Not long now. Probably. As the interminable countdown to Election 2016 continues, one thing we know for sure is that we will shortly be inundated with launches, writes RTÉ Prime Time's David McCullagh.
Campaign launches. Manifesto launches. Policy launches. Candidate launches. Bits of the manifesto that didn’t get enough publicity first time around launches. And so it goes.
The untimely death of PJ Mara saw much discussion of his career, including his famous – or infamous – opening line at the launch of the Fianna Fáil election campaign in 2002.
"OK folks, it’s showtime!" he announced to the assembled hacks in the Shelbourne Hotel Ballroom in Dublin. To some, the remark was an indication of the vacuous, content-free election campaign that was about to begin.
To others, it was a simple acknowledgement of a salient fact that escapes most politicians and journalists – the public, most of the time, are not engaged by their doings; an election campaign is the time when people do become engaged.
So, if you’re a politician or a spin doctor wanting to showcase your wares, you’d better make damn sure you show them off in their best lights.
That Fianna Fáil launch certainly did that – my memory is of a huge room, a mass of media, a slick presentation. In short, a masterclass.
Coincidentally, the very next day Fine Gael gave a masterclass of its own. Only in its case, it was how not to launch a campaign.
Rather than the ballroom, Fine Gael was upstairs in the Shelbourne, in two adjoining rooms with folding doors between them, which were opened to make one large space.
The problem was that the top table was in one room, all the camera crews set up at the folding doors, and the media were in the other room, where they couldn’t see the politicians. Which was some kind of a metaphor, I think.
To add to Fine Gael’s problems, the then deputy leader Jim Mitchell and former deputy leader Nora Owen happily posed for a photograph together.
No problem, you might think. Except that both were, for unrelated reasons, using crutches at the time. "Do a swordfight with your crutches!" shouted an enterprising snapper. To everyone’s surprise, they did.
The colour drained from the faces of the Fine Gael handlers as they watched, clearly imagining the result on the next day’s front pages, which would not radiate the required image of a party that was fighting fit.
To cap it all off, party leader Michael Noonan (remember him? Wonder what became of him...) was to set off from the Shelbourne on his Battlebus, ready to take his campaign to the people of Ireland.
Only problem was, no-one had thought of reserving a space for the bus outside the hotel. With the result that it had to circle Stephen’s Green several times before it could stop, as the party leader fumed and the media sniggered.
Of course, such events, aimed at the media, do not deal with the fundamentals of the real battle of ideas; but they set a tone for a campaign. We will await those launches with baited breath.
By Prime Time's David McCullagh
