Batt O'Keeffe

Batt O’Keeffe is a political enigma, kind of like Otto Von Bismarck. Except Batt hasn’t managed to piss off France for 20 years. Yet. Batt was made Minister for Education by Cowen a little while ago and like every single one of his education predecessors he has managed to get Kidare Street clogged up by slightly angry teachers on a weekday.

The reason Batt is a political enigma is because he hasn’t been all that honest with the Cork or Irish electorate. And more importantly the American electorate. What a shit load of people don’t know is that Mr.O’Keeffe was Ralph Nader’s running mate in the recent US presidential election. And that Batt O’Keeffe isn’t actually his real name. Matt Alves Olivera Gonzalez’ exploits in the land of the free can be found at www.votenader.org. Long story short - they lost - by a lot.

I managed to get an interview last week with Batt’s assistant Jose Huerro Maria Batistuta and questioned him about the double identity of Senor Gonzalez. “Yeah its all fucking true - we got lazy with the first name and just changed the first letter but we decided to go apeshit with the surname. The people of Cork haven't got a bleedin' clue that his real name is Matt Alves Olivera Gonzalez. Matt is also half Guatemalan–half Irish. Him and Ralphie were pretty happy with the twenty-four national votes they picked up on November 4th, especially the sixteen they got in Wisconsin". However, Batistuta did admit that two of the eight votes in West Virginia where from J1 students with forged election ballots that Batt had met on holidays last year.

Which would explain the picture above. Its himself on the US presidential campaign trail. Batt, not known for his geographical prowess, had apparently wandered across the 49th parallel and into Canada (he thought the thing behind him was the state flag of Vermont). According to press reports he gave a speech to the local Inuit population of Canuck province New Brunswick on the merits of ice. Batt promised New Brunswick that if elected VP he would “Give Vermont Ice”.

I moved on to question Batistuta about the ethics of his boss, the blatant lying to the people of Cork and if there are any more secrets that have been kept under wraps for the past two decades.

Batistuta: “Actually there are a lot of thing we have had to keep secret from the electorate but I wouldn’t like to go into them. All I can give you is one word: gerbiling. Also, lets be honest here, those yokes in Cork North West would not have voted for a man who spends his weekends re-enacting ancient Mayan bridal ceremonies in Fermoy".

The shit doesn’t stop there. While running with Nader Batt/Matt did some work for the Financial Regulator on their new advertising campaign. The regulators budget was 300k, but Batt was supposedly like ‘fuck this’ – so he offered 350k. Done deal.

“See most people don’t know that Matt has a PhD in ‘Subliminal Psychology’ from the Universidad del Valle de Guatemala”, noted Batistuta during the interview. “Matt knew this banking bail-out was coming,he could feel it ‘in his balls’ – as he told me. So he sorted the Financial Regulator out with their 'itsyourmoney' campaign.Making people believe that its ok to guarantee their money and savings with their own tax money – its sweet. And all we had to do was get two knobends on TV to fuck around with a touch screen monitor and look really happy at the end of the ad. Its worked a treat and not a murmur from Joe Sap Public. Why? Seven words...Matt Alves Olivera Gonzalez and his genius”.

Batt has retained his Secret Service presidential nominee detachment in Cork North West. Basically two blokes in a camper van outside his pad 24-7. There have been rumours that the paramilitary leftist wing of the INTO has reformed.

To finish off, it is largely thought that Batt made this happen.