Butenthusiasmforwar, frombucklingonarmourtorippling standards to determined sightseeing, colours the medievalChronicles, as does the fear, wearinessandboredom that set in afterwards.
The Republicans' crushing loss of both houses of Congress in the mid-term election of 2006, thanks in large part to war-weariness, crops up only in passing, as a possible impediment to the planned surge in Iraq.
More important, however, nationalists seem to have gained a political self-confidence that unionists now lack, born of both war-weariness and faith in the leadership of Sinn Fein and the moderate Social Democratic and Labour Party, the largest nationalist party.