OH DEAR, it’s getting kind of laughable now. I’m expecting any day soon to hear that Sinn Féin was responsible for Ireland getting knocked out of the Rugby World Cup, for Jack Grealish opting to play for England and for Daniel O’Donnell getting kicked out of Strictly Come Dancing.
I think I did write here before that the nearer we got to a 2016 election the more attacks on Sinn Féin there would be but it is now getting so transparent as to be ludicrous.
The latest report on paramilitary activity in the North kind of vaguely suggested that the IRA Army Council kind of controlled Sinn Féin or at least some of the people they spoke to kind of believed this.
In the Dáil the leader of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael gratefully jumped on this to claim that Sinn Féin was a political party in the Republic with an armed wing.
Gerry Adams was grilled on RTÉ radio.
Couple this with the Sunday Independent’s weekly list of columnists producing a weekly barrage of attacks on Sinn Féin and my only worry is that if the assorted media and politicians do not calm down for a while they will have run out of claims come the election.
And then maybe they will actually suggest that Sinn Féin is responsible for the rugby, Jack Grealish and Daniel O’Donnell.
After all if we are to believe that PIRA members or ex-PIRA members have been busy approaching security officials to help them compile a report and been saying that they believe that PIRA control Sinn Féin then I suggest we might be asked to believe virtually anything.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I do have doubts about Sinn Féin.
Mainly though I do not fully trust them in that I do not trust that they will stick to the policies they espouse.
The socialist TD Paul Murphy’s suggestion recently that there could be a left-wing government in Ireland if Sinn Féin could be incorporated into a coalition recognised that Sinn Féin talk certain policies but cannot necessarily be trusted on this.
Time will tell. I lean towards thinking they can be but politics is a dirty business.
What the Irish establishment and the Irish media seem mainly worried about though is that the cosy cartel of conservative parties that have ruled the Irish state since its inception are facing a challenge.
That is why these attacks on Sinn Féin are becoming relentless and repetitive. I don’t for one minute think that Enda Kenny or Micheal Martin or all of those dutiful journalists believe that Sinn Féin is a threat to the security and safety of the state.
They dress it up in that way but I don’t think they really believe it, never mind expecting us to do so.
What they do fear though is the coming election and what they do fear is the following nightmare scenario.
It is Easter 2016, the centenary of the Rising, a huge and emotional day in this country’s history. There is huge international media coverage outside the GPO in Dublin and the full trappings of a state occasion. The great and the good are gathered.
One hundred years since the events that directly gave rise to the establishment of the Irish state and eventually this 26 county Republic. It doesn’t really get much bigger than this, not for any state or any country.
And there up on the balcony are the members of the Government, the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste and all of the rest. Michael D Higgins, the President, is there.
And this is where the nightmare unfolds because, after the election, up on the balcony are not the grandees of Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael, no up there on the balcony representing the state is Gerry Adams, Martin McGuiness and an assortment of left-wing TDs.
That is the nightmare and that is what all of these relentless attacks on Sinn Féin are about.
It is that that is driving those journalists and politicians on and hang on to your hats because they are driving this so hard that it could come off the rails at any moment.
