Copy as filed, not as published. Was off for the previous two weeks (Dec 2nd and 9th)
December 16th, 2007
If you’re panicking at the realisation that it is nine days to Christmas and you’ve no presents bought, I might just be able to help you out.
Is there someone on your gift list who supports Fianna Fail, plays golf, commutes, uses a computer and wears double-cuff shirts? There is? Well, you’re in luck. Fianna Fail has launched an online shop, apparently aimed at those struggling to think of presents for hard-to-buy-for Dads and uncles.
Available from the shop are Fianna Fail golf balls (€6.50 for three), a Fianna Fail golf bag towel (€6), an “attractive and handy” Fianna Fail chrome thermos flask (€12), a Fianna Fail mouse mat, with the slogan “I’m on Bertie’s Team” in the ugliest font imaginable (€5) and sterling silver Fianna Fail cufflinks (€40). Somebody’s going to be very happy on Christmas Day.
Aside from this mini-catalogue of tat, the shop also sells replica Fianna Fail campaign posters from the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s (€10 each or two for €16). Party supporters with a sense of humour, and Lord knows they need one these days, should appreciate these. The 1951 poster, for example, is emblazoned with the slogan, “Wives! Get Your Husbands Off To Work”. Hilarious, right? Sure, life was gas before the sexual revolution.
The party apparatchik who dreamt up the idea of selling replica posters evidently decided not to sell copies of more recent campaign posters, for fear of highlighting all-too-obvious breaches of promise. Even now, little more than six months after the last election, who could look at a poster featuring a smiling Bertie beneath the slogan “Together, let’s take the next steps forward” without imagining the addendum “into a prolonged and grim recession”?
Mind you, some of those old campaign posters run the risk of leading people to believe that Fianna Fail has been making promises and forgetting to keep them for rather longer than six months. The 1954 poster, for example, reads “Young People! Fianna Fail has plans for YOU! We gave you New Houses New Schools Employment In Industry Better Conditions. Fianna Fail is going AHEAD There Will Be More Industries Much Improved Health Services More New Houses and Schools”. Much Improved Health Services? We’ve been waiting a while, haven’t we?
I have to say, the whole Soldiers of Destiny online enterprise lacks vision. This could be a multi-million euro gift business, if the party broadened out its product offering. Why, for example, doesn’t it come up with new posters to sell on the site? There would surely be a market for pastiches of iconic propaganda posters: “Loose Lips Prolong Tribunals!” “Careless Talk Makes Headlines!” “Your Country Needs You (To Buy More Houses)!”
The special e-commerce adviser in party headquarters needs to think laterally. Who could forget Bertie declaring himself a socialist? That’s surely a range of memorabilia unto itself. The iconic Che Guevara poster, redesigned to feature Bertie in a beret, would be a surefire seller. In fact, there’s almost an infinite array of possible Bertie-as-Che products. TheCHEstore.com, for example, sells Che Guevara t-shirts, tank tops, hoodies, bandannas, baseball caps, backpacks, belt buckles, clocks, key rings, lighters, necklaces, wallets and much more besides.
The gang in party headquarters on Mount St might also want to take a look at Sinn Fein’s online shop for further inspiration. The Fianna Fail gift range fairly pales in comparison with the bounteous selection of products on offer at sinnfeinbookshop.com (which accepts dollars and sterling as well as euro). The items for sale mightn’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but staunch Republicans like getting presents just as much as the next person.
Along with CDs of rebel anthems and republican flute bands, the site also sells DVDs, including Mise Eire, The Patriot Game and When Ireland Starved. Other gift ideas include: republican-themed jewellery; Unrepentant Fenian Bastard mugs; a Republican Resistance Calendar 2008, which features dreary photos of funerals, marches and the H-Blocks; a United Ireland road sign (with the figure 32 where the distance in miles or kilometres would normally be) and a 2008 An Phoblacht diary.
At the very least, Fianna Fail could come up with a few t-shirts, emblazoned with anything from the basic I Heart Fianna Fail or I Heart Willie O’Dea to slogans like “I’ve Looked Up Every Tree In North Dublin” ,”It’s All Smokes And Daggers” and “I Voted For Fianna Fail and All I Got Was This Lousy T-shirt”.
Books, too, would be a no-brainer addition to the Fianna Fail website. Think how many copies of Judging Dev and De Little Book of Bertie they could shift to adoring party fans. And a quick browse on Amazon throws up a plethora of other titles the party faithful would be only too happy to have on their bookshelves:
Getting A Pay Rise (Teach Yourself);
Cocaine Politics;
Fundraising for Dummies;
Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail;
The Allure of Toxic Leaders: Why We Follow Destructive Bosses and Corrupt Politicians – and How We Can Survive Them;
How to Lose Friends and Alienate People;
Why Everyone Hates You;
Lies (and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them);
Is It Just Me or Are All Politicians Shite?
and, of course, that classic tome, much thumbed through by TDs, county councillors and political advisers everywhere, How To Be A Sincere Phoney: A Handbook for Politicians and Bureaucrats.
Still, as First Holy Communicants, teenagers and Bertie himself will avow, there’s no gift like a cash gift. Of course, anyone can just hand over cash to their nearest and dearest, but there’s an opportunity there for Fianna Fail. The party’s online shop could allow customers to pay €50 for a cash gift. Once the credit card fee, handling charge, donation to the party and donation to the party leader were deducted, €5 would be sent, in a brown envelope naturally, to the recipient of the donor’s choice.
An accompanying gift card would explain to the beneficiary that the €5 was, in fact, a loan, which they could give back to the donor at some unspecified date in the future or which could be cleared by giving €5 at any time to a charity of the donor’s wife’s choosing. Who wouldn’t be thrilled to get such a thoughtful and generous gift this Christmas?
