“This will be a very serious ardfheis.�

Mary Coughlan, Tanaiste, Launch of Clar for 72nd Fianna Fáil Ard Fheis, 25/2/09

The Fianna Fáil Ard Fheis begins this evening and with this mornings opinion polls combined with/resulting from the recession and of course the little difficulties about the launch of the website during the week it is going to be worth keeping an eye to events in CityWest.

It’s Brian Cowen’s first Ard Fheis and the first major party conference to be held during the deep throes of the recession.  Traditionally a  time to get candidates for local council and European Parliament elections a bit of camera time, I’ll be keeping an eye to who’s out and about and looking about or chosen for Saturday Morning Telly stardom!

Murmurs (aka spin) began earlier in the week on the content of Cowen’s speech (another state of the nation possibility!) and there are several policy launches/initiatives planned for announcement.

A number of Irish bloggers have been accredited to attend the Ard Fheis this weekend including yours truly.  I’ll be in attendance for some of the sessions on Saturday and will be micro blogging on Twitter, liveblogging with some other Irish bloggers and writing up thoughts here.  (Given my current lack of stamina I intend to watch Cowen’s speech tomorrow night at home in the company of live bloggers.)

If you are one of the 4,000 Fianna Fáil members attending the Ard Fheis and want to talk about blogging or even the state of the party/country etc. feel free to leave a message and we could meet up? Minister/TD/ Prospective County Councillor?  feel free to also get in touch and say hello!  You can also try to find me at the Ard Fheis – I’ll be the one with the netbook typing away and inhaling the scents of Soldiers of Destiny en masse.

If you want to join in the live blogging fun from home you can find us here – Registration is simple through Facebook or Twitter or MSN profile and one of the creators of the session will then sort out comments etc. to be published on the blog.

If you are at the Ard Fheis or watching at home or listening to radio coverage and want to tweet rather than live blog your thoughts you might use the tag #ffaf so they are easier to find. Your tweets can be picked up and entered into the Liveblog coverage.

I’m not sure at the moment what Fianna Fáil’s own intentions are regarding online coverage or if there will be any tweeting, youtubes or live blogging coming from party staff but if I find anything I’ll point you in it’s direction.

Finally of course if you have questions for me to try to ask or comments on anything you see/hear feel please feel free to comment!