The rookie answered questions with the agility so often displayed by his fellow countymen

There was a fierce big gaggle of photographers, TV cameras and reporters milling around the entrance to Leinster House yesterday afternoon. Nothing like the whiff of celebrity to add glamour to the humdrum business of politics.

For some weeks now, the top brass of Fine Gael have been strutting about like a pack of dogs with two mickeys, and it's not just because opinion polls suggest the party is feeling the love from the electorate. Their untrammelled glee is also down to the fact that they have wooed and won a bona fide Big Name to run for them in the European elections.

About 20 minutes after the advertised hour, Kerry TDs Jimmy Deenihan and Tom Sheahan proudly escorted their new recruit to the gate like a pair of bodyguards shepherding Britney onto a spotlit stage.

And where it counts (votes in Munster), former GAA president Sean Kelly is bigger than Britney. Bertie may have negotiated peace in the North, but right behind him in terms of impossible tasks is the dapper Kerryman, who is credited with brokering an agreement between the traditionally warring tribes of the GAA, FAI and IRFU over the use of Croke Park.

Given all the attention he faced during the brokering of that peace deal, the political rookie was unperturbed by the media mob and answered the questions with the agility so often displayed by his fellow countymen in Croker.

Asked whether as an aspiring European candidate he had read the Lisbon Treaty -- the questioned that tripped up the Taoiseach -- Sean didn't hesitate. "I've read a lot of it," he declared. "And I've read in particular Gay Mitchell's summary of it, he did an excellent summation. I took it with me on holidays if you'd believe it," he said.

All the political parties had asked him to dance, but Sean had long since firmly nailed his blue shirt to a Kerry mast; he is a cousin of Enda Kenny's wife, Fionnuala, and he also ran for Fine Gael in the local elections in 1991.

"I didn't consider any other political party, but, thankfully, the other political parties did consider me," he explained. "But it was Fine Gael always. I like what they've done."

Sean also tiptoed around the somewhat delicate question of where Colm Burke, Fine Gael's sitting MEP for the constituency, fits into the scheme of things in the event that his arrival on the ticket would split the vote. "I'm not into any splits. I'm into unity, and that's what I tried to do during my time in the GAA," he sidestepped nimbly.

Props

There was even a bit of real fancy footwork when Jimmy, Tommy and Sean posed for the snappers with sports props -- a soccer ball, a football and a rugby ball.

There was also a bit of dodging and weaving from the Government's team captain in the Dail yesterday, too, as he tried to deflect questions over the profligacy of the head honchos in FAS (aka Freebies Are Standard) thrown at him by Enda and Eamon.

Enda brandished an internet description of Cocoa Beach in Florida -- the destination of one FAS pilgrimage, where one can "try your luck aboard a casino cruise ship or take a fabulous eco-tour to get up close and personal with Florida's awesome wild life", he read.

"Does the Taoiseach consider it appropriate that a sum of $400 of Irish taxpayers' money should be spent on some person in a nail bar in west Cocoa Beach?" he demanded.

Eamon was exercised over the mega-manicure, too. He asked: "What on earth were the top brass in FAS doing looking at the US national space centre in Florida? Do we have apprentice astronauts?" And what's more, Eamon wanted to know if Brian thought some of these expenses were "excessive".

The Taoiseach unleashed a reply that would've done his predecessor proud. "I do not believe there were items of expenditure that should have been incurred. In regard to that specific issue, it is clear," he stated, as everyone scratched their heads. Was that a sort of double negative, or what?

Sigh. That's all we need, the perfect linguistic storm of Biffo-jargon meets Bertie-speak. Wasn't it only Monday night on telly when the former Taoiseach admitted his torturous answers were only a cunning ploy?

"People say they are asking you a straight question, but they are not. So what you do is pick up the bit of the question that is not straight and give them 10 minutes of that. By the time you get back to the straight bit, they're gone for their tea break," he 'fessed up on the last part of the epic on his life.

It's gonna be a long winter. Oh to be on Cocoa Beach right now.

- Lise Hand