Roscam’s ‘Mitch Buchannon’ video won’t save Ballyloughane

Bradley Bytes – A Political Column with Dara Bradley 

Self-obsessed city councillors, convinced that they are celebrities, are coming up with more ways to promote themselves.
Not content with licking themselves with positive social media posts about how great they are, the new craze for elected members is to dabble in a bit of presenting, by making videos of themselves sounding off on various topics of concern.
Anybody who has seen them will know that dodgy camera work, uneasy eye-contact and woeful scripts, poorly delivered are the norm on these online cameos.
The latest politician to enter the fray is newly elected City Councillor in City East, Alan Cheevers.
The Fianna Fáil man posted a video this week complaining about the poor state of the water quality at Ballyloughane Beach, where ‘no swim’ notices are regularly in place.
His heart is probably in the right place. But Cheesy Cheevers making a video of himself, standing beside the lifeguard hut in Ballyloughane, like Doughiska’s answer to Mitch Buchannan, ain’t gonna get the E.Coli out of the water – no matter how many times he waves his hands in a video, and calls for “action” to fix it.
Does he actually think the relevant Government Minister, while scrolling through his or her Facebook feed, is going to just stumble across his post and suddenly decide to invest in proper infrastructure at the popular beach? Of course not, but it’s the new politics – no substance; all about likes and shares.
Ditto with the Social Democrat’s former Great White Hope, Niall Ó Tuathail (Owen Hanley is the GWH now).
Nialler recently posted a video of himself, atop a hill in Connemara, in which he promised to do everything in his power to prevent gold and silver mining from going ahead. A noble cause; but given he’s not elected to anything, and has no special powers that we know of, the only thing he can do to try and stop it, is to officially lodge his objection through the public submissions process.
That’s what’s available to you, too, and any other Joe soap who wishes to avail of it – and yet the Galway West election candidate is the only one literally shouting from the hilltops about it. Why? Because it’s great for the likes, and giving off an air of doing something. And gullible voters will say of Cheevers and Ó Tuathail, and the rest of the video makers, that ‘he’s the only one doing anything’ when the reality is, they’re doing nothing other than filming their bar-fart musings.

Horses and Halleluiah for Hildegarde!
The number of high-profile national politicians attending the Galway Races was less noticeable than when Fianna Fáil was in power, but a few Blueshirts made the trip, including Fine Gael leader, An Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar . . . For more Bradley Bytes see this week’s Galway City Tribune