For Northern Ireland folk, the main interest in the Irish general election was the performance of Sinn Féin. It may stress its all-Ireland credentials, but the republican party is still regarded by unionists and nationalists as our dog in the southern fight, especially since it is led by Gerry Adams, who gave up his ultra-safe West Belfast seat to try his luck in Louth.
The implications for Northern Ireland of Sinn Féin's successes in the Dáil elections are both short- and long-term. It has immediately become a factor in the forthcoming assembly elections, with most people thinking it has the potential to benefit both Sinn Féin and the DUP.
After the May elections, Sinn Féin may find there are disadvantages as well as advantages to being a force in both Stormont and Leinster House, especially when you are in government in one parliament and the opposition in the other. In the north, Sinn Féin has succeeded in forming a remarkably stable relationship with the DUP; the two parties more or less run the place between them. After some teething problems, Sinn Féin ministers have become models of fiscal responsibility.
They are praised by Peter Robinson of the DUP for absorbing cuts in their departmental budgets while the SDLP and UUP, who are also in government but are behaving increasingly like the opposition, fight every cutback to the last ditch.
Last Thursday evening, a budget was forced through the Northern Ireland Executive by the combined votes of Sinn Féin, the DUP and Alliance, in the teeth of bitter opposition from the UUP and SDLP, who voted against it. The budget includes spending cuts in every department, including health.
Such fiscal prudence is in marked contrast to Sinn Féin's demeanour in the Dáil where it is has been, and will continue to be, an opposition party that tears strips off governments for spending cuts.
Sinn Féin makes the point that Stormont's budget is largely given to it by Westminster and has been cut by the Tory-led coalition there. To keep the Stormont show on the road, it has to make do on the housekeeping allowance handed to it by the British prime minister David Cameron in the form of a block grant, even if that means scrimping and saving in areas where it would prefer to spend. In contrast, the republic is a sovereign state with its own fiscal powers which can make more fundamental decisions.
That is true up to a point, but even a few years ago the idea that Stormont must be stabilised at all costs, even if it meant absorbing Tory cuts, would hardly have been Sinn Féin's default position. The constraints placed on the Irish government by the IMF/EU bailout are not that different to those imposed by London on Stormont. The most noticeable difference is in Sinn Féin's reaction to the cuts.
Even if it isn't an entirely fair comparison, any Irish government will be tempted to look north for ammunition any time that Adams, who will now lead Sinn Féin's contingent in the Dáil, or Pearse Doherty, the party's finance spokesman, make a particularly telling point about spending cuts and hardship.
Of course, every party faces this problem to some degree. If Labour is in government in Dublin, rivals can hunt through its long years in opposition, from 1997 to 2011, for speeches and policy positions that are being repudiated now it is in government with a centre-right party. The problem for Sinn Féin is that the references won't be historical, they will be contemporary. It will be in government and opposition at the same time in different administrations and open to the accusation of speaking with a forked tongue.
In a sense, these are good problems because they flow from success. They are preferable to the situation a few years ago when Stormont was suspended and Sinn Féin didn't have enough seats in the Dáil to merit independent speaking rights.
Fresh from its successes last weekend, the party must now turn around immediately and prepare to fight a fresh election from a radically different perspective in less than two months. On May 5, Northern Ireland elects not just 108 MLAs, but also members of the 26 local councils. There will also be a referendum on the introduction of AV, a proportional voting system, for future Westminster elections.
Robinson made the most of Sinn Féin's possible difficulties last week as he unveiled his own party's candidates for the Stormont elections. He predicted that Sinn Féin "will end up being something of a contradiction. It will be very difficult for them to take the irresponsible role that oppositions often take in the south, and to take the responsible role that governments have to take in Northern Ireland".
All the northern parties are hoping the strain of two elections will tell on Sinn Féin. "I don't care how good a machine they have, one election straight after the other will test it," a DUP back room strategist ventured optimistically.
Not a bit of it, according to a Sinn Féin worker: "Adrenaline will carry us through."
Behind the banter, both of the north's big parties believe Sinn Féin's success south of the border will create a bandwagon effect. They are equally hopeful that their troublesome smaller rivals in the SDLP and UUP will suffer as voters turn to the main parties. "I listen to what the pundits say, and clearly there will be something of a bounce for them [Sinn Féin]," said Robinson. "But the pundits are equally saying that there will be a bounce for us because people will want to ensure that they stop Gerry Adams in his tracks with his all-Ireland plan."
Robinson attributed Sinn Féin's increase in Dáil seats to a protest vote over the mishandling of the Irish economy, and he has a point.
Fianna Fáil lost 58 seats and everyone apart from the Greens got a place at the feast over its carcass. The fact that Sinn Féin picked up 10 extra TDs transforms its fortunes, gives it an improved platform in the Dáil, and brings in new faces (at least new to Leinster House) which were badly needed. Yet it hardly marks "the reconquest of Ireland" as Adams put it.
That sort of talk is mainly for northern consumption. In reality, most of the dislodged Fianna Fáil vote went to Fine Gael and Labour, probably the two least nationalistic parties in the state. Between them, independents and left groupings picked up marginally more seats than Sinn Féin.
It was noticeable in the southern election campaign that Sinn Féin didn't emphasise cross-border issues such as ending partition. But its victories will have the green flag wrapped round them in time for the Northern Ireland contest, where they will be presented as the partial fulfilment of past republican struggles.
Adams and Mary Lou McDonald were in Belfast last Tuesday to launch a series of events to mark the 30th anniversary of the 1981 hunger strike. Unveiling an exhibition, Martin McGuinness, Northern Ireland's deputy first minister, said Bobby Sands first refused food on March 1 and died on May 5. And that, by neat symmetry, is the date of the election.
