'Its ownership was a murky mystery and its demise a needless bungled tragedy," said Senator Maurice Manning. Others at the launch of Mark O'Brien's De Valera, Fianna Fβil and the Irish Press in the National Library on Tuesday expressed fears for the Irish newspaper industry today. Manning said the Press was not a paper that had come into his house when he was growing up, as his mother considered it the equivalent of Pravda, but he realised later that it was as much a way of life as a paper and it played a crucial part in defining Irish society. He felt angry when he finished the book so he could well believe the feelings of those most directly involved.
No Irish political leader before or since has had such a means of propaganda as de Valera had with the Press, said Manning. It was a noisy, partisan newspaper that never tried to be fair but respected facts. The story was one of terrible incompetence that lost the country three fine newspapers, said Manning. It was destroyed from within and he believed O'Brien's book was the most important published this year. Now might be the time to study carefully some of its lessons, he added.
A former editor, Tim Pat Coogan, spoke of the crisis in the Irish media and the penetration of the market by foreign interests, not necessarily malign. He believed the same enemy that brought down the Irish Press - hubris - now threatened others.