I am still processing yesterday. A bit of me can’t believe Brian Cowen got it so wrong and then the rest of me looks at the last two years of poor communication and appalling decisions, arrogance and lack of understanding or contact with the public and completely understands how it got to this. He was ringing round juniors offering them jobs after midnight (and some of them were refusing it seems). They weren’t standing up to him earlier in the week though were they? And after it all, after being shamed not into giving the jobs out to the new boys, Cowen still proceeded to come on the Six One News last night and give out about the way the Greens protested at what he was doing and their changing the rules of coalitions!

What happened to managing things, spinning, making sure nothing goes wrong? This is a rhetorical question of sorts, but I think we have all become so used to being spun that the lack of it (for so long) shocks me as much as the presence of it makes me cynical/angry.

The next 50 days present a challenge for all who run for public office. There will be lots of political snake oil merchants and parties who have been around for a long time who will have to convince many people that it is important to vote and also important to think about who and how they want the country to be fixed. A load of independents and protest candidates elected won’t fix this. We still have not seen a new political party despite months of 2nd republic this and new beginnings that. By next week that might be added to by neo liberal groupings or initiatives who are plotting on either side of the country.

More about the campaign and the things that have to be fixed in this country later. Because we do still have a country in ruins which for the last ten days one might have forgotten about if the government and the parliament were to be the only things that reflected the state of us.

On to some blogs on the subject to see what others are thinking.

Cian O’Flaherty is back with us on Irishelection.com (hurray!) writing about the loss of legitimacy. Junior Minister Ciaran Cuffe writes about his day. Worldbystorm is wondering too about how someone can get it so wrong. Niall O’Dowd announces the end of Europes most sucessfull political party on the Huffington Post.

On the other side of the divide Eugene feels that Cowen has been hard done by (yes I know I found someone!)