The election circus will be serious business, writes

AT the circus, everybody looks like a clown. There’s great entertainment. People dressed up in colourful suits, jumping through hoops, breathing fire, walking tightropes and ending up with pie on their face. Howls of laughter break out as one falls on their face, causing an inevitable domino effect.

But as the President of the United States might be asked: are the crowds laughing with or at the performers?

Voters will enjoy the next month as the race for Aras an Uachtarain becomes more desperate and, in turn, more dirty.

In his opening pitch last week, Michael D Higgins appealed for a clean campaign which in theory would be best for the country.

However, it’s not what anybody expects because, as previous contests have shown, the presidency is not won with noble ideas.

It helps to have a nice ‘‘policy’’ platform and the ability to string some homely sentences together — but ultimately it won’t be a commitment to a youth corps or a mental health campaign that will win the day. The real challenge is to avoid the booby traps set by your competitors and the natural pitfalls that come with politics.

By that measure, Higgins should be home and hosed. And yet he’ll have a nervous few weeks, knowing that it might only take the slightest hiccup to blow him off course.

For the past seven years, he has been a protected species. The office of President is not like any other in this country. When Higgins attends events in his official capacity, the media usually afford him a level of respect that is not shown to other political figures.

Once the Taoiseach steps out in public, he is fair game for the chasing media but the President is essentially given the option of taking questions or not.

Rightly or wrongly, the highest-ranking citizen is shown deferential respect by everybody.

As a candidate, Higgins will once again be subjecting himself to the normal rules of engagement. That’s not a major problem for him, because as a former minister, he is far better equipped for dealing with ‘‘the hacks’’ than any of his competitors. At the same time, he admitted last week to becoming “tetchy” on a recent trip to New York as a result of questions about spending at Aras an Uachtarain.

No doubt, his rivals will have picked up on that trait and will seek to expose it during the presidential debates, if and when Higgins shows up.

His failure to show up at RTE Radio studios last Thursday was as much about pragmatism as it was scheduling. Officially the President said he couldn’t fit in the News At One debate between an event in DCU and meeting a British royal. In fact, RTE bent over backwards to try to facilitate his participation. They even offered to send a technician to Aras an Uachtarain so that he could take part remotely.

It seems clear that part of his plan for avoiding the pitfalls of the election is to actually avoid his challengers as much as possible.

Higgins’s absence handed Sean Gallagher an out. Clearly trying to elevate himself on to the same grade as the incumbent, the businessman refused to debate with the mere newcomers. On one level, it’s a good way of planting the idea that you’re in a headto-head battle with Higgins. But it also leaves Gallagher open to the accusation that he’s not setting out a clear platform.

Ireland was a very different place seven years ago when he received 500,000 votes. Back then, his message about the need to support business resonated with people. Now the economy is booming again so Gallagher needs a new trick.

The biggest drawback facing his campaign is that we have heard the pitch before, so it’s a bit stale. So far, the key new offering is that he is now a father. Would it be lovely to have kids roaming the Aras? Actually, yes it would but that’s not enough to explain his absence from public debate since 2011.

Then there is Gavin Duffy, who adopted a soft tone last week. He has decided to allow the madness unfold around him rather than be in the centre of the ring. Duffy’s biggest challenge is to make people like him. A narrative has developed that he has a sense of entitlement.

One wonders what advice he would give a client who arrived at his office and asked: “Everybody thinks I want to be president because I’m rich. How do I convince Mary in Roscommon that I’m normal?”

Certainly, Joan Freeman has tried to cast Duffy and Peter Casey as the Trump candidates — not because of their views but due to their financial resources.

She wants to be the people’s champion. “I live in a semi-D. I have a mortgage. I have bills that everybody else has,” she said.

The mental health campaigner seems like a nice person with a very credible record but will herself struggle to play the ‘‘common woman’’ card. In Leinster House, other politicians see the senator as aloof and almost standoffish which isn’t a great starting point for a president. Besides she has millionaire friends who can afford to offer up €120,000 loans.

The other woman, Sinn Fein’s Liadh Ni Riada, is chasing the female vote — but facing the same hazard that all of her party’s candidates do. What about the treatment of Mairia Cahill? How does she feel about what happened to Jean McConville? And so on. She’ll need better answers that her predecessors. Of course, we’ll only get to those questions if she manages to actually clarify her views on the HPV vaccine.

Back in 2016, she revealed on Cork’s 96FM that she sent “a note” to her daughter’s school to prevent her getting the jab. The MEP said she had spoken to “various medical professionals” who “weren’t exactly inspiring in terms of whether to go ahead or not”.

She now claims to be fully supportive of the vaccine but won’t reveal whether her daughter ever received it, and told RTE: “I didn’t write to their school at all. I don’t know where you are getting the information from.”

Finally, there is the wild card from Atlanta, Peter Casey. He is promising not to take a salary and has no problem taking swipes at the other five.

It’s hard to see how he breaks into the business end of this competition — but that doesn’t mean he won’t drag one or more of the other five down with him.

There’s danger up ahead for everybody on the road to Aras an Uachtarain.

With Higgins so far in front, the challengers need a game-changing moment.

And even if they realise the incumbent can’t be overtaken, there will be a battle to get their expenses reimbursed from the State.