I was under the impression that there'd almost certainly be a coalition government of those two, but that still remains to be seen, then? Of course, I was also under the impression that Fine Gael was less conservative than Fianna Fail, so shows what I know.

And on a somewhat related topic, I was intrigued to read some foreign news article - NYTimes, I believe - which quoted Gerry Adams about the Irish government crisis, without even so much as a mention of him being in Northern Ireland. How does that work, exactly, the relations between Northern Irish Sinn Fein and its Republic of Ireland counterpart?

Oh, I wish it was so simple that it could be solved by fresh elections. Judging by all polls, new elections will only make things even more difficult, not less. To summarize the problem, the largest Flemish party by a mile is a conservative party which wants lower taxes and more independence for the regions, while the largest Francophone party by a mile is a socialistic party, which wants higher taxes and as little change as possible in the way the regions work. Which is proving just as impossible to reconcile as you might think, but according to all polls, new elections would only give more votes to both parties.