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. Whatever about the depth of his sporting knowledge, he has proven himself to be a master at scoring own goals. Mr Varadkar’s remarkably ill-advised boast about interfering with the planning process to assist 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 maintain the view from his new golf club in Clare.
Rather than acting like a statesman, the Taoiseach came off more like a star-struck freshman desperate to win the approval of the head jock in the fraternity house.
His choice of edgy language – the phrase ‘piss-take’ 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 US President.
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 and the party and Mr Varadkar have now clarified that it was actually the tourism body Fáilte Ireland and not Clare County Council that he had contacted on Mr Trump’s behalf.
Despite the clarification, the episode still raises many issues. It has now been claimed that Mr Varadkar’s involvement with Doonbeg was so minor that he forgot the exact details.
If so, isn’t it odd that the whole sorry episode stuck in his mind to such an extent that he chose to bring it up again, four years later, to impress his powerful host?
Reading the Taoiseach’s remarks one gets the feeling that it’s a story he has reeled off on many occasions while entertaining.
We should also ask why did he choose to involve Clare County Council at all, considering he didn’t actually contact them?
Could it be that our Taoiseach felt Mr Trump might not be aware of Fáilte Ireland and so decided to erase the tourism body from his tall tale and replace them with a local authority that President Trump would definitely be familiar with?
Was he so desperate to impress Mr Trump that he chose to embellish his story about helping the property mogul fix up his golf course? If so, isn’t that even more worrying?
To quote President Trump, it’s all a little, well, sad.