Sssssh. Listen. Can you hear the patter of hundreds of tiny trotters as the piglets sprint away from the massive swill trough before the bold pig spills it over. Off they run lest they be splashed with any of the muck-spreading that has been caused by the bould pig Ivor. They’ve all known for a long time that the bould pig Ivor had been lashing up the swill with all four trotters, but sure, they let him carry on because they just didn’t want the farmer to come over and see what was going on at the trough. ‘Cos then he might look at them all, and see the muck on the trotters from the fumbling in the greasy swill.
Ya see, when your head is stuck deep into the swill at the trough, it’s important that you don’t splash about or burp or gobble too loudly ‘os then what you do (to quote the great B Ahern, Dublin ) is to upset the apple tart and ruin it for everything.
For the past 48 hours, we’ve had all sorts of politicians coming out to condemn Ivor, the man with the four phones, the two houses, the several jobs. It’s hard to keep all that going, ya know. You should try it sometime, (to quote the great Pee Flynn, Mayo ). It’s hard to keep your mind straight when the four phones are ringing and you know it’s that buff Cowen on the end of one, but you couldn’t be arsed answering it, cos you wouldn’t be able to make out what he’d be saying anyway and ya know in your heart of hearts that all he’d be asking ya in that Midlands accent of his would be, “What are ya fecking playing at Ivor”, why did ya do it, Ivor, and where did ya get that shagging silly name Ivor? Is it compulsory for Dublin politicians to have crazy names like Royston and Shatter and Mary.”
So all Ivor has to do is ride it out and let the four phones ring, and let Charlie Bird sit in the garden ‘til he gets bored.
I have to laugh when I hear politicians saying (with a straight face ) that what Ivor has done is (this great line ) “damaging to the body politic” when we all know that what he has been doing is what most of them have been doing, except that Ivor committed the cardinal sin of being caught. Fair play to Ivor for getting away with it for so long. He turned out to be the dog with the bone in Aesop’s Fable who, when he saw his reflection in the water, went for the other bone and dropped the one he had. Here in Ireland, we didn’t have Aesop, so over here the act is known as “tearing the arse out of it,” and so the bould pig Ivor will have to pay the price. And sure whatever the price is, he will have four different receipts for it.
The humorous part, though, is the bleating from the other politicians who are glad that Ivor’s greed has taken the heat off them. They are afraid, too, that Ivorgate will make even more ridiculous the case for maintaining the Seanad — the great last bastion of failed politicians whose uselessness is bolstered by take-home pay of more than twice the average income of decent hardworking people. And here in the midst of silly season, as the Freedom of Information requests mature and come through the mailboxes of national newspapers, it is open season on politicians, and especially on all those who claim massive amounts, who do an Ivor on it, but who feel in some misguided way that they are worth a hundred thousand euro a year. And so the gravy train rumbles on, with Ivor to be thrown off somewhere in the political equivalent of Woodlawn.
