More than two years have passed since Jimmy Nugent, a humble taxi driver from Clondalkin, lead us temporarily out of the desert of recession into the dessert of prosperity. The glory of his words shone all over the land, before he was silenced. Lowlife journalists stabbed him with daggers of cynicism, and dug deep into his past. The deathblow came in the form of a scandal, when it was revealed that Jimmy didn't have a proper taxi licence plate. In the words of economist David McWilliams, "The public watched his fall with the fixated eyes of a strip club client watching a descending g-string". Shunned by fellow taxi drivers and the greater public, Jimmy fell back into obscurity, and the economic recovery that rose with him dispersed in the wind. But where is he now? The Fair Observations investigates.
It didn't take me long to track down this modern Irish legend. Mr James Carthage Nugent has lived in the vicinity of Clondalkin his entire life, making him well-known and easy to find. He comes from a family of six children and two stern parents. From a very young age, Jimmy was taught to have a low tolerance for those who "act the bollox" or "talk shite". His rapier-wit was first honed on the rough, taunt-ridden tarmac of the primary schoolyard, and it grew sharper throughout his secondary education. By the time he left school, his compelling oratory skills were beginning to get noticed throughout local public houses. Friends respected him and often sought his approval. Foes feared the devastation he could wreak on their worlds. Throughout his working years — during which he has never failed to "give a dig out" — he has been an invaluable voice for the workers' vanguard, battling "gobshite" members of management who are "so far up their own hole". He now has his own family, and resides in his beloved neighbourhood, but his patriotic voice has been heard less and less around town, as he has retreated from public life after his fall from grace.
When I visited his house, the curtains were half-closed, and Jimmy's children were hiding timidly on the landing. They eventually came downstairs and sat in the living room with their parents. Something seemed amiss, but, as it was my first time in his house, I disregarded my feelings. I admired the coziness of the place and the wonderful little vegetable patch in the back garden, before settling down with a cup of tea to talk to Jimmy. Despite the scandal, he wasn't shy with his opinions. As the conversation developed past small talk and family life, we soon found ourselves discussing the hard times we had found ourselves in again. Jimmy asserted that had he remained an influential figure, he would have pushed for economic protectionism or "looking after your own" as he put it. Initially, he thought the EU should introduce heavy tariffs against other countries, such as China, the USA, and Romania. Barry, his nine-year-old son, made his first and last contribution, when he reminded his father that Romania is an EU member state. International affairs then quickly turned to national, as he told me of his revised plan, where Ireland would isolate itself with tariffs, a tougher immigration policy, and the heightened awareness of buying Irish produce to protect our jobs. His memory lapsed a little, as he seemingly forgot how he lost his job, and he bemoaned taxi drivers who were double-jobbing, meaning they either had another job or they shared a taxi plate with another driver to reap more money (I'm not sure, and I never ask, for fear of starting a tedious, factually inaccurate, and awkward conversation about immigrants). "I've nothing against Nigerians", Jimmy told me, "but I have no tolerance for people who cheat the system. There's a way of doing things, and any decent person won't cheat other people out of a fair chance. Now it doesn't bother me if you're Chinese, Polish, Latvian..." (I tuned out of the conversation for a couple of minutes, looking at his children with their heads nervously downturned). I attempted to lighten the atmosphere, by telling him that I was a bit of a Nige-erian myself. The children looked particularly awkward as I clumsily explained the joke to their father.
I was surprised to find that his economic theory was more refined that national plan we had just talked about. His ideas had evolved further, and he had developed a protectionist policy for Dublin alone, keeping jobs and money within the county border. This had evolved further, curtailing the privilege to certain working class parts of the city, and then only as far as Clondalkin. His neighbours were only lukewarm about his later plan to put an invisible economic ring around their estate, a collective consciousness of protectionism, which prevented its members from exchanging gifts with friends and relatives outside the ring. The ingenuity of the project was that nobody outside the ring knew they were being excluded, and they never retaliated with their own defensive economic policy. Jimmy had some vague idea about how this would have been implemented on a national or international level, revolving around the idea that those in power in other countries were "as thick as our own politicians".
After some tentative sips, I left my tea, which Jimmy's wife had made me, unattended on what seemed to be a home-made coffee table. I was too engaged in conversation to consider either the poor quality of the tea or the self-crafted furniture, but when Jimmy left the room for a minute, the horrific truth dawned on me. I realised that Jimmy's economic theory had developed further, and the borders of protectionism now only extended from his back wall to his front gate. The tea, I surmised, was probably from recycled teabags. I looked again out the window to his vegetable patch; the ecological enterprise transformed into a Josef Fritzl-like tool in front of my eyes. I feared for Ann and her little brother, about their psychological and social formation, and about their hygiene.
It was raining as I was leaving. Although I probably would have walked home without an umbrella — as you do in such a frazzled state — Jimmy insisted on giving me a lift. I was surprised when he put his still-installed metre on, despite the taxi light still remaining in the rear compartment of the car. I sat nervously in the passenger chair as they announced the Confederate Cup scores on the radio; Nigeria had beaten Tahiti 6−1. A silent sixty seconds elapsed before Jimmy asked me if I knew why Tahiti had managed to score a goal. I replied with a sheepish look and feint, negative utterance. "It's because the Nigerian players were double-jobbing it." As the rain poured down, I sank deeper into my seat and weathered the storm.
It didn't take me long to track down this modern Irish legend. Mr James Carthage Nugent has lived in the vicinity of Clondalkin his entire life, making him well-known and easy to find. He comes from a family of six children and two stern parents. From a very young age, Jimmy was taught to have a low tolerance for those who "act the bollox" or "talk shite". His rapier-wit was first honed on the rough, taunt-ridden tarmac of the primary schoolyard, and it grew sharper throughout his secondary education. By the time he left school, his compelling oratory skills were beginning to get noticed throughout local public houses. Friends respected him and often sought his approval. Foes feared the devastation he could wreak on their worlds. Throughout his working years — during which he has never failed to "give a dig out" — he has been an invaluable voice for the workers' vanguard, battling "gobshite" members of management who are "so far up their own hole". He now has his own family, and resides in his beloved neighbourhood, but his patriotic voice has been heard less and less around town, as he has retreated from public life after his fall from grace.
When I visited his house, the curtains were half-closed, and Jimmy's children were hiding timidly on the landing. They eventually came downstairs and sat in the living room with their parents. Something seemed amiss, but, as it was my first time in his house, I disregarded my feelings. I admired the coziness of the place and the wonderful little vegetable patch in the back garden, before settling down with a cup of tea to talk to Jimmy. Despite the scandal, he wasn't shy with his opinions. As the conversation developed past small talk and family life, we soon found ourselves discussing the hard times we had found ourselves in again. Jimmy asserted that had he remained an influential figure, he would have pushed for economic protectionism or "looking after your own" as he put it. Initially, he thought the EU should introduce heavy tariffs against other countries, such as China, the USA, and Romania. Barry, his nine-year-old son, made his first and last contribution, when he reminded his father that Romania is an EU member state. International affairs then quickly turned to national, as he told me of his revised plan, where Ireland would isolate itself with tariffs, a tougher immigration policy, and the heightened awareness of buying Irish produce to protect our jobs. His memory lapsed a little, as he seemingly forgot how he lost his job, and he bemoaned taxi drivers who were double-jobbing, meaning they either had another job or they shared a taxi plate with another driver to reap more money (I'm not sure, and I never ask, for fear of starting a tedious, factually inaccurate, and awkward conversation about immigrants). "I've nothing against Nigerians", Jimmy told me, "but I have no tolerance for people who cheat the system. There's a way of doing things, and any decent person won't cheat other people out of a fair chance. Now it doesn't bother me if you're Chinese, Polish, Latvian..." (I tuned out of the conversation for a couple of minutes, looking at his children with their heads nervously downturned). I attempted to lighten the atmosphere, by telling him that I was a bit of a Nige-erian myself. The children looked particularly awkward as I clumsily explained the joke to their father.
I was surprised to find that his economic theory was more refined that national plan we had just talked about. His ideas had evolved further, and he had developed a protectionist policy for Dublin alone, keeping jobs and money within the county border. This had evolved further, curtailing the privilege to certain working class parts of the city, and then only as far as Clondalkin. His neighbours were only lukewarm about his later plan to put an invisible economic ring around their estate, a collective consciousness of protectionism, which prevented its members from exchanging gifts with friends and relatives outside the ring. The ingenuity of the project was that nobody outside the ring knew they were being excluded, and they never retaliated with their own defensive economic policy. Jimmy had some vague idea about how this would have been implemented on a national or international level, revolving around the idea that those in power in other countries were "as thick as our own politicians".
After some tentative sips, I left my tea, which Jimmy's wife had made me, unattended on what seemed to be a home-made coffee table. I was too engaged in conversation to consider either the poor quality of the tea or the self-crafted furniture, but when Jimmy left the room for a minute, the horrific truth dawned on me. I realised that Jimmy's economic theory had developed further, and the borders of protectionism now only extended from his back wall to his front gate. The tea, I surmised, was probably from recycled teabags. I looked again out the window to his vegetable patch; the ecological enterprise transformed into a Josef Fritzl-like tool in front of my eyes. I feared for Ann and her little brother, about their psychological and social formation, and about their hygiene.
It was raining as I was leaving. Although I probably would have walked home without an umbrella — as you do in such a frazzled state — Jimmy insisted on giving me a lift. I was surprised when he put his still-installed metre on, despite the taxi light still remaining in the rear compartment of the car. I sat nervously in the passenger chair as they announced the Confederate Cup scores on the radio; Nigeria had beaten Tahiti 6−1. A silent sixty seconds elapsed before Jimmy asked me if I knew why Tahiti had managed to score a goal. I replied with a sheepish look and feint, negative utterance. "It's because the Nigerian players were double-jobbing it." As the rain poured down, I sank deeper into my seat and weathered the storm.
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