PDs RIP
The Progressive Democrats, that mould-breaking party which stood up against clientilism, cute hoorism etc. and the tendency of government to hand over tex [sic] to the work-shy and the indolent, is no more. Let’s just exclaim a massive “AAAAAAAAA”.
As people will know I have a couple of secrets, one of which was that I once belonged to the PDs. It was at the start, the very start. Indeed I was in at the beginnings with a couple of other defectors from the soldiers of destiny. I was caugft up in the heady liberalism, the ability to say “Up Yours Charlie and your hangers-on, Dessie’ll get you yet ya hoor!” I’m not proud of it, but then again there were a lot of things I did in the mid to late ’80s of which I am now ashamed. I can blame some of it on drink but not my flirtations with the PDs who were always a party of strict Ballygowan topers. And when it came to “the other”, let’s face it I was getting enough in Fianna Fail.
But it all went sour. For me the defining moment was the first Party Conference. There I was queueing up for a coffee behind someone I recognised as an old soldier from the Spanish Civil War, only he hadn’t fought on the Republican side. Still I thought the ould bastard was attempting to make amends for his life of shame, and then I heard some of the comments coming from the speakers. There was a distinctly Thatcherite/Reaganite tinge to these and all the usual suspects were being wheeled out to blame for the state the country was in: the poor, the unemployed, students etc. Thanks but no thanks.
The PDs never repeated their success of 1987, possibly because they allowed themselves to fall into the category of being a yuppy, neo-Thatcherite, neo-Reaganite party. Many of the rank and file were decent individuals with whom I mightn’t agree. Others were just hypocrites: I recall in particular the comments made by a PD senator when he attacked Senator David Norris for criticising the original neo-Fascist nominee of Silvio Lots-a-do Berlusconi to the European Commission. This was unnecessary political opportunism of the lowest form, but no doubt the fact that he had taken on that “Queer from Trinity” earned him a few brownie-points with the local knights.
But the question is now: where do the PDs go? Ciaran Cannon might set up a detective agency like his grand-uncle Frank …. Grealish was going to the FFers anyway, but what about Fatso Harney? The prospect of her jumping ship fills all ocean-going vessels with a degree of horror. But what’s she doing in the cabinet now? Her party has disintegrated. The comments of Monkey-man Biffo were hypocritical, talking about the contributions of the PDs etc. Shit on it Brian; we all remember the evening the PDs pulled out of Albert Reynolds’ government back in the mid ’90s when you were sitting there on the front bench giving guff to Mary Harney and Des O’Malley. In classic Darwinian natural selection Brian Cowen shouldn’t be able to survive, but sadly he does.
Now the PDs never made much headway in Cavan – Oh no! The idea of being against clientilism (whatever that was) would be anathema to most people here – if they knew that anathema was. I remember how a Fianna Fail Councillor exclaimed with unrestrained glee on local election night and on local radio that he was “delighted to see that nepotism was alive and well in Cavan.” Let’s face it you can’t get a job anywhere in the county council unless you”re somebody’s son or daughter. If perchance in years to come some political science or history student should ever be inclined to do a thesis on the PDs in Cavan c. 1986 I would urge them to contact me because I feel I would be able to provide them with rare if not unique insights into the party’s membership.
