Our democracy, our economy, our country is being managed by incompetent idiots. There really is no escaping this fact any more.Not only are the masters of our destiny not that bright, they are woefully unqualified to lead us out of the sticky mess that they've gotten us into.
On what basis do I make this bold claim?
There are examples far too numerous to list, but lets take the handling of the rapidly unravelling Hangar Six debacle at Dublin Airport for some further analysis.
On February 26th 2009, shortly after SR Technics announced that they were pulling out of Dublin Airport, Michael O'Leary contacted Mary Coughlan and told her that he would provide 500 jobs if the DAA would lease or sell Hanger Six to Ryanair.
Imagine how easy your job as Tánaiste would be if people kept offering to create 500 jobs: For one thing you wouldn't have to jet off anywhere on Patrick's day under the pretence of looking for jobs.
However Ms. Coughlan, our Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, in her infinite wisdom and with the good of country always in mind, simply ignored it.
One might argue that Mary was playing a game of Russian roulette with the future of 500 families in the north Dublin region, but her supporters will probably counter that she was playing Mick O'Leary at his own game.
After all, Michael is used to having people at his beck and call, asking "how high?" when he shouts "JUMP". Let's call his bluff and see what happens...
Effective? Not so much. Whether the minister was engaging in a bold new strategy, or just criminally incompetent, it didn't work.
O'Leary, a businessman used to governments pulling out the stops when he offers them 500 jobs, was unimpressed.
So 200 of the jobs were lost to Glasgow, but O'Leary persevered, in no small part out of a desire to embarrass our government.
He again offered 300 jobs, but made it public. The man loves some cheap publicity and he is the best in the European market, if not the world, at the PR game.
However, the government refused to play ball because in the intervening period they had leased out Hangar Six to... Aer Lingus.
The Aer Lingus who is interested in creating 500 jobs in Ireland?
Or the Aer Lingus that is about to make 1,200 cabin crew redundant and will then hire back only 970 on reduced terms and conditions? Ah yes, that's the one...
So rather than leasing out the hanger to a company that wanted to create 500 jobs, they leased it out to a company that is making 230 people redundant, and reducing the wages of a further 970.
The logic in all of this? The government "can't tear up a legal agreement with one company to facilitate another".
After all, this is the party that puts business before the little people and hasn't that strategy paid dividends for us all?
Well, I'm glad they have their priorities in order.
But it still doesn't explain why they entered into the agreement in the first place, given that they already new that they could get 500 jobs in the Fingal area by renting it to Ryanair, rather than renting the space to Aer Lingus.
And as arguments go, Cowen's claim has one fatal flaw. The devil, as always, is in the detail
When Aer Lingus was privatised (and as always happens when this governments sells off state assets, think Eircom, lots of ordinary Irish punters lose money on an over-priced former state company) the government kept a 25% stake in the company.
We were told the reason for this 25% stake was 'to protect the national interest.' Sound logic so far.
Ryanair, unscrupulous corporate raiders that they are, own 29% of Aer Lingus, the single largest shareholder in the company.
To make things simple for our Taoiseach and Minister for Enterprise, I'll do the maths.
29 + 25 = 54.
So between the two of them, they have a massive controlling stake in Aer Lingus, 54%. Well over and above the amount required to pull the strings.
Aer Lingus wants Hangar Six and to cut 230 jobs. Ryanair wants Hangar Six and to create 500 jobs. Between them, Ryanair and the government can solve the problem, with no fallout.
But the government don't want to. Despite the fact that it is in-arguably "in the national interest."
W.C. Fields said that "Comedy is tragedy happening to someone else."
The rest of the world must be laughing up their sleeves at Ireland.





