Irish PM-in-waiting Harris faces daunting but not impossible task

“The 37-year-old is set to be voted in as Ireland's youngest ever prime minister when parliament next sits on April 9.”

Prudence dictates waiting until after April 9th to pop the champagne to be sure, to be sure.

He's too young to be Taoiseach. Likely it won't matter anyway as there will be a complete clear out come the General Election later in the year.

People are justifiably mad at this crowd - and they've long overstayed their welcome.

Most political parties simply lack talent. However they get into power, usually by being the opposition rather than the widely hated incumbents, they lack the competence to do the basic things well enough and can't resist getting their snouts in the trough. The fundamentals of 'popular-enough' government really aren't difficult, but most of these people are just not up to it. When a party fails for long enough and annoys enough people, they swop places with the opposition, reset the fail clock and count the days until they will be back in. When in power, each regime wrecks different things and damages different sectors of society. No wonder the planet is a mess.

Japan really is remarkable for the persistence of LDP control, despite having an opposition and regular elections.

Sinn Fein seem to be doing well all over the place. It will be interesting to see whether they can bag more seats than the Tories in the UK general election. After more than a decade of Tory policies, Britons feel like they have lost a war. They are more than a quarter poorer with the decline of Sterling, their councils are going bankrupt and their services are edging towards third world status. Voters are not transitioning to their new post-Brexit lower league status happily. The problems in Eire are nothing like as bad, and should have been a walk in the park to fix.