Another August. A new report. Another recall of the Dail. D'you know, if you had an air you could sing it: another season, another reason, for taking cover . . . Mr Justice Liam Hamilton's beef tribunal report was published at the end of July 1994. A month later, on September 1st, the Dail was recalled to debate the findings. Mr Justice Brian McCracken's payments-to-politicians report, the result of another tribunal, will be published on Monday. In three weeks' time, the Dail will be recalled to debate its findings.
In the debate on the beef tribunal report, Dick Spring demanded changes in the rules of the political club and wrote to the other party leaders proposing a committee of wise men (and women) to decide on reform.
As Labour strategists recall, the Progressive Democrats didn't like the idea. Fianna Fail and Fine Gael ignored it. Only Democratic Left made a favourable reply. However, some measures which had already been aired - covering ethics in government, party funding and freedom of information - began to be viewed more favourably.
The safest bet on the political response to the Dunnes tribunal is that another tribunal will be set up to answer questions raised in the course of the inquiry which were outside its terms of reference, as well as others that have been much longer in the air.
This, at least, seems to be generally accepted. But it also begs the question: how many tribunals does it take to persuade politicians that, in the end, it's up to them to make a better fist of their affairs? If they don't take the action that's needed to clean up their act, they can hardly complain of rough treatment at the hands of the media and public.
This weekend, however, the media are busy trying to anticipate the McCracken findings. As if this were a mystery story in which all that mattered was how and by whom the deed was done and how, after all, the truth came to light.
At the end of a story, no one asks: what next? They don't need to: everyone knows. In this case, it's what matters most. And the answer depends largely on what the politicians and media make of it. It depends on what questions are set for a new tribunal and how determined are the Republic's opinion leaders to set new standards in public life.
When the report of the beef tribunal was published, shamefully little was made of it. This was partly because, though a great deal of ground was covered in the report, it reached few conclusions.
It was also because the landscape had changed since the tribunal was set up and, even as it reported, political fortunes were in flux. Labour, which had pressed for the inquiry, was now in coalition with Fianna Fail, whose leaders' activities were among the items under scrutiny.
And the FF/Labour coalition was on the point of welcoming the Provisional IRA's 1994 ceasefire. By an astonishing coincidence, the ceasefire was announced within hours of the opening of the Dail debate on the report, with the coalition partners still dizzy from the gymnastics that had preceded its publication.
Sean Duignan, as government press secretary, watched events at close quarters. He was to describe with characteristic candour the attempt to make it appear that Albert Reynolds had been vindicated.
The impression was of doors locked in Labour faces while Dick Spring fumed from a distance and, inside the Taoiseach's office, Fianna Fail rummaged for the right words and stitched bits of sentences together to suit its purpose.
It didn't work: Labour was outraged and the stitching was spotted. "It was a total balls-up," Duignan writes in One Spin On The Merry-Go-Round, "and it happened because neither FF nor Labour trusted each other."
Mr Reynolds "really believed, given the way Labour were shaping, that they were fixing to put an anti-Reynolds spin on the findings. So he was obsessed with getting his `spoke' in first".
But the merry-go-round went on spinning, and a month later Mr Reynolds and friends were celebrating the ceasefire. Outsiders may find it strange, but politicians are tough and resilient and, against the odds, forever hopeful that the past will be forgotten or overlooked.
By the same token, an Duignan notes how cool and careful with each other Mr Reynolds and John Hume had become once the ceasefire had been announced. What was it, he wondered - vanity, rivalry or jealousy? None of the above, according to Bart Cronin, one of the most seasoned official spokesmen, through whose hands many governments have passed.
"Posterity," says Bart. "They're already jostling for their place in the history books."
But what of Mr Justice Hamilton's report on the longest, and for some most profitable, inquiry in the history of the State? Well, it too rated a mention in the Duignan diaries three years ago. In an entry on the triumph of the ceasefire, the diarist notes a happy coincidence: "The tribunal (Dail) debate has started. Some timing! Some stroke?"
As for the debate, it produced four powerful speeches by Dick Spring, John Bruton, Des O'Malley and Pat Rabbitte, but they were lost in the excitement which followed the ceasefire.
As Denis Coghlan of The Irish Times shrewdly observed, by the end of the debate the only certainty was that FF and Labour would continue in government even if they had to grit their teeth to do it.
They did, but not for long - as both Coghlan and Duignan forecast. The FF-Labour coalition, weakened by mutual suspicion, had lost the ability to co-operate and the will to carry on. Three months later it collapsed and was replaced by the centre-left coalition of Fine Gael, Labour and Democratic Left.
An Irish Times/MRBI Poll measured public reaction to the beef tribunal report, attitudes to politics and politicians and views on relations between politics and business.
Contrary to the Hamilton findings, 70 per cent believed there was undue closeness between the Haughey-led FF government of the late 1980s and the businessman Larry Goodman.
More than 60 per cent believed that Charles Haughey, Albert Reynolds and Larry Goodman had not been cleared of the claims made against them. Some 40 per cent believed there should be further investigations with a view to prosecution, though they didn't say who should be prosecuted. ail, they should be fired or forced to resign. Fewer than one-third thought Mr Reynolds should have claimed vindication. Mr Spring's committee was not established. The legislation on freedom of information, ethics in government and party funding was seen through the Dail by the Fine Gael-Labour-DL coalition.
FF and the PDs were sceptical about two significant reforms, on State funding of parties and the disclosure of political contributions, but claim nevertheless to be in favour of improved standards. We are about to discover how serious they are.