Exits for Brian Cowen and Brian Lenihan

Taoiseach Brian Cowen doesn't believe he personally was in any way responsible for the devastation caused to the country by the economic policies he pursued as Minister for Finance, by the collapse of the financial system under his watch and the bank guarantee which he gave on 30 September 2008.

Yes, he is very sorry the country has been devastated, he deeply regrets this – as does everyone else in the country, many regretting it far more than he does because they are the ones bearing the pain of the devastation.

Finance Minister Brian Lenihan thinks Cowen has a lot to answer for regarding the policies Cowen pursued as Minister for Finance from 2004 to 2008. Lenihan has not quite spelled it out that way but he has stated it fairly categorically in interviews – and even in the Programme for National Recovery recently published (or did the IMF and/or the European Commission write that bit as well?).

But Lenihan thinks he has made no mistakes since he became Minister for Finance in May 2008. The bank guarantee was fine, his repeated underestimations of the cost of the bank bailout are of no consequence. His spectacular volte face on the state of the country's finances in the space of a few weeks last September is also trivial.

Cowen and Lenihan both said there was no IMF/EU bail out on the way until Patrick Honohan said there was on morning radio. They assured, not just the country, but their cabinet colleagues this was so – and probably assured themselves as well.

There have been volumes of reports about the two Brians are not getting on. All they agree on, apparently, are the denials. Lenihan is believed to have been saying that Fianna Fáil TDs been asking him to make a move for the leadership, and has been asking other Fianna Fáil TDs what they think about the idea.

I heard from one person who said that Lenihan told him he didn't know what Cowen's position was on anything, that the Taoiseach just looked at him with a blank face and said nothing when they discuss the state of the nation. I am not saying that this is so; I am merely saying that a person who I believe told me that this.

There is much talk about corruption being at the heart of the Irish meltdown. This is false. If it were a matter of personal corruption it would not be serious.

All we would need to do would be to get rid of the corrupt ones. Corruption by ministers personally is not the issue. It is the corruption of politics: that deference to the world of finance takes precedence to deference to the basic requirements of our people.

I believe neither Cowen nor Lenihan is remotely personally corrupt. Both are very able, very clever, very committed to what they are doing.

Lenihan must be the ablest communicator anywhere; an ability to put a plausible gloss on even the most implausible situation – like there was never any inconsistency in what he said about the banks and the economy.

He has an outstanding ability to absorb a brief. And, given his illness, his personal courage and persistence are, by any human measurement, extraordinary. This is an exceptional guy. The problem is he has been wrong on the economy and on the banks every step of the way – again and again – and that has done terrible damage.

Cowen is also an exceptional person, very clever and with a great capacity to absorb a brief. He is funny, with a capacity for mimicry, that also shows cleverness and capacity for observation. But I suspect the long years of drudgery on the backbenches, with little to challenge his considerable abilities, did his lifestyle no favours. Nor did that lifestyle allow him much time for contemplation on the purpose and priorities of politics.

I know both only very slightly, but I like and admire them both – not that I admire their policies or the effects of their policies. But I was pleased last week to see Cowen awake from the slumber of despondency that seemed to have engulfed him over the last few years.

He showed, in a few interviews, that there was still fight in him. He landed a few punches in the Dáil too, making the good point that the two wannabe coalition partners in the next government were hopelessly at odds on dealing with the crisis: one eschewing tax increases, the other eschewing welfare cuts.

The two Brians are on their way out but I hope for their sakes they don't go quietly into the dark night.