Leo’s Washington wind farm boast is far more than a simple ‘gaffe’
DURING his time as Minister for Sport Leo Varadkar was frequently accused by his critics of having little or no interest in the sporting world. Given the Taoiseach’s well known passion for fitness those accusations were undoubtedly more than a little unfair but we now know Mr Varadkar definitely picked up one skill during his tenure in the Sport Department.
He’s now shown himself to be a master at scoring own goals. Mr Varadkar’s astonishing and remarkably ill-advised boast about interfering with the planning process to help Donald Trump marks an embarrassing new low for our image conscious Taoiseach.
Given his apparent obsession with spin and public relations it is ironic that the Taoiseach’s greatest weakness is his own tendency to run off at the mouth when he’s off on a foreign jaunt.
His cringe worthy reference to romantic comedy ‘Love Actually’ during his first visit to Downing Street as Taoiseach was awkward enough but his juvenile attempt to impress Donald Trump last week took it to another level.
Clearly excited by his surroundings in Washington Mr Varadkar went off script to brag about his questionable efforts to help the billionaire businessman maintain the view from his new golf club in Clare.
Rather than a Statesman the Taoiseach came off more like a star struck boy desperate to win the approval of the head jock in the frat house.
His choice of ‘edgy’ language – which apparently didn’t go down well with his conservative US audience – only served to heighten the embarrassment.
Considering the success of his meeting with representatives of the Choctaw Nation the previous day it’s a shame that within 24 hours the Taoiseach had regressed to doing his best Ross O’Carroll Kelly impression in a bid to win over the President of the United States.
And what did he get for opening up a can of political worms back home? A verbal pat on the head from arguably the world’s most odious politician.
Fine Gael have done their best to minimise the damage pointing out that there is no record of then Minister Varadkar contacting Clare County Council on the billionaire property mogul’s behalf.
The party spin machine’s claims are actually backed up by Clare County Council who also say they have no record of any intervention by Varadkar.
If Mr Varadkar didn’t improperly intervene in the planning process then why on earth would he claim to have done exactly that in front of an audience in Washington?
Was he so desperate to impress Mr Trump that he chose to lie about helping him fix up his golf course? If so, isn’t that even more worrying?
If the Taoiseach did interfere with the planning process to help a foreign billionaire it is deeply concerning and raises serious questions that Mr Varadkar and his party need to answer.
On this occasion he only has himself to blame.