Ireland has always been known for rolling out the welcome mat for Irish-American leaders looking to rekindle the connections between the two countries - and if it just happens to be in the run up to an election year, well, what harm? (Aside from the clean-up and the massive security bill.)

But Obama's Irish homecoming, as many things in the young president's life are, is a rather unlikely affair.

Obama admitted as such during his speech to the Democratic National Convention in that most Irish of cities, Boston, in 2004.

"Tonight is a particular honor for me because, let's face it, my presence on this stage is pretty unlikely," said then-Illinois State Senator Obama.

But in his speech at College Green in Dublin before a crowd of 60,000 on May 23, by connecting himself proudly to his roots in Moneygall, County Offaly, Obama paid Ireland one of its greatest compliments during one of its darkest hours - that the leader of the free world still wants to be associated with his Irish roots and is proud to do so, and for more than just expedient political gain.

Yes, he describes himself as a bit of a "mutt," drawing lineage perhaps more directly from his father's native Kenya, or his mother's Kansas upbringing, or from his time spent living in Indonesia, but his story, while a uniquely American one, is also the universal one of the immigrant's success.

"I am here to find the apostrophe we lost along the way," added Obama with a laugh in his Dublin speech, since his Kenyan last name was often mistaken for an Irish one growing up, something he alluded to in his book Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance (1995).

Obama's Irish lineage first truly came to light in 2008 when he was seeking the Democratic presidential nomination. Genealogists at ancestry.com were able to trace the line on his mother's side back to Fulmoth Kearney, the president's great-great-great-grandfather, who left Moneygall for Ohio in 1850, as the famine came to an end.

"(I am) grateful for the diversity of my heritage," said Obama during his rousing 2004 speech. Stirring words indeed, but ones which need to be tempered by his remarks four years later when he was, himself, in the running, and John Kerry was but a footnote of history.

"It never hurts to be a little Irish when you're running for the presidency of the United States of America,' CNN quoted Obama as saying in 2008.

Indeed, Obama has learned this lesson well from predecessors of both political stripes, from John F. Kennedy's 1963 visit, to Ronald Reagan's in 1984 and Bill Clinton's rock star arrival in 1995, when he became the first sitting American president to also visit Northern Ireland, according to the BBC.

Obama celebrated the strong links between America and Ireland in his Dublin speech. He noted that American abolitionist Frederick Douglass, an escaped slave, was a great friend of "your great liberator, Daniel O'Connell," and that they formed their "unlikely" friendship in Dublin.

"Irish signatures are on our founding documents," added Obama. "Irish blood was spilled on our battlefields. Irish sweat built our great cities."

Like the Queen before him, Obama also tried his hand at Gaelic, alluding to the cead mile failte - a hundred thousand welcomes - he and Michelle had faced when they arrived in Ireland.

"It certainly feels like 100,000 welcomes," he said. "We feel very much at home. I feel even more at home after that pint I had. I feel even warmer."

Obama also wrapped up his speech with a repeat of his 2008 election motto - yes we can, or, as gaelige: "Is féidir linn."

Taoiseach Enda Kenny returned the favour by borrowing - some said plagiarizing - from one of Obama's most memorable speeches, his election night victory speech in Chicago's Grant Park in November 2008.

"If there's anyone out there who still doubts that Ireland is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our ancestors is alive in our time; who still questions our capacity to restore ourselves, reinvent ourselves and prosper, today is your answer," said Kenny.

Kenny later told RTE News that the quote he borrowed from was a tribute to Obama's oratory, and that a copy of the same speech hangs in his office.

While the speech was the most public part of his trip, the Obamas were kept busy during their whirlwind stay.

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II, who had visited Ireland just a few days earlier, had had a glass of Guinness poured for her inspection - and some hoped, consumption - at St. James' Gate, by none other than Guinness' brew master Fergal Murray. But she was unable, or unwilling, to partake of a pint, though there are photos of the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Philip, closely inspecting the glass, and maybe hankering for a quick one for the road.

Obama meanwhile was only too glad to be seen raising a pint at Ollie Hayes pub back in Moneygall.

While Obama must have been hoping that newspapers in Boston, New York, Chicago and other Irish hotbeds, were picking up the photo for the next day's editions, no doubt Hayes must have been be hoping that his pub will become to Offaly what the Ronald Reagan Lounge is to County Tipperary.

After his first sip of the dark stuff, Obama made a compliment that has been heard by countless publicans having pulled a pint for a visiting American.

"It tastes so much better here than it does in the States," Obama joked, before adding. "You're keeping all the best stuff here."

While America's debt is as high as it has ever been, Obama made sure to let everyone know that he settled the bill before he left. He and Michelle also crossed the road to meet with hundreds of townspeople who had come out to welcome their native son home. The president and first lady spent a considerable amount of time shaking hands and having photographs taken, not unlike a rather rushed family reunion.

Other parts of the Obama visit were not as likely to make the front page of the next day's papers but were noteworthy nonetheless to Irish people everywhere.

According to The Belfast Telegraph, Kenny's wife Fionnuala, took Michelle Obama on a tour of Farmleigh House during their visit, showing her an embroidered panel depicting the Norman invasion, as well as topgraphia of Hibernia in the house's Benjamin Iveagh Library.

The first couple also met with several school children at Aras an Uachtarain in Dublin's Phoenix Park, following a ceremony where he planted an upright Irish oak, leaving a lasting imprint of his visit on the countryside. It was the same park where presidents Clinton and Kennedy had also planted trees during their visits.

And no doubt the Gaelic Athletic Association was pleased to see Taoiseach Enda Kenny present a hurley to Obama, who may very well need all of the defensive strength the mighty ash provides as he girds himself for battle next year against Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, or whoever the Republicans scare up against him.

The only dark cloud over the whole visit was a literal one, in the form of a volcanic ash cloud heading in from Iceland, which prompted the president to skip a planned night's stay in Dublin and scurry over the Irish Sea to England to beat the cloud.