WHEN Fianna Fail backbenchers gave Brian Lenihan's Budget speech a standing ovation in the Dail on Tuesday, I turned to the person sitting beside me and said: "Wait until these guys hit their constituencies. They'll change their tune then."

My timing was hopeless. The backbenchers changed their tune before the day was out.

But a bigger change had already occurred. The Fianna Fail party had changed, perhaps for ever. Joe Behan's resignation was a sensation, and within half an hour of the announcement the Government was fighting what looks like an outright backbench revolt.

In addition, three of the Independent deputies on whose support the Taoiseach relies, were openly expressing their disgruntlement and speculation had begun on the position of the parties in the Coalition.

The Greens wanted the medical card measure scrapped or amended, but how could the remaining Progressive Democrat, Health Minister Mary Harney, agree to that without ending her political career in a less than glorious manner?

Fianna Fail is the party that prides itself on having its finger on every pulse; that never fails to calculate electoral gains and losses; that always knows what Middle Ireland wants and has an abundance of excuses and pretences to hand when it fails to provide it. On Tuesday it showed that it had lost its touch.

Free medical treatment is one of the greatest boons enjoyed by the elderly Irish. Never mind that the decision to lash the cards out to everyone bore all the marks of a classic Ahern-McCreevy stunt.

The fact remains that for several years everybody has had one, regardless of income -- but also without having to worry about means tests, form-filling or petty regulations that can give a person one benefit but not another.

It is impossible to exaggerate the psychological effect. For generations, fear of combined old age and ill-health had plagued Middle Ireland. It was one of the worst anxieties; for many, the greatest anxiety of all.

Universally free medical cards had lifted that anxiety off their shoulders. Now it is back.

In the sense of failing to understand people's thought processes, could the Government do anything worse? Yes, it could, and on Thursday it did.

The slight adjustment of the move was pitiful. It did not placate the backbenchers or the hordes of furious callers to their constituency offices. And it followed two other signs of panic, which showed -- as if we needed showing -- how far the party has drifted out of touch.

One was the new Fianna Fail banner hoisted by Mary Coughlan: 'No medical cards for property tycoons'! The other was the attempt to shift the blame to the Fine Gael frontbencher Dr James Reilly.

In his former life as president of the Irish Medical Organisation, Reilly had negotiated the doctors' fees for treating holders of the over-70s cards.

He did the job so well that the exchequer has to pay nearly four times as much for property tycoons, who presumably don't need them, as for those who do need them (we'll say nothing for the moment about those who do need them but don't have them).

When a government announces a scheme that requires the co-operation of a powerful organisation, how can it be surprised when that organisation holds out for the highest price?

But in any case, the punters have no interest in raking over these old embers. They are interested in the here and now. And that boils down to two things: they want to hear that at some foreseeable time their circumstances and those of their families will improve, and they want to know that someone is in charge.

As to the first, nobody can credibly foretell an economic upturn. As to the second -- another point always in the forefront of Middle Ireland's mind -- the evidence is scanty.

Brian Cowen's authority in his party and the country took a dive with the loss of the Lisbon referendum. He cannot recover it fully until he wins the next one. In the meantime, he is trying to stagger on without an inner cabinet. Power resides, if at all, on an axis composed of the Taoiseach and Brian Lenihan. The ministers for industry (let's call these departments what they are and not by fancy titles) and education are clearly not in the loop, and the foreign minister's situation is highly anomalous.

Two questions dominate our foreign policy, the financial crisis and Lisbon. So overwhelming are their importance that the Taoiseach must devote most of his own time and intellectual energy to them, overshadowing the role of the foreign minister.

Both of them have to operate against a backdrop of the sour mood at home and Fianna Fail's ineradicable reluctance to admit that things are worse than they look and could become still worse.

Any pretence that our European partners are symp-athetic or willing to tolerate delay in finding a solution is nonsense.

Among the chattering classes, the view is that the Government will win the second Lisbon referendum with ease. A second 'No' vote would condemn us to exclusion and penury.

You may have heard the joke that has circulated in the City of London. Alex Salmond, the Scots Nationalist leader, said a while ago that an independent Scotland could form "an arc of prosperity" with Ireland and Iceland. The wags have changed that to "an arc of insolvency".

Cowen for his part asks the question, where would we be without our membership of the common European currency?

A good question, and the answer he implies is the correct one: bankrupt, like Iceland. He is right, and I would like to hear more straight talking of this kind. But is his party, and Middle Ireland, ready for it? Is he ready for it himself?

The shape of the Budget, and its aftermath, lead me towards a dismaying answer.

On Tuesday morning, Middle Ireland was ahead of him. It expected hardship. It got it. What it did not get was coherence. The Budget was composed of bits and pieces, without an overall design.

It left the economy in no better shape, and it left the Government in even worse shape. And it turned out that the backbenchers, for all their foolish momentary enthusiasm and subsequent panic, were wiser than their leaders. Who would have thought it?

jdowney@independent.ie

- James Downey