The news is fooling with us

It was hard to tell this week if we were meant to be celebrating Halloween or April Fool’s Day. First up, there was presidential runner-up Peter Casey refusing to go quietly, and threatening instead to take over Fianna Fail, or maybe set up Fianna Fail Mk II, whilst Renua (remember them?) were practically throwing themselves at the maverick businessman with all the giddiness of groupies at a Justin Bieber gig.

As if all that wasn’t weird enough, there then came the spectacle of balaclava-clad terrorists in the UVF telling the Irish Government to tone down the “Brit bashing” over Brexit, whilst Sinn Fein’s newly-retired leader Gerry Adams was simultaneously launching a cook book, featuring the recipes that kept him going all those years when he absolutely wasn’t in the IRA.

All this, and there might still be an election to come before too long? Christmas really can’t come quickly enough to spare us from this deluge of nonsense.