Hey Joe!

Late result just in: Vatican 2, Liberation Theologists 0. Yes, thought you might like that one. The football analogy was prompted by watching the bould Joe Little reporting on the papal election for RTE.

Despite the threat of excommunication hanging over the voting cardinals if they so much as farted in the media's general direction, the Religious Affairs Correspondent was able to tell Brian Dobson that RTE had "exclusively learned" that my man Ratso had won the day with a comfortable majority.
This put Sam in mind of his pals in the FAI who can barely even use the jax in Merrion Square without word, well, leaking out to the ravenous media hounds who roam the park across the road like a pack of demented hyenas. No one has ever been elected to a big job in Irish football without the dog in the street, or the wild dog in the park, being the first to know. Or consider the case of Paddy Mulligan, who learned via a leak why he didn't get the job of Irish manager – one of the powerbrokers let it be known that he'd declined to give him his vote because someone had once thrown a bun at him on an Irish team flight and he thought the culprit might have been Mulligan.

German Shepherd

Sadly, we didn't get that kind of tetchy detail out of the conclave in the Vatican but it's nice to know that even under the threat of excommunication the lads in the red hats will leak as readily as the boys in the green blazers.
Better still was the news that the top job had gone to Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI. Some people might be surprised to learn that Sam rates a man who has been described variously as the Catholic Church's 'enforcer', 'rottweiller' and 'Panzer Kardinal'. One disgruntled progressive even said that while it was one thing for the flock to seek a new shepherd, it was quite another for them to end up with a German Shepherd, whose bite is much worse than his bark.
And there's more. He's a man who has described other religions as 'defective'. He has actually excommunicated a Sri Lankan priest who didn't toe the party line. He has denounced homosexuality. He has set his face firmly against atheism, moral relativism, agnosticism, materialism, secularism and syncretism. Sam doesn't even know what the fuck syncretism is but, frankly, he doesn't like the sound of it either. If Joe says no, that's good enough for me.
Best of all, reports from Rome say that Ratso "is speaking Latin on every possible occasion."
I mean, what's not to like?
Lest you think that your favourite hedonist has lost the plot, fear not. The reason Sam is happy is because, at long, long last, The Pope's a Catholic.
And that means we're back to the good old days of Us and Them.

Old Crank

Some people thought John Paul was a bit of a fundamentalist, but Sam promises that you ain't seen nothing yet. The previous Pope's opposition to communism meant it wasn't possible to entirely dismiss him as a mad old crank, while his constant world touring in the teeth of failing health was at least as heroic in its own way as Keef's staggering ability to get up and do it again. Or even just Keef's staggering.
But this new guy – now here's a Pope with no socially redeeming features whatsoever, apart from the kind of twinkly-eyed smile you see on the face of a great white just before it explodes into a feeding frenzy.
With Ratso what you see is what you get - a real, proper, no bullshit, arch-Catholic - and that's good news for those of us who long ago shook off the shackles of daft superstition in favour of a clear-headed devotion to science, reason, logic, not to mention lashings of poontang, and a side-order of pills and porter for when we're feeling a bit mystical.
Though they may not immediately appreciate the fact, it's good too for those hush puppy types who for too long have felt comfortable sipping Catholic-lite - a kind of sanitised, happy-clappy, watered-down version of the real medieval deal. For them, the folk mass is about to go belly up, and a la carte is off the menu for good.
With Ratso in charge, it's time for them – as our Minister for Foreign Affairs might eloquently put it – to shit or get off the pot.
And once they're back on their feet and before they've buttoned up again, they should come all the way over to our side, where the living is easy, the sex is guilt-free and we only ever speak Latin when describing eels' new album as a magnum opus.