FORMER New York State Assemblyman John Dearie has called for a 2008 presidential forum which would involve the key contenders from both political parties for the presidency facing off before an Irish audience.

Dearie certainly knows the drill. He created the first presidential forum back in 1984 and has run the events in every presidential election since.

Dearie began the process when Senator Howard Baker, then a leading Republican presidential candidate, told him in 1980 that he had never been asked a question on Northern Ireland in his decades in the Senate or on the campaign trail for the presidency. Dearie resolved to change that forever.

He has been incredibly successful. History will note that it was at the Irish presidential forum in 1992 that then candidate Bill Clinton agreed to consider a visa for Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams, and also to send a presidential envoy to Northern Ireland.

Of course, both those pledges were adhered to. In the process the presidential forum played a large role in creating the Irish American initiative without which the peace process might never have happened.

There have been other forums which have not been as successful, but it is fair to say that what Dearie created will rank as one of the great contributions to peace in Ireland.

Now Dearie has announced plans for this year's forum which he hopes to schedule around the St. Patrick's Day period. There is no reason to believe he will not be successful again.

The forum will be timely and it would certainly be helped enormously if the Republican Party standard bearers took part. To date no Republican Party candidate has appeared at the forum.

That could well change this year, especially if Senator John McCain is the nominee. McCain has attended many Irish events over the past few years and has made clear his interest in Irish issues. He was one of the first to attend the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform rallies in Washington, D.C. and New York.

Immigration would obviously be a hot topic at the forum. Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, as well as McCain, have taken an enlightened position on the need for comprehensive reform.

Getting them to deliver on that in power a la the Clinton pledge on a visa for Adams could be a major part of the forum's brief this year.

There is a clear sense from the primaries that the anti-immigrant sentiment in America is balanced by a genuine desire on the part of voters of both parties to have a broken system fixed.

Is it possible that a major candidate would undertake that within 100 days of being elected, that they would bring the immigration issue forward for resolution? The forum could create a major step forward if a candidate went on the record with such a pledge.

While Northern Ireland is definitely off the front burner in terms of American focus, there are still many Irish issues that the U.S. must keep an eye on.

The need for an economic envoy has never been greater. The Northern Irish economy is in dire straits and American investment is a critical part of the future, as evidenced by the recent visit to America by Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness.

The new administration can continue to play a key political and economic role in ensuring that the Northern Ireland peace process is bedded down permanently and violence and division is a bad memory and nothing more. The Dearie presidential forum is a good place to start.