tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55409422024-03-13T00:42:51.874+01:00Italian Politics with WalstonA forum of free voices discussing today's Italian politics and its historical rootsitalpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.comBlogger240125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-5799395307736116862014-03-05T12:46:00.001+01:002014-03-05T12:57:07.059+01:00Matteo Renzi. The New-Old GovernmentOnce again, it’s the Genoese comic, Maurizio Crozza who has taken the best measure of “Italy’s mayor”, the former mayor Florence, Matteo Renzi. He has been imitating the ambitious young local administrator for almost two years now and identified his key features as his youth and lack of clear programme. Renzi follows the Florentine stereotype as a honey-tongued talker always with the sharp and italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-84162916212707673932013-12-01T19:54:00.000+01:002014-03-05T12:53:25.399+01:00The Falklands are still the Falklands in the Vatican even with an Argentinian Pope.In the third loggia above the Belvedere Courtyard are some of the offices of the Secretary of State, in practice, the government of the Vatican. A portion of these are the Dicastery of Relations with States, in practice, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs where I went with students last week. And as one might expect in the Vatican, the loggia is decorated with 16th and 17th century panels of maps italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-91507216295551429652013-11-29T18:07:00.000+01:002013-12-01T20:02:22.426+01:00Mussolini on the road to Sainthood.Rome provides unlikely images and stories which have delighted travellers and resident observers for centuries.
In his “Roma” (1972), Fellini was more the poet than the documentarist but he surely would delight in the juxtaposition of tourist tat on sale near the Vatican today; of another famous son of Fellini's Romagna with rather more sacred images.
After a visit with students to the italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-45822932631812199122013-11-25T17:23:00.002+01:002013-11-26T12:12:51.983+01:00Berlusconi’s endless endgameWhile government and parliament deliberate over the budget where the final vote in the Senate is due this week, the foreign media (and the Italians for that matter) are more interested in guess-who.
And he is doing his best to concentrate political and media attention on himself and his imminent expulsion from the Senate. On Saturday he gave an impassioned version of his stock speech to the italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-8930211119755420232013-10-27T22:24:00.001+01:002013-11-01T16:49:04.522+01:00Special Arabic The office dealing with the prying and spying on Chancellor Angela Merkel apparently goes under the coy euphemism of Special Collection Service.
A long time ago, a colleague on the University of Maryland’s programme for the US military told me of another spooks’ euphemism used back then (and now for all I know). He had been teaching at the US Air Force listening post in Crete, one of various italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-62938518699321106452013-10-24T15:10:00.001+02:002013-11-21T11:21:13.262+01:00The Unaddressed Immigration Questions. At the European Council today, immigration policy is once again on the agenda. Italian prime minister Enrico Letta has put forward a number of plans for immediate implementation including cooperation between EU countries in patrolling the Mediterranean, EU offices in transit countries like Libya to deal with asylum requests for the whole of the Union (and presumably Norway and perhaps Switzerlanditalpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-38838959445220281082013-10-22T22:26:00.000+02:002013-10-22T22:26:36.526+02:00San Marino and Turkey. One of the more bizarre interview requests I have received was this afternoon when Turkish Radio and Television (TRT) sent me an email. I presumed it was about the usual Italian questions; instead the topic was “to discuss San Marino and its refusal to be a member of the European Union”, not an item at the top of either my own news agenda or most others for that matter.
Now we all know that italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-24876911619104159982013-10-20T15:43:00.002+02:002013-10-20T15:53:15.004+02:00Italy’s problems beyond Berlusconi. So Silvio Berlusconi is barred from holding public office for two years; yesterday the Milan Court of Appeal handed down its verdict after the Supreme Court had declared that their previous sentence of 5 years did not comply with the law.
In immediate personal terms for Berlusconi and political terms for the country, nothing changes with the sentence. He will not be expelled from the Senate italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-820195428695880252013-10-07T14:16:00.000+02:002013-10-07T14:24:14.416+02:00Silvio Berlusconi’s long and bumpy Sunset Boulevard.Last week was a helter-skelter in Italian politics as Silvio Berlusconi tried to re-establish his undisputed leadership over the centre-right and to protect himself in some way from the effects of his August conviction for fraud and tax evasion.
For the whole week he told Italians that he and his party were leaving Prime Minister Enrico Letta’s coalition government and would vote against the italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-84657025419118143832013-08-13T12:44:00.002+02:002013-08-13T12:44:49.343+02:00Andiam, votiam!One of the caricatures of Italian opera is the call to immediate action usually launched by the tenor “Andiam! Partiam!” (“let’s go, let’s leave!”), sustained heartily by a robust chorus… for the last 25 minutes of act III.
The People of Freedom (PdL), or at least part of them, are singing that tune, except that instead of the lead tenor, we have Daniela Santanché at the moment Silvio italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-29943498708566453742013-08-11T16:28:00.001+02:002013-08-11T16:28:01.446+02:00The Civil War – Intolerance of Regulation Many countries have had civil wars – mostly long and bloody affairs fought over deeply held principles. After Silvio Berlusconi’s conviction for tax fraud and tax evasion, one of his advisors, Sandro Bondi expressed the possibility for Italy. This civil war, thankfully, will not be bloody but it will be drawn out and it is being fought over a deeply held principle, respect for the law against italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-59718521005652847862013-07-30T11:36:00.000+02:002013-07-31T17:46:33.954+02:00Waiting for the Verdict. Berlusconi contra Legem. For the last month, the Berlusconi family paper Il Giornale has put a countdown on its front page (yesterday's left), a countdown to the hearing for the appeal to the Supreme Court in which Silvio Berlusconi's “Mediaset” conviction will be reconsidered. Berlusconi was convicted on tax evasion and accounting fraud charges first at the court of first instance, then confirmed on appeal. The Supreme italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-58567553603530629572013-07-29T12:43:00.001+02:002013-07-29T12:51:19.326+02:00Constitutional Reform – the Creeping Summer Transformation of Italy Italy’s summer lethargy is masking a radical change which if passed will unleash the country’s least attractive instincts and give them a constitutional validity – not far from almost any political initiative in Italy is the acceptance of weakly checked power and the desire to have someone take charge and solve the country’s problems.
At the moment a structural change to both the institutions ofitalpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-2968778141235597942013-07-22T17:37:00.000+02:002013-07-22T17:37:03.656+02:00Stably unstableA week before Prime Minister Enrico Letta’s meeting with his British opposite number, David Cameron, I was at a meeting talking about some of the issues the two leaders might be discussing. Most of the meeting was about medium and long term issues like banking regulation, relations with Europe and Italian institutional reform but then the elephant in the room waved its trunk and woke us up: woulditalpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-83430882972554856672013-06-24T10:28:00.001+02:002013-06-24T10:28:37.816+02:00Ruby, Berlusconi and Bloomsday, on the day of judgement. More interesting than the legal approach to the Ruby trial is the literary analysis, a week after 16 June, Bloomsday.
A couple of year’s ago, at a Bloomsday reading I was enthralled at the idea that the ever-prescient James Joyce had foreseen Berlusconi’s arrival and his friendship with Karima al Mahroug aka Ruby .
Berlusconi appears in Ulysses as the Commendatore Bacibaci Beninobenone, the italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-72586857934580387612013-06-23T21:12:00.002+02:002013-06-24T18:53:04.771+02:00Ruby – spinning in opposite directions Tomorrow we will have a verdict in one of the two trials involving Karima el Mahroug aka Ruby. In one, the accused are the model agent, Lele Mora, the former journalist and anchor, Emilio Fede and the former Lombardy regional councillor, dental hygenist and lover of Silvio Berlusconi, Nicole Minetti. In the other, the accused is Berlusconi himself and this is the one that will come to judgement.italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-30255946032873770072013-06-18T22:42:00.001+02:002013-06-18T23:08:14.885+02:00Turning up the heat. It’s going to be a hot week in Rome; it was 33 today and we have 38 threatened for Thursday but that is nothing compared to the ordeals that Berlusconi is going to go through and because of them, the government and the parties.
Tomorrow is the most important day. The Constitutional Court will pronounce on the so-called “legitimate impediment”. In 2010, the Court of Appeal was hearing the italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-35261253255745934602013-06-14T09:26:00.000+02:002013-06-17T17:19:16.485+02:00New Italians, New and Old Italian Racism II This is the second blog on racism in Italy, all the more relevant after a local councillor in Padua yesterday asked on her Facebook page why no one had raped Cécile Kyenge “I didn’t mean it” she said after the predictable explosion. The rest of the blog is an answer to a long, thoughtful and disturbing comment from an American friend contemplating a return to Italy. It warrants a careful answer italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-51960717403138312013-06-13T08:21:00.000+02:002013-06-13T08:21:06.000+02:00New Italians, New and Old Italian Racism I Racism in Italy has finally become a subject of debate – slow and limited and usually provoked by foreigners or Italians living abroad. This is one of two blogs which addressing some of the issues and trying to answer some of the questions.
Last month I wrote a piece on racism in Italy for a CNN blog – this is the full version with comment and response.
Italy has its first black cabinet italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-53694335591010762512013-06-12T09:15:00.001+02:002013-06-12T09:23:12.688+02:00Parsing Violence As the world knew, the swearing in of the new Italian government in April at the Quirinale, the President’s palace, was brusquely interrupted by news of an attack at the Prime Minister’s office Palazzo Chigi. For a time, the city stopped as security measures went into overdrive. Then it became clear that there had been one lone gunman, Luigi Preiti, unemployed, with two broken marriages and a italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-83663437524299773712013-06-11T14:05:00.002+02:002013-06-12T08:48:37.309+02:00Local Elections, Local Consequences Normally in Italy, politicians and analysts examine local election results with the care that ancient soothsayers took in entrails and the flight of birds in order to foresee the national future. This time there is more detachment; these local elections are just that… for the most part, local.
Over the last fortnight, about 7 million Italians were called to vote for their city councils. On italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-85337021250046989892013-06-07T12:08:00.001+02:002013-06-09T23:57:31.561+02:00Lemmings or Lemurs. Last One Alive Wins. The New Yorker has a crowd of furry animals rushing over a cliff until one of them realises that they are lemurs, not lemmings (above left).
At the moment, the Italian political class seems to be in the same state. They are rushing to the brink and the one that holds back enough for the others to go over the edge will be the winner. For the lemmings it is the evolutionary race, for the italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-53993924963009053512013-06-04T17:16:00.002+02:002013-06-04T17:16:51.942+02:00Ungovernable Italy? Last week there was a flurry of Italian national pride when European Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger said that Italy, like Bulgaria and Romania, was ungovernable.
Oettinger: „Mir machen Länder Sorgen, die im Grunde genommen kaum regierbar sind: Bulgarien, Rumänien, Italien.“ Dazu komme, dass in vielen Ländern EU-kritische Bewegungen stärker würden. In Großbritannien regiere Premier italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-79153223721499864552013-06-03T10:37:00.003+02:002013-06-03T10:40:00.096+02:00Presidents, Semi-presidents and Prime Ministers. Yesterday was the anniversary of the foundation of the Italian Republic; in 1946, Italians voted in favour of a Republic rather than the constitutional monarchy which had governed the country since 1861. After choosing the republic, the Constituent Assembly gave the country a parliamentary constitution. This has a largely symbolic president and most power with a prime minister conditioned by italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5540942.post-42008733797567323732013-04-28T10:09:00.002+02:002013-05-01T15:25:49.781+02:00Letta’s Government – Unsettled Spring Weather. True to his promises, Enrico Letta produced his government in three days prompting Beppe Grillo to say that it wasn’t Christ who had risen but Barabbas. The ministers will be sworn in today and tomorrow he will seek (and get) the confidence of the two houses of Parliament.
It is a low profile cabinet, very intentionally. Letta and Napolitano knew that any big name from one side would have italpolbloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06088591985622787379noreply@blogger.com1