Comments on: Elections don’t solve Italy’s chaos (or get rid of Silvio)

By: CHRISTOPHER DUNNE

CHRISTOPHER DUNNE — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 22:56:12 +0000

Fascinating battle between the new social media and the powerful old media monopoly of Berlusconi; says it all.

By: Michael

Michael — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 05:57:09 +0000

If we can elect a deadbeat like Julia Gillard why is it unusual for Italians to vote in a statesman like Berlusconi? It seems to me and a good majority of Italians that he is the only suitable candidate for the job of dragging Italy out of its despair.
#VivaBerlusconi

By: klewso

klewso — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 04:10:25 +0000

Rome, bread and circuses.
Who does “Burlesque-coney’s” make-up? Michelangelo?
That smile, the face lifts, the taut skin - the Viagra’s kicked in?

By: joanjett

joanjett — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 04:01:40 +0000

I was reading Grillo’s blog yesterday and was deeply impressed (although I actually already knew who he was having seen a show of his when I lived there). Italians are very technology-adverse and he is enlightening them about the internet and is a huge critic of Telecom Italia. But he mostly highlights the huge amount of cronyism in the public service, which sees officials paid enormous sums for the rest of their lives in their “pensione”. If he has the guts to tackle entrenched tax avoidance (rife as in Greece) and reel in wages and entitlements then he will be doing the country a huge favour. I really recommend reading “Midnight in Sicily” by Peter Robb (aussie journalist) for a comprehensive look at the country and its historical links between the mafia and the government to get an idea of how corruption is entrenched over there. I wish Beppe and his Vaffanculo moment all the very best luck in the world. But if Eric Ellis is correct in his recent article on M5S http://www.theglobalmail.org/feature/laughing-all-the-way-to-power/255/ then the Machiavellian nature of power will win, unfortunately. You do get the government you deserve and there is a level of ignorance and absence of curiosity about anything outside of one’s own ‘piccolo mondo’ that makes any change virtually impossible.