Eoghan Harris, Hot Press and a lot of stuff…

Who wrote this recently?

“One of the reasons I really enjoy the Seanad is because Leinster
House allows me to meet a fantastic range of real Irish women. Senator Geraldine
Feeney is a terribly good-looking woman. I really admire Beverly Flynn. I love her testosterone, her energy and her sense of fun. And I love the women in the Seanad,” he said.
…
“I have always liked the erotic dimension in women. People say to me, ‘Well, you would because you’re getting older and you’re not able to do it any more!’ And there’s a lot of truth in that! There is a decline of sexual function, there’s no point pretending there isn’t,” he informs as he reveals his new, younger wife gets as much out of the marriage as he does because they are “political soul mates”.

Why, it’s none other than Eoghan Harris. Recognise the intimate writ large, the name-dropping, the sense of inviolable self-confidence, the readability of it all, albeit in a car crash sort of a way.

And yet something is missing here. Something very important. Something that really shouldn’t be…

I totally believe in the de-criminalisation of drugs… fundamentally I am a libertarian. I belive that people are responsible for their own lives….

Okay, but where is the ideology? What we appear to get instead is a pro-legalisation of drugs, vaguely libertarianism, nearly but not quite liberal, almost avuncular figure. Now this too is no coincidence. It is unlikely that Harris could have made it as far as he has without carefully tailoring his message to his specific audience. Hence one doubts that the fluffy stuff about sensuality and the near-morose ponderings of a failing male sexuality in advancing age enlivened his conversations with David Trimble. Equally, it seems unlikely that during the planning of the entirely horrendous Twink sketch at the Fine Gael Ard Fhéis in the early 1990s that he sallied forth with his thoughts on the legalisation of drugs. Too rich for John Bruton’s blood. But all this, just right for Hot Press, including some slightly cringe-inducing references to the counter-culture and the excellence of the HP editor.

Niall Stokes comes out of that ’60s libertarian generation; counter culture; up yours to the establishment. Niall Stokes is still one of the most tolerant people…

Sure, there are some digs, supposedly political…

I accept that when Ahern goes, I may have a more rocky relationship with Fianna Fáil.

But putting that aside even his much vaunted loathing of the Provisionals seems nothing so much as a phase, one that started, say, around 1970 or so and continued until… well perhaps until, as he informs us, he had a recent cup of tea with Martin Ferris. Oh, to have been there when that happened, if indeed it did.
And class, well it’s a fascinating thing because even the detested Provo’s are much more ‘his’ people…

Although I hate Irish nationalism, I don’t dislike Sinn Féiners. Far from it – as human beings I tend to like them a lot more than Dublin 4 types. I come from they same political background and they tend as people to be stand-up guys and girls… and SF people from outside Dublin reflect the basic values of rural Ireland… So I would rather have a cup of coffee with Martin Ferris – and I have done – than with some of the trendy shites who sit on Government and Opposition benches…

Yeah, stuff those D4 types and their fancypants ways… which of course is why he advised FG, Robinson, etc, etc…

But reading it the impression that I gain is of a person who made hay while the sun shone during the 1970s and 1980s and onwards by managing to do something very Irish indeed. He locked into the glamour and mystique of television (albeit on the technical side) and leveraged that into a strange sort of celebrity. It might be stretching it to suggest that he was in some respects the equal and equivalent of Gay Byrne – however much he might enjoy, and revel in, that comparision, but really? Where else, could such unhinged movement from ideological pole to ideological pole be dressed up as constancy? Where else could the proposal and dismissal of political positions of almost incredible difference be seen as a badge of honour? Where else could someone who drops the word ‘dialectical’ into a conversation to describe the most banal processes be regarded as a sign of profound intellect? Only in a society going through rapid transformative change where the ‘glamour’ of television locked straight into the modernising project, such as it was, one which was at root much much less political or ideological than social.

And… my horror of what I believed could turn into a general pogrom against Protestants conditioned my attitude to any manifestation of sectarian nationalism. I was particularly perturbed by pan-nationalism, the kind of thing that John Hume and the Irish government were working for until 1998…

I tried to see the two sides and establish a political dialectic, using my own background and my new insights into Northern Protestants to put the two sides to David Trimble [as regards the ‘cold house for Catholics’ phrase which he claims’.

Okay, but in a context where one nationalism (British) was embedded in the North did he really believe in this apocalyptic prognostication, or that the Irish government up until 1998 (prop. J. Bruton 1994-7, prop. B. Ahern 1997 – now) was ‘pan-nationalist’ in any meaningful way? This isn’t political analysis. It’s certainly not history either. It’s simply self-aggrandising nonsense.

Only in a country where we had one state television service and … ah yes, that’s right, nothing else. Only in the super-heated atmosphere of a society where not so much the civil war defined Irish politics as the lack of any serious movement forward from the civil war to new political or ideological positions. Only in a state where to identify with those who identified with not so much with another cultural and political tradition, as to ignore the nationalisms at the root of that tradition and treat them as somehow not nationalist at all, could be regarded as radicalism of the most extreme form.

And there is a certain sort of naive optimism about the way in which his pronouncements down through the years were received. I’m odd I guess in that I remember all too well reading the “Necessity for Social Democracy” and thinking ‘what a crock, that places us [in the WP] to the right of Labour and Fine Gael’… but some who should have known better took it entirely seriously. Have his detractors actually read his advice to Mary Robinson. It’s not rocket science, that much is for sure…

You need distinctive, attractive European colour systems for posters and logos. Colour is critical. Think of the way Peter Mandelson used the red rose in Britain. You need a ‘feminine’ but strong colour system, preferably Italian style with a typography designed by a graphic artist with a feel for that kind of ‘soft’ political attack.

But… to be fair, in the context of Irish political campaigning this may well have seemed like a remarkable blueprint for political success.

And also in fairness a certain charisma attached itself to him. As it happened I had some dealings with him and he was, as the phrase goes, unfailingly courteous, and reasonably helpful. I never heard him lecture the masses, but IIRC Splintered Sunrise has given a good report of his abilities back in the day…
So once more, could Eoghan Harris have appeared at any time other than when the new medium of television was taking hold in Ireland? Could he have persuaded people of his ability to utilise the dark arts of media manipulation in any other period? Could he have swayed a remarkable array of politicians from all points on the political spectrum? I don’t think so.

I have strong views on the abuse of internet boards like Indymedia and politics.ie [he says when it is suggested he harbours a dislike of blogging] by political nerds who need anonymity to function (sic). I have always seen them as little wankers masturbating in a room and hiding behind the computer while they write their nasty pieces. They absolutely loathe me but I regard their attacks as a badge of honour. What I loathe more than political correctness is left wing political correctness….

It is of little wonder that he regards the new medium of the internet with such disdain, because it’s not his, is it? The glamour of television has been diluted in the more democratic but increasingly pedestrian reality of the internet. Everyone can hold forth on any subject as long as they like, and as loudly as they can get an audience. His unique selling point is lost in a world where everyone is a political pundit, advisor and newscaster.

His recent outing on TV3 with Ursula Halligan said it all. His command had deserted him as he meekly submitted to her ‘we’re recording as live’ diktat. Here was a figure strangely like the Paisley of recent times, the pugnacious streak not quite gone, but fading fast. The new generosity of spirit (note his somewhat revisionist revisionist spin on Sinn Féin) not quite there, but becoming ever more visible.

His position as regards Bertie Ahern has been revelatory – note what he said yesterday reported a couple of posts ago about how ‘anyone who looked at Berties face would see he was honest’. Oh yes. Here too the ideological has been subsumed into a miasma of emotionalism one step removed from that of our other great bard, John Waters. Bertie is great… well, greater than he was when reeling Sinn Féin into the Good Friday Agreement.

Is this how political careers end, not with a whimper, but with a hug?

In some respects the most serious aspect of this who issue is how such a deeply unideological individual managed to impress upon others the idea that he was profoundly ideological. I’m fairly sure he’d be an interesting person to discuss these and other issues, but that is not in any way to dispute the fact that he has had a negative impact on aspects of societal discourse over the years…

Still, I will never forget the following from the same interview:

Most women dress for women and look crap as a result. But if you are one of the few bright women who want to be noticed by both men and women, here are my three ‘nevers’ of fashion:

Never wear culottes or shorts no matter what the tempatation. Never wear pashminas, wraps or shawls in an attempt to hide weight – men have x-ray eyes when it comes to weight… Never pass up the chance to wear anything with a leopard skin motif – not the loud sort, but anything with a dappled effect. I think it prompts primitive genetic memories of animals moving through trees!

Senator Harris, we salute you. Irish public life would indeed be…different… yes, that’s the word… without you.*

* he tells us that being Senator is ‘a horrible job. I’m doing a term. I don’t want to do more than one term. I actually find it time-consuming and tedious’. Promises, promises…