We will probably never know the precise reasons the talks collapsed on Wednesday afternoon. But what puzzles me more is why, out of nowhere the previous weekend, it was being reported that a 'breakthrough' was on the cards.
Cynics and pessimists - commentators like me, in other words - were told that we had taken our eye off the ball and were missing the change in mood music and body language. Yet within 48 hours it was clear that a deal wasn't coming. Theresa May and Leo Varadkar looked foolish on Monday evening. A public mood which had perked up over the weekend plunged again, down to Baltic temperatures. Key figures in the business, health, education, employment and community sectors - who had also be led to believe that a deal was ready to be signed-off - were, yet again, very angry.
Were there even a few hours between last Thursday evening and Monday afternoon when a deal was possible? Michelle O'Neill says she believed Sinn Féin and the DUP had reached an 'accommodation' - presumably involving an Irish Language Act (ILA); but the DUP deny that.
In a couple of interviews last Sunday and Monday - while expressing my surprise at the sudden upbeat mood - I did say that if the DUP was shifting on an ILA then they would require 'something massive' in exchange. But I couldn't work out what that 'something massive' would be. Contacts in the DUP were telling me they would be 'uncomfortable' and 'unhappy' if there was a shift on the ILA. Contacts across the broadest swathe of unionism/loyalism were telling me they didn't want an ILA, 'or anything that looked like one.' I couldn't find one unionist who was standing up and making the case for an ILA.
I don't know if Arlene Foster and her negotiating team believed that they could sell an ILA in some form. I don't know if they had discussed a draft form with Sinn Féin over the last 13 months. I don't know if Sinn Féin presented them with a draft bill which included what they wanted.
I do know they had conducted a consultation exercise last summer and were seeking the opinions of key figures and influence-formers within unionism. I don't know what conclusions were drawn from that exercise; but I do know that the DUP said, over and over again, that they weren't backing an ILA. Which sort of suggests that they must have recognised than an ILA would always be hugely difficult - probably impossible - to sell. If they had thought an ILA was sellable then surely they would have softened and nuanced their language?
Anyway, we are where we are - trying to throw cotton threads across the widening chasm between unionism and republicanism. I heard someone say that the failure of the DUP/SF to reach agreement should mean that the UUP/SDLP/Alliance be given the chance to sort something out. But the SDLP/Alliance support an ILA, while the UUP don't; and there are also huge differences between the UUP and them on Brexit. So no chance of a deal from them.
And, as I've said many, many times, even if there was another assembly election in the next few weeks I can't see the electoral dynamics shifting. Indeed, I suspect that Alliance wouldn't move at all, while both the UUP and SDLP would lose seats - pushing the DUP/SF to +60 seats.
In the last week I made a point of talking to four people I've known for years: two living in the South Belfast constituency (where I used to live) and two in my present constituency, East Belfast. Two UUP (one of whom 'flirted' with Alliance) and two SDLP. In the event of an election the two unionists told me they would shift to the DUP and the two SDLP said they would shift to SF. All four made the same point: "This is now endgame territory."
And it is. Increasing numbers of people - including many who haven't voted for years - will row in behind the DUP and SF. There may be some reluctance and lack of real enthusiasm in their decision, but that won't stop them gravitating to the polar opposites. They know and they've accepted that the chances of constructing a credible, genuine, power-sharing government here are remote. So they'll back the party which, from their perspective, is most likely to protect and promote their constitutional position. Whether or not they voted Yes/No in 1998 is irrelevant: they know that the Good Friday Agreement is now incapable of delivering reconciliation and inter-community cooperation.
It's head-count territory now, folks. Nothing else matters.
