So it went at the offices of the Green party in Cork in the past fortnight. The target of the anonymous ire was local party councillor Chris O'Leary. At a city council meeting on 27 March, he spoke out against a Fianna Fail motion calling for condemnation of the murder of detective garda Jerry McCabe. It was the third time the council had been called on to condemn the murder in recent years, the previous time being last November.

On those other occasions, O'Leary voted for the motion.

This time, though, he didn't see the point. All he saw was a cynical attempt by Fianna Fail members to use the murder as a stick to beat Sinn Fein at the last council meeting before the Easter 1916 commemorations, when the Soldiers of Destiny intend to retake the republican mantle from the Shinners. The memory of a police officer who died in the line of duty was thus used as a crude political tool, just to garner votes.

"How many times do they want us to say that the murder was wrong?" O'Leary asked last week. His stance, at a stratum of politics top-heavy with clowns, was a victory for common sense over silly rhetoric.

His refusal to cheapen Jerry McCabe's memory in the grubby pursuit of populism signalled a rare break from the herd.

The response . . . the malicious calls . . . demonstrates how ludicrous this issue has become. O'Leary twice signalled his abhorrence of the murder, but because he wouldn't play ball with politics, attempts were made to paint him as a provo. To such a depth has sunk the matter of Jerry McCabe's murder.

And it's not just Fianna Fail politicians who use the dead garda as fodder for cheap shots. On 28 February, Michael McDowell addressed the Dail on the subject of the riot in Dublin the previous Saturday.

Referring to the rioters, he said, "they insulted members of the force such as the late detective garda Jerry McCabe, who died at the hands of cowardly and sectarian terrorists as he was helping to uphold our democracy".

McDowell was dealing with a riot largely perpetrated by rampaging youths, yet he managed to invoke the horror of a murder perpetrated by the IRA. Great public relations manoeuvring, but is it appropriate that he use this man's memory for little more than scoring political points?

Are we expected to believe that Jerry McCabe, whom McDowell or most other politicians outside Limerick never knew personally, instinctively evokes an emotional response in these people nearly 10 years after he died?

Another PD, some senator by the name of Morrissey, dragged things down further last Thursday on RTE's Liveline. He managed to slip the garda's memory into a discussion about privatising healthcare and the questionable tactics of Ogra Sinn Fein in using stink bombs. It would make you wonder whether mainstream politicians are coached to name-check Jerry McCabe whenever Sinn Fein comes up for discussion. Are they that cynical about cheapening the man's legacy in pursuit of votes?

Fine Gael is as bad. Following the Late Late Show appearance by Toireasa Ferris in February, the Blueshirts on Kerry county council moved a motion of no confidence in her as mayor because she refused to condemn the murder. The object of the exercise was to embarrass Fianna Fail councillors who, because of a voting pact, were obliged to support Ferris. On such weighty matters of state, the memory of Jerry McCabe is tossed around.

The detective's murder was brutal, but not isolated. The provos killed many others, some in an even more callous manner. But that outrage on an early June morning in 1996 hit an emotional chord with the great swathes of middle Ireland like few other killings.

And politicians have been milking it ever since, using his name as a cheap political tool, dragging their trade deeper into the mire. Surely a man who died protecting the state deserves more than that.