Italian Reporter

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[italianreporter]

Giuseppe Civati

I haven't written in my blog for a very long time (and this seems to be the start of all my latest posts), mostly because I felt that I had nothing to say while everything and the opposite of everything is being said on social media, but yesterday I watched the debate between the 3 candidates for the Democratic Party premiership on TV and finally felt compelled to write something.

The main reason is that I finally found in one candidate, Giuseppe Civati, the person that the PD so desperately needs. A quick Google search shows that there are pretty much no news in English about him, but hopefully the underdog will soon become an household name.

He his the proof to me that they are not "all the same, all thieves", the mantra that has become so popular among those Italians so fed up with politics that  have decided to support Beppe Grillo and his 5 Stars Movement.

In my opinion the democratic party has failed so badly in past 20 years for two main reasons:

a) they have compromised too much in order to win the weak support of catholics and Berlusconi's conservative former supporters

b) they lacked a charismatic leader that was able to communicate to a younger generation - in a time when two very charismatic leaders, Grillo and Berlusconi, basically constitute two "one man party".

I have been following Civati for a while, but his performance last night really surpassed the expectations. His statements and answers were honest and direct, his opinions not mellowed down to please the voters, and on top of that, he's clearly a brilliant communicator, someone young and fresh but with enough experience and charisma that can rival the likes of Obama on the world stage. I am sure the international press will love him, when they get the chance to get to know him,

The other two candidates didn't impress me much. Cuperlo is a "maybe", I see him more like a compromise between old and new, but not the strong personality that we need. Renzi is too much of a dividing character, and he seems to appeal more to the conservatives than the leftists, almost a cheap, slightly more democratic Berlusconi.

At the primary elections of the Democratic Party, which will be held on 8th December, Civati will definitely get my vote, and I hope many others.

[italianreporter]

Finalmente l'ha ammesso.

"La Rete rende possibili due estremi: la democrazia diretta con la partecipazione collettiva e l’accesso a un’informazione non mediata, oppure una neo-dittatura orwelliana in cui si crede di conoscere la verità e di essere liberi, mentre si ubbidisce inconsapevolmente a regole dettate da un’organizzazione superiore."

Gianroberto Casaleggio ha finalmente spiegato al Corriere della Sera il principio del M5S: una neo-dittatura orwelliana in cui si crede di conoscere la verità e di essere liberi, mentre si ubbidisce inconsapevolmente a regole dettate da un’organizzazione superiore

[italianreporter]

Stefano Cucchi

Stefano Cucchi was arrested in 2009 because the police found him with a small quantitative of hashish and cocaine.

Stefano was beaten up by the police, neglected by doctors and died a week after his arrest.

After a long trial nurses and police officers were found not guilty while the doctors have received a two years sentence for manslaughter but will be on parole.

Unfortunately the pictures of his postmortem speak for themselves and tell a very different story:

[italianreporter]

History Repeating Itself?

When I started this blog, the idea was to report news about Italian politics in English. At that time I found that although foreign press tended to be much more objective than the Italian's, it couldn't quite capture the true essence of our politics. For example, I don't know any non-Italian person who doesn't think that Berlusconi is an idiot a highly corrupted politician, and yet in Italy he is still hated and loved in equal measure.

At that time, it also seemed much easier to understand what was good and what was bad, but after the elections the political situation in the country is much more blurred.

On one side Berlusconi and his centre-right coalition, on the other side the Democratic Party (PD) and centre-left coalition, and on neither side, but still at the centre of it all, Grillo and his 5 Stars Movement.

After a messy elections result, where no one obtained a strong majority, the Democratic Party was pretty much forced to form a coalition Government with the centre-right, after failed negotiations with Grillo.

I guess this is no much different from what happened in the UK with current coalition Government, and in  my opinion it represents a good expression of democracy. As much as I hate to admit it, there were still over 10 million Italians that voted for Berlusconi, and this  has to be acknowledged.

However, most Italians see this as a "dirty partnership" among the old political parties, who want to keep the power and cut out the new (Grillo and his movement).

What I think is that Grillo had the chance to stop all this, and by forming a coalition with the PD he would have had the opportunity to actively contribute to the reforms that are really needed (rather than keep wasting time on Berlusconi's trials, which will jeopardise the relations inside the existing coalition).

The main problem is that Grillo never had a programme other than 'destroy everything and rebuilt from scratch' and therefore any alliance would have been seen by his supporters as a betrayal.

What scares me, is that most people don't seem to realise the similarities between Grillo and Berlusconi. Berlusconi also rose to Italian politics with the intent to reform the old political elite, presenting himself as a self-made man, who could lead the country to prosperity in the same way that he had made his businesses successful.

Grillo and Berlusconi are both extremely charismatic leaders, their supporters become like followers of a guru, rather than active participants of the political life.

Both cases remind me of George Orwell's Animal Farm.

This is an extremely complicated political situation and I really don't think I have the ability to explain it, and probably even fully understand it, but for those who wish to understand more about what's really going on in Italy I suggest this brilliant piece authored by the Wu Ming Foundation:

Grillismo: Yet another right-wing cult coming from Italy

[italianreporter]

Digital Democracy, what Digital Democracy?

For those who are not familiar very familiar with the political situation in Italy at the moment, there’s a lot of talking about “digital democracy” advocated by the new party Movimento 5 Stelle, which is pretty much the second biggest party following the last elections. They think democracy should be open to digital conversation and the decisions made by politicians influenced by it.

Especially in Italy, with its ageing population and relatively small number of people engaging with social media, digital democracy would be fundamentally flawed, and frankly pretty scary.

Beppe Grillo, head of the Movimento 5 Stelle, has already turned into a digital dictator, calling the negative comments on his blog "digital shit" and using the positives as democracy only when they validate his own opinion.

[italianreporter]

Ridendo e scherzando, la migliore analisi politica la fa lei....ma questa democrazia del web e' poi' cosi' democratica?

[merdadigitale]

Questi i numeri del programma M5S. Praticamente il costo delle promesse di Grillo valgono 96 miliardi ( N.B senza includere il famoso “reddito di cittadinanza” ) mentre tutti i tagli arriverebbero a 22 miliardi. Rimane un buco di 74 MILIARDI. Se questa non e` demagogia…

Seguite il servizio di Ballaro`…

[italianreporter]

Il vero discorso di Berlusconi, questo e' veramente spettacolare!

[italianreporter]

Good Italy, Bad Italy, Girlfriend in a coma.

Must-watch documentary.

[italianreporter]

Amazing, sad, inspiring documentary.....da vedere soprattutto per gli Italiani all'estero!

[italianreporter]

Nothing to add.

[italianreporter]

Word cloud of the most common terms found within Social Media coverage about Berlusconi during the past week. He generated more than 229k mentions in the past 7 days (Italian only).

[repubblicait]

++ADDIO A RITA LEVI MONTALCINI++

[italianreporter]

Michael Slaby, who helped Obama with his social media campaign for the elections, is NOT advising Berlusconi as some publications have reported.

[italianreporter]

The tide is high! #river #thames #water #sky #skyporn #clouds #cloudporn #london #londonist #londonpop #igerslondon #igersitalia #chiswick #picoftheday #nature #instafamous #instamood #instalondon #winter #inverno

[italianreporter]

Unconventional weapons

I have read reports in Il Fatto Quotidiano, an Italian left-wing website, but nothing (as far as I can see) in English news, that unconventional weapons, including white phosphorus boms have been used agains Gaza in the past few days (and since 2006).

Heartbreaking video below (mostly in English):

http://tv.ilfattoquotidiano.it/2012/11/21/gaza-dentro-lospedale-di-shifa-usate-armi-non-convenzionali/211660/

[italianreporter]

As said in my previous post countless videos and pictures are being shared on social media as a cyber fire exchange between Israel and Palestina. Of them all, this one I found particularly interesting and hard to watch. The beautiful thing about it, is to see a Jew standing up for the Palestinians, the hard part is to see that treatment he receives in exchange.