Paschal’s long weekend

Politicians don’t get much sleep generally. The Iron Lady herself, Maggie Thatcher, boasted that she got by on as little as four hours a night at the height of her powers in the 1980s. And another of the Tory party’s great heroes from their patchy past, wartime leader, Winston Churchill, only clocked up four to five hours a night, although he famously topped this up with a little nap after a tipple of something strong every afternoon. This brings us to our very own Paschal Donohoe, the hard-working Public Expenditure Minister here in Ireland and President of the Eurogroup of Finance Ministers in Europe who doesn’t spend much time in the leaba either. Apart from the heavy work schedule his top roles in politics bring, he’s also a bit of a Renaissance Man, let’s call him the James Franco of Irish politics. Franco is almost sickening with the many strings he has to his bow. Not only is he an award-winning actor, the star of the Spider-Man flicks also writes and directs his own indie movies, he’s in a band, he writes poetry and he backs this up with a PHD in English literature from Yale University after studying creative writing at another Ivy League university, Columbia in New York city. He also has Hollywood matinee idol good looks too, as if he wasn’t blessed enough. Our own Paschal doesn’t have quite the same level of fame and fortune, but, come on, he’s only a lowly Irish politician, but he has a breadth of interests that is impressive. Not only is he well-read in economics works, good for the job, but he also devours fiction as well as non-fiction. Yes, that is the same Paschal Donohoe that you see forever reviewing books for the magazine supplements of the Irish Times and Business Post. He’s also an avid fan of the role-playing Dungeons and Dragons gaming phenomenon, as he revealed at a software company’s job launch before Christmas that he was a practising D&D wizard in his youth. And then there’s his well known love of music, and not your standard middle of the road stuff, not just a bit of Christy Moore or Dire Straits on CD, no, you’re as likely to find him at a Battle of the Bands in The Academy on Abbey Street in Dublin on a wet January Tuesday night. Oh, and did we forget movies? A glance at his ministerial desk and the bobble heads of characters from various fantasy movies like Star Wars and Harry Potter gives the game away there. All in all, you’d wonder if the fella ever sleeps. Unfortunately, it’s likely he has been getting even less sleep over the past number of nights as he’s at the centre of the political storm that’s been tagged Postergate. The scandal arose from an error he made in not declaring a political donation by way of free postering services from a businessman, Michael Stone, during the 2016 General Election campaign. This has caused him sleepless nights since it first came to light in the Phoenix magazine ten days ago. And with Pascal set for his showdown in the Dáil tomorrow afternoon (TUES), he faces another long, sleepless night tonight.

Ditch the homework

Michael D Higgins might already have been the most popular President this country had ever seen before this weekend. But it appears that he has now it wrapped up with young voters too if he ever chooses to run again - never say never never with the wily Miggledy. That’s because every kid in the country will be chanting his name in school playgrounds after he proposed banning homework on an RTE children’s news programme, news2day, last Friday. Michael D was a teacher of sorts in his past life as a lecturer in Soc ‘n’ Pol (Sociology and Politics) at UCG back in the day. This was the lovely laid-back UCG of the 1970s and 1980s and homework was definitely not a priority for Arts students at the beautiful Galway university. Most lecturers probably figured out early enough that it saved time and stress to keep the level of homework on the down low - it wouldn’t get done anyway. This columnist went through UCG and did Soc ‘n’ Pol, but I didn’t have the joy of sitting through any of Michael D’s tutorials. He was long gone on one of those infamous extended sabbaticals that teachers and lecturers get to enjoy when they become elected TDs. But we applaud his move to introduce a 1980s university attitude to homework in the 2020s.

Davos rich and famous

It’s that time of the year again, where the Taoiseach of the day really gets to mix it with the great and the good at the most prestigious networking gig in the world. And this year it's the turn of Leo Varadkar to don his own Moncler ski jacket, ironically, from the ‘Leo’ range, and join the jet set at the luxury ski resort of Davos for the annual World Economic Forum. Leo got in a bit of hot water before when he wore his posh €700 jacket to meet people on the ground during the Big Freeze of 2018. The Taoiseach flew out on Wednesday this week after taking a testy first Leaders’ Questions of the new term - he could have worn his fancy Moncler there as it was a frosty enough session with Sinn Féin boss, Mary Lou McDonald. As usual this year was a who’s who of the world’s political elite at Davos. We all know how Leo likes to mix it with the celebs too, remember his lovebombing of Kylie Minogue when she came here for a concert, he sent her a gushing fan letter urging her to visit him in Government Buildings. We don’t know where he grabbed a pint or a gluhwein with, apres all the serious business of political hob-nobbing, or who he met, but at least he would have been nice and cosy in his plush Moncler Leo that he picked up on his taxpayer salary.

We have a pic of Leo wearing a ‘Leo’ Moncler jacket here at this link to a previous story we did before if needed: https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/politics/fine-gael-leo-varadkar-12144472

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“Some people who are billionaires on paper, or appear to be billionaires, are actually ‘fur coat and no knickers.’” Leo Varadkar questions the real wealth of Ireland’s richest citizens.

ENDS