“Gordon won’t change,” a source said. “He’ll still lash out at the cat and accuse the furniture of spying on him. He is probably consoling himself now doing Michael Jackson impersonations or shouting abuse at random strangers. He is in many ways above politics”

Meanwhile it is thought that ousted DUP leader Peter Robinson does not believe his defeat has anything to do with him. “Although he feels betrayed by the electorate he probably believes anyone who didn’t vote for him  is mentally ill,” a psychiatrist said.

Finally, Conservative Party leader David Cameron is expected to banish the volcanic ash if he succeeds in forming a government. “I shall do it with a smile,” he is believed to have said.

Boyle, the X Factor runner up, who is thought to have a Svengali-like hold over Brown, is apparently livid that the Prime Minister spent 45 minutes behind closed doors with the Rochdale pensioner after he apologised for calling her a bigot.

“Who does she think she is? She’s not getting my job,” Boyle is thought to have said.

Meanwhile a Downing Street spokesman played down the issue. “This is a storm in a tea cup,” he said. “There are clearly enough roles in government for both Gillian and Susan after the election.”

“The sound of Nama was the deciding factor. An Taoiseach would say it over and over again,” a source said.

“It’s true,” another source confirmed. “Nationalisation did nothing for him but he couldn’t get enough of saying Nama. He even said it to President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Gordon Brown to their complete confusion. .. those were happy times.”

Saying Nama repeatedly probably kept Mr Cowen sane, a leading psychologist told The Mire. “He was under extreme pressure and deeply unpopular,” he said. “Childishly repeating the word Nama would have helped him to cope.”

Vote for The Mire as Best Humour and Best Newcomer in the 2010 Irish Blog Awards.

Then there was the shocking news that the Celtic Tiger was caused by inappropriate alcoholism.

There was good news when the HSE announced that Ryanair would take over the running of the health service. Sadly, the deal fell through as the airline didn’t like dealing with “bloody invalids”.

NAMA was delightful for the usual suspects until they found that Pat Kenny had already squatted all the good properties.

Taoiseach Brian Cowen feared a very Mirish coup until he decided to bank on a tree stump to save the economy.

A suggestion from French President Nicolas Sarkozy that getting Enda Kenny to say no to Lisbon would guarantee the referendum’s success won cross-party support.

A report by food safety experts found food and packaging was completely interchangeable although the packaging tended to be more appetising.

In September the HSE said children with swine flu should be kept in sheds. It also launched WellBeing perfume to replace traditional health care. Sadly we were allergic to WellBeing.

Former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern announced he would step down from politics to focus on Mehole, his anti-social networking site.

The Dublin bikes scheme turned out to be flawed as obese cyclists abandoned the bikes when they came to a hill. Obesity was in the news again when it was linked to appalling injuries during sex.

Sources in Taoiseach Brian Cowen’s head announced that he was not drinking nearly enough. Meanwhile, the voices in Enda Kenny’s head escaped. Finally, Brian Cowen and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown sang a duet of Man in the Mirror to the voices in Mr Brown’s head.

It was a rollercoaster year for the Greens. There was euphoria when Trevor Sargent launched waterproof Jesus sandals so organic farmers could walk on water without getting wet feet. Dismay followed when it emerged our Carbon Arseprint was entirely responsible for global warming. And there was defiance when the entire Green Party leadership was arrested for urinating in their neighbours’ compost bins.

Few were surprised when performance evaluation monitors found that 37 per cent of public servants were “probably dead”. And no one was surprised that a third of new roads go nowhere while others are completely lost.

In perhaps the most sinister development of the recession the very existence of the lesser spotted rural drinker was threatened until UNESCO intervened.

Stephen Ireland refused the FAI’s reasonable request that he change his name. A churlish John Delaney turned down the opportunity to be Sepp Blatter’s official gimp and strongly denied trying to burn down the Guinness brewery because it is French-owned.

Green TD Paul Gogarty crossed a line when he used the word “sincerity” in Dail Eireann.

The wider community said it lived in fear of bored, bitter ex-bishops while the bishops said the Murphy report was quite innocuous when read with mental reservation.

Finally, sexperts everywhere fear that quitting golf could destroy Tiger’s “game”.

It was a pig’s mickey of a year, a twisted, crooked thing. The Mire looks forward to more of the same in 2010.