Down here, in the slightly polluted oxygen we ordinary mortals tend to breathe, our concerns are more mundane. We worry about things like the fact that 29 people have been murdered violently in the past six months.

We feel it when our friends and relatives suffer a less than optimal service in our two-tier health and hospital system. We panic when it looks like child rapists will go free because our high-flying law-makers have failed to plug a well-flagged legislative gap.

We had supposed, because he was saying so little about the real legacy of Charles Haughey, that Michael McDowell was busy being justice minister, pulling out all the stops to ensure gardai were given every help to catch the gun gangs and doing a final, final redraft of his Criminal Justice Bill.

But no, when you are Michael McDowell, the man who would be PD king and perhaps future Tanaiste, much more important things are always on your mind . . . in this case, that old nagging sore that he is the rightful leader of the party he helped found.

Last time he threw a sulk this big was when he blamed Mary Harney for the loss of his Dail seat and left the party. This time, he threatened to leave because he claimed she was reneging on a "Tony Blair/Gordon Brown-style pact" to bequeath him the leadership of the PDs before next year's election.

Harney has said clearly that the leadership of the PDs, as an elected position, is not in her gift. But she was not always clear on when she intended to step down. Many in her circle were under the impression from private discussions that the leader's seat would soon be vacant.

There is no doubt Harney is very politically astute and that McDowell has proved himself several times to be the minister for misjudgment, but in this instance it appears she led him up the garden path. The damage done is enormous and the PDs' political enemies will be cock-a-hoop.

McDowell has declared his hand with a naivety born of pure arrogance. Thanks to the leaking of the story of his leadership bid, the electorate now knows that the PDs are a party riven by distrust. Lunch in the Unicorn every Thursday from now until election day next year won't change that.

People know now that if they vote for the PDs, they may not be getting Mary Harney as leader. A vote for Harney is, in reality, a vote for a party led by Michael McDowell . . .

or even Liz O'Donnell, who is emerging as another contender from the party's more liberal wing. And if O'Donnell wins a leadership fight, McDowell, who is not her greatest fan, will probably leave the party.

There is no guarantee, either, that McDowell will get his party's blessing as Harney's successor. Last week's leadership tilt was met by deafening silence from PD TDs at the meeting . They know that, with 11 months to go to an election, McDowell's rush of blood to the head may have fatally damaged the PDs. They have just 3% of the national vote.

They have only eight TDs, half of whom are in very precarious constituencies, including big names such as Tom Parlon, who could well lose his seat, even on a good day.

Voters, troubled as we are by the price of housing, the penalty points fiasco, road deaths and the failure to repay elderly people robbed of their pensions to pay for public nursing home care, do not like to be dealt an unreadable hand before making a play.

Michael McDowell wants to be leader of his party but if he is not very careful, there will be no party left to lead.