The Mad, Mad Life Of Brian

Damien Foley of Dublin made me the unusual wager that I couldn't work the great New England horror writer, Lovecraft, into a description of Fianna Fail in America for St. Patrick's Day. (Don't ask.)

Good God, man! This was Fianna Fail! Lovecraft would pale in terror at the thought of these chancers arriving en masse. And had you forgotten that our beloved and dignified leader Brian Cowen would be there to show us all up? Do you want to pay up now?

I would have left Clown alone this week if he had only stopped his mad Stalinist quest to censor every negative thing said against him, be it from the National Spineless Broadcaster of Ireland, RTE; the writers of satire about him; or even artists who take the proverbial out of him? Nah, at this stage he doesn't deserve to get away with that.

I'll return to our dignified leader by default later.

For now, though, the early eighties have been much on my mind. It was still a time when some people - not the present writer - believed in the divine right of Holy Father Church to tell we poor misguided mortals what to think, what to wear (not condoms, that was a no- no for sure and would have almost gotten you excommunicated. Of course it still holds true if the recent babblings of Herr Pope Benedict are anything to go by); and it was a time before it had dawned on us that there seemed to be a hell of a lot more paedophile priests than there were paedophile plumbers or even paedophile carriage makers.

It was an innocent time when people actually believed that the money that went into the collection box automatically went towards the community rather than into the large pockets of some of the holy men, as with the Florida duo.

It was also the time when one of the funniest films ever made was released. Not that we got to see "Monty Python's Life of Brian" back then as it was immediately banned here. Ah, the good old days.

The opening scene was of the Three Inept Wise Men travelling miles to bestow on the baby Jesus their abundance of - let's be honest - pretty useless gifts for a new-born baby.

They accidentally turn up at the door of the Christ-child's next-door neighbour Brian, where his shrewish mother squawks at them: "Messiah? Messiah? There's no Messiah here. There's a mess all right but there's no Messiah!"

It could be modern Ireland with its own Three Wise Incompetents, the hideous triumvirate of Brian Clown (Taoiseach), Big Brain Brian Lenihan (Finance) and Typhoid Mary Harney (Health- ha!).

No doubt these three would have knocked on the wrong door as well; and yes, there's a mess here but Clown certainly is no Messiah.

We'll leave Wig Lenihan and Typhoid Mary alone this week because the man who has been adding to the gaiety of the nation is Our Beloved Leader.

He certainly represented us well on St. Patrick's Day as he stumbled around wondering what to do with his Shamrock Bowl (suggestions on a postcard please) before making a holy show of us by reading from Barack Obama's speech instead of his own as some practical joker had turned his pointy head towards the wrong autocue. Way to go, Leader! How we cringed.

What was in that bowl anyway? Not shamrock, that's for sure. Did it contain some hallucinatory lotus of the East we wondered, as our mouths fell open here when President Obama graciously told the Leader that they could well be cousins?

Had Obama fallen into a parallel universe, we wondered. After all, one was a dignified and relaxed statesman and the other was... well, the other was Brian Cowen. I searched and searched for the resemblance but couldn't see it. Can I have some of that shamrock please?

I wrote here last week that I was surprised that ex-terrorist suspects weren't landing in Ireland looking for freebies.

The piece was written before Cowen's magnanimous offer to his new pal Obama that the Irish will be crying with happiness at the thought of taking in those released from Guantanamo Bay.

That went down really well here, I don't think. I really shouldn't tempt fate, should I?

As Cowen saw it the real insult to his imagined dignity came on home ground as it emerged that two of artist Conor Casby's paintings had been smuggled into a couple of art galleries and were hung unsolicited on the wall.

They were of Cowen naked from the waist up - thank God for small mercies - and weren't the most flattering images you'll ever see. They also weren't the worst.

I particularly liked the symbolism of having him holding a toilet roll in one hand. Most apt as he has been flushing the country down the toilet since he took power after Bertie Ahern was caught with thousands of pounds that he had won gambling with nary a betting slip in sight.

I just love the whole insanity of this: guerrilla art lovers hanging unauthorised paintings in a gallery under cloak of darkness (actually in broad daylight and not even noticed for weeks) and a Taoiseach ordering a police investigation at a time when the country is overrun with crimes of rape, murder and burglaries (the latter just being the ones committed by the banks).

Did you ever hear about priorities, Brian?

As the story escalated out of hand Brian did what all great leaders do: he blamed his spin-doctor. If I believed it for a second, which I don't, it doesn't exactly inspire confidence if he can't even control his own spin-doctor, does it?

What does he need one for anyway when he's perfectly able to screw things up on his own? Police are undoubtedly on 24-hour shifts, with overtime, quite rightly laughing their heads off at this vain buffoon who one would think had better things to do with his time. If he had just laughed it off it would be long forgotten by now instead of having become an international joke.

There's a growing list of cases of censorship from the Government at this point. Some years back we had the satirical politics-grounded radio show "Scrap Saturday" forced from the airwaves by a mixture of the government and the gutless National Broadcaster.

We've had Brian Lenihan going directly to RTE's Director General in order to successfully stop top broadcaster and journalist Joe Duffy from doing a piece on the banking crisis.

We've had top cancer specialist John Crown being pulled at the last minute from the Late Late Show because it seemed he had some none too complimentary things to say about Typhoid Mary's handling of the Health issue.

Then there was the threat against the writers of the very funny satirical show, "Nob Nation" who regularly lampoon Cowan as a bumbling drunk, when they were told to behave themselves. Fair play to them as they ignored the warnings from Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels and went on to do an even more savage skit on Cowen's Patrick's Day celebrations.

(There's a story about Hitler holding a staff meeting where he declared: "What are we going to do about Ireland when we win the war? It's too small to be a country and too large to be an asylum!" Probably apocryphal but I like it all the same.)

There's more, much more; but what really rankles is that the NATIONAL BROADCASTER, for crying out loud is willing to give a grovelling apology for doing a NEWS ITEM!

Now artist Conor Casby has been questioned by detectives at Pearse Street Station over the incident. WHAT FOR? Two paintings of a fat bloke naked from the waist up? It's not as if we're talking hard-core porn here, now is it?

What are they going to charge him with anyway? It's not as if he stole from their collections - he added to them!

Solicitor Patrick Goodwin says: "I would be intrigued to see what harm this man has done under the criminal law. It brings to mind what Alexander Pope said: 'Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel?' If any criminal charges are brought I'm looking forward to defending him."

It was bad enough when we simply had a government well and truly out of control. Now we have a paranoid government that is out of control. And let me make something very clear to the Minister for Health: I don't want these dingbats in the same ward as me. I have enough troubles of my own, what with trying to write with the restraints on.

I've just space to mention that U2 have refused to say whether or not they will pay tax on this summer's Irish gigs, which totalled them €13 million in ticket sales. I guess that would be a "no" then, Bono? What a surprise.

Can things get any crazier here outside the bat cave?

If they do then I hope to see you next week.

Same bat-time! Same bat-channel!

And Foley! I want my money!

You can reach Charley at chasbrady7@eircom.net