OPINION: Budgets, smiles, smoke and mirrors

LIFE has a way of kicking the naivety out of us and replacing it with cold, hard realism. The promises of government politicians this week will gladden many and embolden others, but I know they’re nothing more than wallpapering over a gaping hole. Everything will seem lovely for a little while, but that gaping hole will inevitably, sickeningly reappear.
Budget 2025, out yesterday, is all over the media. It’s hard to escape. One political group smiling, telling us they’re looking after us, caring for us, building us a better future – the other group looking seriously disappointed, telling us how they would have looked after us much better, cared for us much more deeply and built us all a better future if only given the opportunity.
I’m sick to the back teeth of all of it. A game of smoke and mirrors, it just gets worse and worse. The current band of politicians populating Leinster House have somehow managed to make us all feel poor while living in one of the richest countries on the planet. They have created an environment in which those of us who work are put to the pin of our collars to stay ahead of the bills, the taxes, the charges. They have created an environment where the health service is on its knees, our police service isn’t fit for purpose, our infrastructure is pathetic and we pay through the nose for everything. 
However, our politicians deserve huge credit for the wonderful way they have massaged the majority of the nation into ‘small thinking’.
They have distracted the nation by dangling before it a taoiseach in Duracell-bunny mode who drinks a pint of Guinness with the leader of the British people. Enamoured, the people forget to ask about the chronic housing shortage, which has been gathering pace for the past two decades; about overflowing Emergency Departments and months- and years-long waiting lists for basic health checks; about the chronic shortage of gardaí on our streets.
The political classes deserve huge credit for this. They are laughing themselves silly, and rightly so. The massive problems facing our nation are all wallpapered over because Simon Harris turns up at every dog fight and donkey derby in the land. He pops out from a meeting of the UN to shout about Israel, but it’s all smoke and mirrors. There’s no substance to it. He meets groups concerned about various aspects of life and poses for pictures, but once again there’s no substance to it.
However, he and his handlers deserve huge credit. They’re well aware that it takes very little to put smiles on the faces of the small thinkers. Harris has made a fantastic start to his time in the top job. He has hopped around the place, shaken hands, nodded and smiled. He has empathised with everyone and projected himself as a man of the people. He deserves huge credit because all of this has masked the fact there’s no substance to the smiles and the handshakes. 
What we want is a leader and a government who actually make this rich country a place where we all enjoy the services and the living standards we deserve. Instead, we live in a nation where the political classes rinse and repeat time after time after time. They know there are enough small thinkers to elect them again and again.
The small thinkers hear about the lack of services, the housing crisis, the disastrous health system, the lack of gardaí, the woeful infrastructure and they lament all of this, but all the local politician has to do to divert their attention is to smile at them, or shake their hand or make a speech at some community gathering where they emphasise their own ‘ordinariness’.
These politicians deserve great credit. They even have some commentators writing about whether they smiled at constituents in the local supermarket – and all the while those tasked with leading one of the richest countries in the world continue to create an environment in which we all feel poor.
The politicians know how to play the game. All they have to do is keep enough of the small thinkers with them and they can continue to live in their kingdoms of milk and honey.
Fair play to them, they have it solved.