ON NEW year's eve I'd never been happier to have my entire family spluttering and dripping from a nasty cold virus. It's rough seeing a 10month old through sleepless nights of congestion but it also offers the perfect excuse to gorge on the Christmas gift to beat all others . . . the West Wing DVD box set. All seven series, 154 episodes on 44 DVDs, plus bonus material, deleted scenes, mini-documentary, the lot.

So it could be my overdose of American political drama that left me agape at the way last week's big Irish political story played out.

In addition to a pretty mild poster campaign questioning the government's record on crime and health, Fine Gael's Enda Kenny promised a series of rallies in an interview with the Irish Examiner.

When Harry McGee wrote, "such mass meetings are a staple of US presidential elections" it was the first dark warning of the "Americanisation" of Irish elections.

Apparently the word 'American' is synonymous with 'dirty', so no surprises when the Irish Independent splashed "US experts hired to fight the 'dirtiest' election ever".

The Indo "revealed" that political consultant Bob Shrum has been working with Fianna Fail and pollster Stan Greenberg has been working with Fine Gael.

Within just 24 hours, the story . . . which had started out the week as Fine Gael coming out fighting and ready for battle . . . had become about USstyle "negative campaigning".

The tone of the discussion was extraordinary. On Radio 1, Tom McGurk argued that new politicians would make no difference to crime levels.

Indeed, he added, the system of liberal democracy itself was unable to cope with crime.

Change is impossible, so it's pointless to talk about it.

Any attempt to call attention to difference between political parties is "negative campaigning", and is therefore illegitimate. In fact, you might as well just call off the election right now.

It's a sad day for Ireland when its leading commentators sneer at anyone who clings to the old-fashioned idea that elections matter.

It's sad that Irish political reporters have to be reminded that it was Ireland, after all, where the mass meeting was born, before it became a staple of US presidential elections. The main boulevard of your capital city is named for the chap who invented them.

Name of O'Connell, I recall.

It's sad that we allow the subject to be changed so easily. The question should have been, are Fine Gael's accusations that crime rates rose measurably under McDowell as justice minister accurate? Instead we debate the role of US consultants and what that says about the Irish electoral process.

Let's at least put that one to bed.

The first mention of Bob Shrum working with Fianna Fail was not in Tuesday's Irish Independent but in the 17 May 2002 edition of the Washington Post under the byline of TR Reid. It was picked up a few days later in Business & Finance, the first of 19 mentions in the Irish media before last Tuesday. So Irish use of US consultants is not news. In fact, I'm told, the first use of American political hired guns may go back to Jack Lynch in 1977.

Finally, what are we to make of commentators who with one breath denounce the election of Republicans in Washington or marvel at the Democrats' win and Speaker Nancy Pelosi this week becoming the most powerful woman in the history of American politics . . . and with the next tell you that elections that actually affect your life don't matter.

Elections do matter. Why did the property market cool last quarter? An elected somebody raised the prospect of stamp duty going the way of the dodo. Why do you find it hard to get your kid into school? Who decides how much we spend on health?

Who hires gardai and firefighters? Who's going to decide whether Ireland does anything on climate change?

What can be done about rising crime?

Explaining that there is more than one way of tackling problems is not "negative campaigning". It's the motor that powers democracies.

If you ask me, the Irish political system could use a little more of that sort of actual debate, not less. If you want to call that American, that's fine by me.

I'll be digging into series four of the West Wing if anyone's looking for me.