Friday, February 13, 2009

Tea and biscuits


Sinn Fein in da house.
The Limerick Leader is like the Dail Bar this Friday, with more political leaders wandering through than a League of Nations barn dance, circa 1919.
Gerry Adams and local election candidates Maurice Quinlivan and Tom Collopy were in this morning, chewing the proverbial fat with political stone thrower and leader of men Mike Dwane.
Green Party leader John Gormley, a man who with each passing day looks more and more like Clint Eastwood running alongside the limo in In The Line of Fire, is in later on.
Oh, the democratic ecstasy of it all.
Much has been written about Sinn Fein's as-yet failed attempt to pry open the door into the political establishment of this country.
But since their pasting in the last general election, they seem to have re-focused their tactics on grass roots strategies, rooted in the uber-local.
A combination of this, and the extension of the northside boundary, means the probability of Maurice Quinlivan taking a council seat in the city this June is almost odds-on.
A lot of it is quite showy - most notably their three-man march on Henry Street with a new crime strategy a few months back - but it seems to be working.
With Fianna Fail's polling numbers at a record low, local election candidates could do worse than eye up Sinn Fein's high-visibility strategy.
Say what you like about their policies, but they know how to play the game.

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