Madam, - Your political editor, Mark Brennock, poses some interesting questions about the present PD/Fianna Fáil government and those who inhabit it (Opinion, April 5th). His piece was prompted by John McGuinness's whingeing about the influence of the former on the latter and was written, or so it seemed, with tongue planted firmly in cheek.
One would be hard put to slip a cigarette paper between the political ideologies of the PDs and the people presently running Fianna Fáil. Their collective project of forcing the State in a radical, rightward direction has been enthusiastically executed. They have succeeded in doing so under the cloak of the Celtic Tiger boom, the fruits of which they have squandered along the way.
My own belief is that the passage of time and the judgment of history will reveal them for the extreme right charlatans they are. One can only hope that the damage they do in the meantime is reversible.
To answer Mr Brennock's last question regarding Bertie Ahern: it seems abundantly clear that our glorious Taoiseach is characterised by a gaping central vacuity. There is no core, only the raw desire for power which he learned from his mentor, Charles Haughey. To be in power is the end in itself. Market fetishists such as McCreevy, Harney and McDowell can get on with their project as long as Teflon Bertie remains unstained.
It is often said that we get the politicians we deserve. I don't know what we did to deserve this lot but it must have been something pretty awful. I cringe at the prospect of four more years of them vandalising the country with their neo-conservative zeal. - Yours, etc.,
JOE O'CARROLL,
Inchicore Road,
Dublin 8.