Mick Clifford

And that is an issue too.

No, I mean, it's a psychodrama that pops up every now and again.

And I mean, Willie O'Dea is a column, which I think probably sums up a lot of it, where he talks about it.

Despair is that it's deeper today within the party than it ever was.

Now, you're talking about a party.

that went through existential change in 2011 and went through some serious issues since then.

Now despair is deeper.

He's saying that Fine Gael, those rotters in Fine Gael are actually playing the dark arts of politics better than Fianna Fáil.

He made a comment about we need to get back to humanity.

Again suggesting presumably that the Fine Gaelers, their colleagues didn't know much about humanity.

And

The thing that struck me more than anything, we're talking about despair, we're talking about the party.

Not once did he mention the issue that is straining the social contract, particularly in a generational sense, and that is housing.

So you had this whole existential manufactured crisis within Fianna Fáil over Micheál Martin again.

And funnily enough, Willie O'Dea is the same man back in 2014, one of the early heaves against him.

He had a great quote one morning where he said...

He said, I look around the table at my colleagues and I don't see the Messiah and I look in the mirror and I don't see him either.

So I don't know what has changed since then in terms of the Messiah coming to rescue Fianna Fáil from this psychodrama.

I'm not saying there isn't a disconnect I'm just saying these so-called heaves which amount to tips against Micheál Martin they're continuous and I just wonder whether this is another one they suspect that it is even though things have changed he won't be there at the next election Derek I think Clare Scott and Jennifer Bray actually have quite a good piece analysing the week that was but you know they were saying all three perceived front runners had numbers behind them if they chose to act

I would have my suspicions.