseach's brother, Noel, raised eyebrows when he admitted he didn't always know what Bertie was thinking. Even those who believe that the Fianna Fail leader is so cute he doesn't always know what he's thinking himself were surprised to hear his promise that there would be no election this year doubted so publicly by a family member. Maybe we shouldn't worry too much about this. After all, there is the example of the Bruton brothers, who were firmly on the same side in Wednesday's vote. And there's the further example of Mary Banotti, who also supported the incumbent. She and Nora Owen - Bruton's deputy - are, of course, sisters. Although, I hasten to add, not in any way weird.
LAST week, writing about Peter Mandelson's complaints over his mistreatment by the media, I made a light-hearted comparison between press coverage of politics and fox-hunting. My point was that while it might be considered cruel at times, the media's pursuit of politicians was a long-established cultural tradition for a small but nonetheless important group of people. It also acted as a way of keeping politicians' numbers down; although, as I said, this didn't appear to be very effective on the island of Ireland, where the professional public representative population has been multiplying in certain areas, most notably Belfast. Above all, I pointed out that it was a two-sided game, in which the politicians always had a sporting chance. And this was dramatically illustrated last Tuesday night when journalists, already stretched by the Liam Lawlor debate and the Fine Gael crisis, also had to deal with the sudden publication by the Department of Rat-like Cunning of a report delivering large pay-rises to politicians.
So, instead of hunting politicians, in accordance with tradition, we journalists were ourselves hunted - as we were forced to cover three major stories in a couple of hours, with the warm, blood-scented breath of deadlines, not to mention the sharp-toothed newsdesks, bearing down on us. We escaped in the end, but the stress of the experience has probably done permanent damage.
That's why this week, in a spirit of sportsmanship, I want to congratulate the politicians on that victory. I also want to wish them well with their pay rises, which in most cases were thoroughly deserved. And above all, I want to say, in what I hope is the same light-hearted vein as last week: let's kill them all now.
Frank McNally can be contacted at fmcnally@irish-times.ie
