Few episodes over recent years have given rise to such anger as the Government's nomination of Mr Hugh O'Flaherty as a vice president of the European Investment Bank. At one level, the issues involved may have appeared remote from the concerns of the man or woman in the street. But at a more profound level, the Government's choice - and its subsequent intransigence - touched the deepest wellsprings of rage and resentment among the general public.
For many of those in public life who know Mr O'Flaherty on a personal level there is an added paradox. Nobody can say that he is not a likeable, courteous and modest man. And were the circumstances of his departure from the bench other than they were, few might have quarrelled with his nomination, notwithstanding his lack of experience in the world of finance or banking. It would have been far better if he had declined to allow his name to go forward in the first place. But he regains some entitlement to a degree of public esteem in now withdrawing and allowing this unseemly affair to be brought to a conclusion.
The Government's choice was inexplicable from the start. Is it possible that the judgment of the Taoiseach, the Tanaiste and the Minister for Finance were so distorted by the pressures of office that they failed to recognise the contradiction between Mr O'Flaherty's resignation under threat of impeachment and his selection as a representative of Ireland in a prestigious and lucrative European job? If it was a massive and collective failure of judgment this was a serious matter. The alternative explanation - that there is an agenda in all this which is still hidden from public knowledge - might be worse.
Politically it has been a disaster for the Government. Every backbench TD and local councillor has spent the recess endeavouring to distance themselves from the unwillingness of the Cabinet's senior troika to respond appropriately to the sentiments of moral outrage from all levels of society and in all parts of the State. Not even at this late stage was the Taoiseach, the Tanaiste or the Finance Minister willing to square up to their mistake and to withdraw Mr O'Flaherty's nomination. It was the votes of the directors of the EIB which decided the outcome.
Ireland's standing within the EU has not been enhanced. None of our European partners has a blameless record when it comes to political expediency. But the Government has tried to introduce a degree of Tammany Hall politics into an arena in which it had heretofore been absent. Perhaps at a time when our economy is so strong, senior politicians may not place the same store on how Ireland is regarded internationally. But reputation is important, even for a Tiger Economy. Mr Ahern, Ms Harney and Mr McCreevy appear to have put such considerations aside from start to finish in this matter.