Enda – You can run but you can’t hide

» John Hedges

An Phoblacht Editor

'Taoiseach too chicken to face Browne' – Terry McGeehan, Irish Daily Star

BREAKING: No sooner had we posted this than Enda Kenny admits it's not about Vincent, Ursula or TV3 – he doesn't want to argue his case against Gerry Adams!

THERE’S NO HIDING PLACE for Enda Kenny now that Vincent Browne is offering to stand aside in favour of Ursula Halligan as chief inquisitor in Gerry Adams’s challenge to the Taoiseach for a head-to-head TV3 debate on the EU Austerity Treaty.

Enda is still miffed over a 2010 jibe by Browne that he should go into a dark room with a gun and a bottle of whiskey even though Vinnie has since said sorry.

Terry McGeehan over at the Irish Daily Star cried ‘fowl’ over Enda’s less-than-leader-like runaway reaction.

“Hen-da Hen-ny should get off his high horse,” crows the headline on Big Mac’s piece with the strapline, “Taoiseach too chicken to face Browne.”

Enda has billed this treaty campaign as more important than a general election because of its long-term ramifications. So, the Star man says, the Taoiseach cannot afford to indulge himself and let personal spats and his vanity get in the way.

“Who does this prima donna think he is?

“We now have a no-show Taoiseach forcing us to vote on a no-go fiscal treaty. It’s getting more like Father fecking Ted every day.”

Lost leader

PITIFULLY trying to make himself relevant, Mícheál Martin, leader of the Fianna Fáil rump, pleads from the sidelines that Gerry should debate with him instead but gives grist to the Sinn Féin mill by bleating:

“Sinn Féin has accused the Taoiseach of ‘running scared’ from a head to head debate.  They have said that the Fine Gael leader has a duty and a responsibility to ‘step up to the mark’ and debate the contents of this treaty. [Fianna Fáil] agree. The same rules must apply to Gerry Adams and to the leaders of all political parties involved in the campaign.”

(But not deputy leaders, of course, just in case Eamon Ó Cuiv gets all excited.)