Fine Gael and, even more so Fianna Fáil, bucked the international anti-incumbency trend in last week’s election. As always, after-the-fact explanations for the outcome are two a penny. A Europe-wide poll just published gives another dimension as to why the two bigger incumbent parties were effectively re-elected. Irish respondents to the Eurobarometer survey, taken across the continent in October, were far cheerier in almost every respect than our European cousins. When it comes to satisfaction with the general state of their country, fewer than half of those surveyed across the EU were satisfied with how things are going in their…

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