Friday, February 06, 2009
Rubrica del Lunedì special edition: da Appunti Digitali
http://www.appuntidigitali.it/3213/ma-lenergia-pulita-e-veramente-pulita/
Commenti e critiche ben graditi
Monday, February 02, 2009
Rubrica del Lunedi`: Da Appunti Digitali
Per chi e` interessato potete leggere un mio intervento sul blog Appunti Digitali a
questo indirizzo:
http://www.appuntidigitali.it/3170/qual-e-il-vero-allarme-energia-o-ambiente/
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Cevapcici western
There was a land
A land of champions
A land called Yugoslavia
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boys
And god I know I'm one
Oh mother, tell your children
Not to do what I have done
I've lost my soul, on glory alleluyah
Down in Yugoslavia
Land of Champions, Magnifico
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Sinterklaas, episode III: Revenge of de Sint
So this is Christmas.
And it's then normal ending for this esalogy of Sinterklaas to see what went wrong when Sinterklaas crossed the Ocean and went to America.
In fact the figure of the Santa Claus is heavily based on the character of Saint Nicholas, and especially in his Dutch version Sinterklaas.
History say that when they went to America, Dutch conquerors and settlers brought with them their traditions and habits, and within them, Sinterklaas.
Then, during the American War of Independence, the inhabitants of New York City, the former Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, reinvented their Sinterklaas tradition, as Saint Nicholas was a symbol of the city's non-English past.
The name itself of Santa Claus is supposedly derived from the old Dutch form Sinte Klaas.
Despite the fact that this historical reconstruction is not supported by all the experts, it is supported by me (and many others).
But of course also the traditionally Christian Saint Nicholas, or Sinterklaas, is in turn a clone (as all he Christian characters I may say).
The features of Saint Nicholas, a greek bishop pretty popular in Germanic Countries, is in fact molded from the casting of Wotan, the Germanic version of the chief god in Norse paganism Odin.
Odin, as his alter ego Sinterklaas, is often depicted as a old man, with a long beard, a hat and a stick in the hand.
He's ridings his eight-legged white horse Sleipnir, a grand-grandfather of het wit paard van Sinterklaas.
Also the character of Zwarte Piet, Sinterklaas' helper, in the Medioeval traditios was bearing a lot of similarities in role with Odin's ravens Hugin and Munin.
Finally, late Roman historians, such as Tacitus, used to refer to Odin by using the name of Mercury since they shared features and roles.
Ergo: Ermes is Santa Claus.
(This could explain my childish confusion in understanding the meaning of Santa Claus.)
Friday, December 19, 2008
Sinterklaas, episode II: The attack of the Piets
As I said in the previous post of mine, the description of Zwarte Piet, the companion of Sinterklaas, as a moorish slave from Spain freed by the Saint is very shaky. And even more shaky is the more politically correct portray of Sinterklaas' helper as a chimneysweep from a Southern Country that decided to follow the Sint because of gratitude.
The truth is that, according to myths from the 18th century, Saint Nicholas operates in the companionship of a devil. It is said in fact that on Saint Nicholas Eve the Saint fought the devil and triumphed over it (him?), and eventually enslaved it.
In Holland the figure of the devil was softened into less strong appearances of a moorish kid. But in other Countries in Europe, where Saint Nicholas is also warshipped, some features of the devilish nature of the Saint's helper still remain.
Saint Nicholas is celebrated mainly in the Lower Countries, but it is also very important in most of Central Europe, as well as his dark companions.
In the North of Germany, Sinterklaas helper is called Knecht Ruprecht, or servant Ruprecht. As in Holland they look like black or moorish people and they gave up their devilish appearances.
But in the South of Germany, as well as in Austra, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia and even in the north mountainous part of our region in Italy, Friuli Venezia Giulia, Sinterklaas helper are much like devilish incubi figures, called Krampus. In those areas, young men dress up as the Krampus in the first two weeks of December and roam the streets frightening children and young ladies with rusty chains and bells.
Krampus usually wear wooden masks with huge horns, and sheep skin.
(Present idea: I'd really like to receive a Krampus mask, so if someone needs ideas for a Christmas present for me, just consider this.)
Similar to Krampus are the Bavarian and Styrian Klaubauf, while Pelzebock are more human like, as well as the Pelznickel, Belzeniggl, the American Belsnickel, the Swiss Schmutzli, Rumpelklas, Bellzebub, Hans Muff, Drapp or Buzebergt, and the France Hanstrapp and Le Père Fouettard.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Women in the Netherlands - what they think
After my old (and very succesful) post about the women in the Nederlands, and more specificaly, on the marvellous invention of the plastuit, here I am again, after a Women Lunch, a good occasion to see and to hear about the reality of women in the Netherlands (and actually, all over Europe and beyond).
The idea started by two women researchers in our institute that wanted to share their experience with the younger girls in the same field and have some feedback on how life's going. I am always been very committed to these kind of subjects, as on one side I don't understand how it is possible that among all the discriminations that the human being has done during history, the one on women is the most prolonged and fundamental one, that has held strongly along centuries, that exists in every culture, north and south, east and west, no matter which religion, no matter in which time it is, the discrimination on women has always been present. On the other hand, it is also clear that it is the discrimination that has been most accepted by the victim herself. Many women not only accept it, but are actually proud of being not considered at the same level as men. Well, the discussion of today was much more practical (being Dutch, we may say :-) ) and it was focused mostly on how the society helps women with a family and how it is accepted to have women in high position in a company or in science. Well, I heard a lot of complaints indeed! When I said that surely The Netherlands is not the top, but is not so bad either, I have been answered that statistics shows that women in the Netherlands works less than in the rest of Europe. So I have checked on internet, and what I found is that here 75% of the women are working part time, against the 31% of the European average. Well, it is true that probably the tradition is such that women are more likely than men to stay at home to take care of the children and the house, but if you look more carefully, also the percentage of men having a part time job in The Netherlands is way bigger then the European average. In practice, people work less, because a part time salary is very often enough to have a nice life. Well, one can argue that is often not a choice because there is a lack of childcare, and that's true, but is also true that having a part time job is not a bad thing by definition. Also because part time is not defined. Some people work at 50%, some people at 90% of the full time. The average is around 80%. And often it is for a nice and managerial kind of job. Also, I think that the main reason why in Holland you see so many women discriminations or related problems, it is because women are free to talk about it, they want to express it. I think the number of housewives in Italy is just scary, and of course all these women staying at home, claiming that taking care of the house is just as any other job, and chit-chatting with ladies friends agains men and their housband is not the right mood to fight against male chauvinism. Actually it is just a good reason to become even more chauvinist. At the end The Netherlands is a country that has chosen as main value the eguality among people, and is one of the main supporters of the CEDAW ( Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women) so I think that it may look a bit paradoxal, but the fact we can complain so much about the situation of women in the Netherlands is actually a sign of a better position of the women here then in other places. It is nevertheless true that everywhere, we are very very far from reaching the same rights and the same treatment then our male collegues, and even if it may be not very useful, it is always good to talk about that and let people reflect about this.
Sinterklaas, episode I: The Zwarte Piet menace
Traditions in Holland say Sinterklaas comes from Spain, and they are supported by facts: every year a dutch TV troupe films the departure of Sinterklaas and his helper Zwarte Piet from Spain (as you can see in the picture Eleonora took in Madrid two yers ago) and after a couple of weeks his arrival in Amsterdam by steamboat is greeted by many dutchmen.
Traditions today say that when in Spain, Sinterklaas freed a young moor slave sentenced to death and after that he became his little helper. A even more politically correct view teach that the dark skin of Piet comes from his job as a chimneysweep. This is supported by his clothes which remind the Italian chimneysweep's costume.
But of course the origin is another: in Christian traditions Saint Nicholas was in fact said to work with the devil himself (he's said to have enslaved the devil), and how's the devil looking?
Well, dark skinned of course.
And when this XIX century picture became too racist Zwarte Piet became "just a young slave from a non better specified South, freed by the Sint".
He's supposed to help Sinterklaas to bring presents to the good children, and to punish the bad ones.
Parents use to tell their children that if they have been good, Zwarte Piet will bring them gifts and sweets, but if they have been bad, Piet will catch them, stuff them in his huge dufflebag and send them away to Spain as punishment.
This is sort of funny: what kind of menace is to being send to Spain???
It's even more ironic if you think that Spain is nowadays the main holiday country for dutch people!
But this is something that often sounds weird to me.
The way dutch children are punished if they were bad is pretty different from what we're used to in Italy.
Another typical punishment is to force them to eat spruitjes, Brussels sprouts. This is understandable (even if I love Brussels sprouts), but the funny thing is that if they were good they will be allowed, as reward, to eat spinaches!
There is in fact a way of saying here to incourage kids, which is:
En je zult spinazie etenwhic translates as: "[if you are good] you'll eat spinaches".
This doesn't have much to do with Sinterklaas, but I like it because it's a sort of parody of another saying: "if you keep going fine, you'll become like Spinoza".
Spinoza and spinache in Dutch sound more or less the same, so they just switched to the funny version.
Have I been heavy enough? Good...
Monday, December 15, 2008
Sinterklaas, episode VI: The return of De Sint
One of the recent hit from the dutch band Bløf sings Oktober is de wreedste maand, October is the cruelest month.
Despite this, Autumn is actually one of the best season in Holland.
"It is in Autumn that Amsterdam feels like at home" as one of the main critic of our modern society had to say.
The proof of this is that the only remarkable festivity in the Dutch tradition is Sinterklaas, at the apogee of Autumn.
Moreover this is the only period in which The Netherlands offer some good stuff to eat (or some eatable stuff for good), mainly candies and sweets.
There are in fact a lot of typical Autumn sweets sold only in this period and they make the athmosphere pretty warm and Christmas-like. So yes, this is definitely the best period to visit Holland (this, and the Koninginnedag, of course).
The main sweet of the Sinterklaas period are the Chocoladeletteres: thick alphabeth letters made of chocolate. Every kid gets usually the first letter of his name, or a neutral S (for Sinterklaas) or P (for Zwarte Piet). In smaller letters, such as Js or Is, the thickness of the chocolate layer is larger, so to compensate the amount of choc-ness with bigger letters such as Ms.
Then there all kind of other candies and biscuits:
- speculaas, baked cookies with a cinnamon flavour, with some figures stamped on the rectangular front side;
- kruidnoten, small round cookies made from the same dough as the speculaas, they exist also with a chocolate shell;
- pepernooten, not to confuse with pepernoten, they are instead made of rye. They are traditionally scatterd around to children together with coins or candies;
- marzipan! This is of course my favourite! And after last year's 2kg marzipan pig-head Eleonora bought me, this year this became a tradition and I got another one (but bigger, tastier and marzipaner)!
Eet smakelijk!
Friday, December 12, 2008
Sinterklaas, episode V: De Sint strikes back
The main aspect of the Pakjesavond, the evening of December 5th when Sinterklaas brings presents to Dutch children, is of course receiving presents.
Usually the kids find their presents the morning after, left by Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet.
The presents are accompainied by a simple poem, called Sinterklaasgedicht, that says something about the behaviour of the child during the past year and it gives some hints to the nature of the present.
When children grow older and they quit believing in Sinterklaas, the tradition of the Pakjesavond resists and it becomes a party within friends where everybody brings a present for another person.
Usually people draw a lottery (lootje) and they pick the name of the person they will but a small present.
They also write a poem to accompain to present. Usually these poems are more ironic and teasing to the person who receives the present.
In this last case, gifts are usually creatively wrapped in weird shaped boxes the "children" have to make by themselves. Funny situations usually come out also from the un-wrapping procedure, since all kind of tricks and jokes may be used.
Sticky situations may arise: common ingredients for the filling of the gift-box may be saw dust, syrup, hair gel and cotton balls, news paper and peanut butter...
Someone told me that's also traditional to "wrap" the present within a sticky dough made of gingerbread and water and that's what I've done this year for the present I made.
So yes, we had our Sinterklaas dinner with presents, poems and all the other things and it was pretty funny (it was my first Sinterklaas in Holland, since the last two years I was defrosting in the US).
(Even if you know I'm kind of annoying about traditions.)
Saturday, December 06, 2008
Sinterklaas
Yesterday morning I woke up a bit late (even compared to average Saturdays standards).
The reason for that was the happening of the previous evening: sinterklaasavond.
Sinterklaasavond, or pakjesavond which tranlates as "presents' evening", is the main festivity in the dutch calendar and it's celebrated every year on December 5th, Saint Nicholas' eve.
Saint Nicholas, or Sinterklaas in dutch, was a Greek bishop, patron saint of children. He's celebrated in mostly all the Countries in central and eastern Europe, as well as in the most extreme eastern outposts of Italy: Trieste and Monfalcone.
He's an old guy dressed like a bishop and, in the dutch tradition, he's supposingly coming from Spain every year, riding a white horse (het Paard van Sinterklaas) and followed by his personal helper Zwarte Piet, or Black Peter, a Moorish kid that stories tell Sinterklaas resqued from prison and now, in sign of gratitude, helps him in delivering presents to children.
Sinterklaasavond in The Netherlands is a holiday especially for children, and at this time they are supposed to get presents if they were good in the past year. It's in fact Sinterklaas that brings presents in The Netherlands, not Santa Claus, la Befana (which I discover just now it's a peculiar character of Italy only), the Three Kings, any kind of italian Madonna or Child Jesus (as my grandmother used to tell me. I have to admit this separations of roles confused me a bit when I was young).
There are a lot of cooking traditions, funny ways of wrapping the presents and to write the cards, but I will talk about this later on.
(Or you can check on Wikipedia.)
Friday, November 28, 2008
Smoke under the water
There is an urban legend in Holland saying that Dutch people don't like bans, and the only way to let them follow a certain rule is to explain them its social utility.
I'm not sure if this is true, or if this is the case, but the smoking ban active in The Netherlands is definitely facing some comportamental problems.
It all started on July, 1th 2008, when also The Netherlands, one of the last Country in Europe to decide so, started to ban smoking tobacco from public closed places such as bar or restaurants.
In the Country of free Marijuana this sounded a bit weird (even if this is actually one of the few places where you could create some legal smoking rooms for almost all kind of smokers) and protests started as soon as the law was enforced.
On July, 15th dutch Café owners started to join a new religious movement called One and Universal Smokers Church of God whose worshippers are said to believe in the trinity of smoke, fire and ash and honour their god by smoking.
Dozens of bars owners asserted the Dutch constitution and European rules give it legitimacy under the right to freedom of religion.
But the government went on and the police started to give fines to those bars that let their costumers smoke inside.
Unfortunately the fine was not so high (300€ for the owner, nothing for the costumer) and it wasn't enough to persuade the bar owners.
What happened is that in many places owners put next to the door some collecting box, where costumers can throw some coins, to help pay for the potential fine.
In response, Health Minister Ab Klink decided to get tough.
In the future, he proposed, violations of the ban have to be treated as economic offences which would allow the authorities to impose fines as high as 16000€.
A lot of owners of cafes then started to strike, especially in the South.
Groups of cafe owners in cities such as Groningen, Tilburg and Breda have already agreed informally to ignore the ban.
Last weekend, cafe and bar owners in Den Bosch decided en masse to ignore it.
The war has started.
29 bars were sanctioned last weekend only in Den Bosch, while the minister announced that cafes which continue to defy the ban will be closed down for breaking competition laws (because they compete unfairly with cafes which are not breaking the law).
We'll see who'll win.
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Voyage au centre de la Pizza (9):
Pizza romana
This week-end we've been visiting Rome, so it's finally time to update my brief compendium about pizza.
And finally, after two episodes (I, II) talking about not Italian pizzas, I can finally talk about a real one!
So...
Pizza in Rome is pretty different from the usual Napoletan pizza.
Its round pie is very thin and crusty, much more than its sister from Naples.
The dough is made by wheat flour, water, yeast, olive oil and salt (so not other American crap such as vegetable oil or high proteinic content flour) mixed together to give a very hard and steady dough.
One of the most tipical kind of pizza you can find in Rome is the so called pizza Napoli, guarnished with tomato, mozzarella and anchovies. The funny thing is that this kind of pizza is called pizza romana elsewhere in Italy, but not in Rome.
Then of course you can find all kind of toppings on you pizza.
Honourable mention the pizza al taglio.
This is pizza cooked in rectangular metal pans and sold in square slices.
The dough of this kind of pizza is usually more watery so to resist longer and not to become dry, and to be also re-warmed up without loosing any taste.
The pizza al taglio is actually sold all over around Italy (and nosonly) but in Rome it's very particular.
It's in fact prepared with the usual crunchy roman dough that makes it very tasty, with a thin ciabatta-like shape.
It's then usually sold by weight and not by slice.
So then, after two years in Holland I really enjoyed a (couple of) real good pizza.
And the pizza in Rome was pretty good indeed, even if I probably preferred the one al taglio.
Monday, November 17, 2008
15 Miljoen Mensen (Fluitsma & Van Tijn)
After the two versions of the song Het Land van (by Lange Frans & Baas B and Salah Edin) I posted a couple of months ago, here it is another dutch song telling about this Country.
This time it's a non-rap song from 1996. Here you can find the lyrics in dutch and this is the translation:
15 million people
Country of 1000 opinions
The Country of matter-of-factness
All of us on the beach
Rusk for breakfast
The country were nobody goes full out
Except when we win [in football]
Then we have an instant bout of passion
And nobody stayed inside
The country that hates finicking
No uniform is sacred
A son who calls his daddy Pete
A bike is nowhere safe
15 million people
on that little piece of Earth
You don't tell them what to do
You just respect them
15 million people
on that little piece of Erath
You don't put them in a straightjacket
You just respect them
The country full of protest groups
No manager who's really a boss
Where curtains are never drawn
And lunch is a bun with cheese
The country full of tolerance
Except for the neighbour
The biggest question will always remain
Where he gets the money for his rent from?
The country that cares for everyone
Not even a dog eats from the gutter
With snacks from the wall [FEBO]
And nobody who eats dry bread [nobody who is poor]
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Waterschapsverkiezingen 2008
It's been already two and a half years since when I became part of the (second) Italian diaspora.
And since a while I started to think if it was morally right for me to start being interested in Dutch politics rather than keep voting at my homeland elections.
The pragmatic me suggests that Italy needs more help than Holland, by looking how things were going on during the last 14 years; the idealistic me (which I tend to follow most of the times) claims instead that it's unfair to leave a Country in search of better opportunities abroad, but still wishing to interfere with its politics.
Moreover the pain-in-the-ass me states that technically I'm due to be represented here in The Netherlands since I'm paying taxes for this Country since a while.
So the metamorphosis started.
And the opportunity came by post.
We in fact just received an envelop with the ballots and the list of candidates to partecipate at the elections for the Waterschap.
The waterschappen (Dutch for water boards) are regional governament bodies in the Low Countries.
They are charged with defending The Netherlands from water by maintaining the integrity of the water defenses around the polders, managing water barriers (dunes, dikes, quays and levees), waterways, water levels and the water quality in their regions.
Having to do with water, you can easily feel the importance of these institutions (25% of the Country is below sea level, and three main rivers cut the land in many wet slices). In fact they are among the oldest forms of local government in the Netherlands, some of them having been founded in the 13th century.
Waterschappen hold separate elections, levy taxes and function independently from other government bodies.
There are 27 waterschappen in The Netherlands covering the whole territory. The Hoogheemraadschap Amstel, Gooi en Vecht is the waterschap governing Amsterdam region and it's this the one we're going to vote for.
The general structure of these institutions consist in a general administrative body (elected by people), an executive board (elected by the administrative body) and a chairperson (appointed by the government), also called dijkgraaf, the Count of the dikes (cool, isn't it?).
Actually, asking around to some friends of mine it turned out that among common people nobody really cares about these elections and that it's just "another political charge".
Nevertheless I'll try to find out the differences between the candidates and start being interested in dutch politics.
Maybe also here there is someone that believes that Obama is tanned.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
The Abilene paradox
On a hot afternoon visiting in Coleman, Texas, the family is comfortably playing dominoes on a porch, until the father-in-law suggests that they take a trip to Abilene (53 miles north) for dinner. The wife says, "Sounds like a great idea." The husband, despite having reservations because the drive is long and hot, thinks that his preferences must be out-of-step with the group and says, "Sounds good to me. I just hope your mother wants to go." The mother-in-law then says, "Of course I want to go. I haven't been to Abilene in a long time."
The drive is hot, dusty, and long. When they arrive at the cafeteria, the food is as bad as the drive. They arrive back home four hours later, exhausted.
One of them dishonestly says, "It was a great trip, wasn't it." The mother-in-law says that, actually, she would rather have stayed home, but went along since the other three were so enthusiastic. The husband says, "I wasn't delighted to be doing what we were doing. I only went to satisfy the rest of you." The wife says, "I just went along to keep you happy. I would have had to be crazy to want to go out in the heat like that." The father-in-law then says that he only suggested it because he thought the others might be bored.
The group sits back, perplexed that they together decided to take a trip which none of them wanted. They each would have preferred to sit comfortably, but did not admit to it when they still had time to enjoy the afternoon.
Thursday, November 06, 2008
Are Americans better then Italians?
Well, from a first glance, it would look like yes, they are. But maybe Obama is so good that he can even explain us that maybe it is not true. He said, just after being elected:
"Today the American people have made their voices heard, and they have said, 'Things are finally as terrible as we're willing to tolerate, to elect a black man, in this country, and at this time—these last eight years must have really broken you."
Yes, probably he is right. The situation in the U.S. is now much worse then in Italy, even considering Berlusconi and his mafia/massonic connections. At least, americans are much poorer then we are. Not because of our great way of doing economy, hell no, but because we have Europe to save our ass. God Save Europe. And we don't even realize that.... but this is another story. The point is that I am very happy of this election result, and I am very happy for my american friends, they can rely on the fact that they are not surrounded by completely helpless people, but it is still possible to change things. Nevertheless, I would like to strike a blow in favour of the Italians, and say that we are very far of having such an alternative and vote for somebody like Obama. Maybe if we could, we would also do it. Maybe.
Anyway, I am not sure that he will really change things as much as we europeans are expecting him to do.... but hope is last to die, so let's see if he can astonish us and change the western world in a different way of the one is happening now (the decline of America and the rise of the East, hopefully, but unfortunately unlikely, with the hand of Europe).
For the moment my main hope is that Europe will keep a look of what happened in the U.S. in the last 10 years and learn the lesson, and stop voting for right wing populistic non-political people.....
BTW, last glance to who has led U.S. in such a disastrous situation:
In a press conference held this morning on the White House lawn, President Bush formally asked the assembled press corps and members of his own administration if, in light of today's election, he could stop being the president now. "So it's over, right? Can I stop being president now?" Bush said after striding to the podium in a Texas Rangers cap and flannel shirt, carrying a fully packed suitcase. "Let's just say I'm done as of now. Presidency over." When informed by Washington Post reporter David Broder that his presidency would continue through early January, Bush stared at him quizzically, sighed, and shuffled silently back into the White House.
Poor him, would you please leave this poor guy alone, to run behind the cows and stop forcing him (hopelessly) to think???????
Monday, November 03, 2008
Vouwfietsen
This week I gain one more point on my Dutchness score.
After the aardappelstamper (a potato masher ment to be used to prepare the stamppot), the eiersnijder (an egg slicer) and the legendary kaasschaaf (a cheese slicer), now I'm proud to announce that I'm finally in possession of an awesome Vouwfiets!
Which is, as the picture shows, a foldable bike (I've got it as a birthday present: thanks!).
Here in Holland this kind of bike is often used by commuters like me: people that live in one city (Amsterdam) and has to go to work to another city (Utrecht).
So instead of having a bike in each city and leave them in the train station to wait (which is what I was doing before: home -> Amsterdam train station by bike, Amsterdam -> Utrecht by train, Utrecht train station -> University by a second bike) now I can easily fold up my bike and put in on the train.
Cool, isn't it?
The bike works amazingly!
Despite the fact that the wheels are small, the gear system is smartly done and pushing on the pedals is very easy and definitely not hard.
And the bike itself is not heavier than 11 kg, so it's handy to bring it around in a folded configuration.
A last thing I discovered googling around.
The word commuting ("fare il pendolare" in Italian) is translated as "forensisme" in Dutch. Which originates from the Latin word forenses (= of the forum, the Latin market) and apparently was used to refer peasant coming to the city market from Germany to sell their goods. Then it was taken over to name in general people from the countryside that use to work in Amsterdam.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Gelli Beans
Once upon a time there was a pseudo democratic Country called Italy.
It was located at the very border of the Free Western Empire and because of that it was very much subject to the risks coming from the bordering Evil Red Empire.
Since the inhabitants of this Country didn't completely agree on which side to support, the ruling Free Western Empire had to spent a huge effort (both in economical and political help) to keep the Country under its influence sphere.
As a consequence the political life of the Country stayed for 50 years frozen in the hands of the Christian Democracy party, while safety and stability where assured by precise and harsh actions led by some governament guided right-wing paramilitary groups.
This worked for a while, but later it became clear that it was more easy, in order to keep the power over the Country, to fill all the society spheres with trusted men rather than facing the Evil Empire with direct brutal force.
In this Country was living a Venerable Master.
He was a peculiar character: during the last war he used to play for both fascist and anti-fascist sides (even if he preferred the first one), while right after the war he started collaborating with the Free Western Empire intelligence service, and then ended up being at the intelligence service of his own Country.
Someone claims it was this Venerable Master that helped the Empire in building a thick control net over the Italian society, using his acquaintances in the Freemansonry world.
His covert lodge was very powerful and it included very important state officers, politicians (also ministers and deputies), military officers.
The aim of the network was to subvert the political order in Italy and lead eventually to an authoritarian turning by steps: creation of two big parties, gain control over the media and judges, ask for constitutional reforms, bench reform, abolition of provinces and study qualifications.
"Unfortunately" the network was discovered after five years and the lists of associates were made public.
Notably, the then future Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi was on the list.
A couple of times the Master had something nice to say about him: "The real power lays in the hands of who control the Media", "All is becoming a reality little by little, piece by piece. To be truthful, I should have had the copyright to it. Justice, TV, public order. I wrote about this thirty years ago..." or "Berlusconi is an extraordinary man, a man of action. This is what Italy needs: not a man of words, but a man of action."
Today, after 25 years, our Venerable Master has been asked to go public and to run a TV program, Venerable Italy, where he's going to teach Italian history, from the Fascism to these days.
Special guests for the first episode will be controversial former Italian Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti, and the co-leader of Berlusconi's Forza Italia party, Marcello Dell'Utri, convicted for collusion with the Mafia (pending appeal).
Together, they are going to explain us their version of Italian history.
Is this good or bad?
Is this a chance for enlighten people to see the real connections between present and past powers in Italy, or it's a sign that by now in this Country you can say whatever you want and full as many people as you can, telling them your own truth?
I'm not sure actually.
Personally I'm pretty interested in listen on what he has to say. It's more or less like to listen to the devil's teaching. He definitely knows a lot of our Country's dirty secrets and he's probably going to play with them.
I think the interesting thing will be to see who he's going to address his stories to.
Normal folk or non-disinterested politicians?
Anyways... they all lived happily ever after.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Francesco Cossiga on Democracy in Italy
On Thursday, October 23rd, commenting over S.Berlusconi's intimidation (denied righ after by he himself) to use police force against university demontrators in Italy, former President of the Italian Republic (and currently lifetime senator) Francesco Cossiga stated the following on an interview (here the original text):
President Cossiga, do you think that Berlusconi has gone too far in threatening the use of State force against the students?
That depends, if he believes he is the Prime Minister of a strong State then no, he was right. But as Italy is a weak State, as the opposition is no longer the rock-like PCI (Italian Communist Party, which changed name and broke up in 1991) but the evanescent PD (Democratic Party, led by Walter Veltroni, formed in 2007 from the remains of the old PCI together with other centre-left forces), I'm afraid that his words will not be followed by action and that Berlusconi will just end up with egg on his face.
What should happen now?
At this point, Maroni (Roberto Maroni (Lega Nord), current Home Minister) should do what I did when I was Home Secretary.
What's that?
Firstly, forget the high-school students... can you imagine what would happen if a 10-year-old kid got killed or seriously injured...
Instead, the university students?
Let them get on with it. Withdraw the police from the streets and the universities, infiltrate the movement with agents provocateurs ready for anything, and allow the demonstrators to run loose for a week or so, devastating shops, setting cars on fire and causing havoc in the streets.
Then what? Then, with public opinion on your side, the sound of ambulance sirens should drown out the sirens of police and carabinieri cars.
In the sense that...
In the sense that the forces of law and order should massacre the demonstrators without pity and send them all to hospital. Not arrest them - the magistrates would set them free straight away in any event... beat them bloody and beat the teachers storring them up bloody too.
The teachers, too?
The teacher above all. Not the older ones, of course... the young girls. Have you any idea of the seriousness of what's happening? There are teachers indoctrinating children and encouraging them to demonstrate - that's criminal behaviour!
But you realise what they would say in Europe after something like you suggest? "Fascism returns to Italy", they'd say.
Rubbish, it's the democratic way - put out the flame before the fire spreads.
What fire?
I'm not exaggerating when I say I truly believe that terrorism will return to bloody the streets of this country. And I wouldn't want people to forget that the Red Brigades (BR) were not born in the factories but in the universities. And that the slogans they used were used before them by the Student Movement and the trade union left.
So you think it is possible that history will repeat itself?
It's not possible, it's probable. That's why I'm saying: let's not forget that the BR were born because the flame was not put out in time.
Veltroni's PD is on the side of the demonstrators.
Look, I can't in all honesty see Veltroni taking to the streets and risk getting a cracked skull. You're more likely to see him in some exclusive club in Chicago, applauding Obama.
He won't take to the streets with a stick in his hands, sure, but politically...
Politically, he's making the same mistake that the PCI made when the troubles (The widespread progressive protest movement which began in the late 1960s) started: it backed the movement, deluding itself that it could control it, but when it too became a target, as was bound to happen, it soon changed its mind. The so-called hard-line adopted by Andreotti, Zaccagnini and me was suggested by Berlinguer (Leader of the PCI from 1972 to 1984)... But today we've got the PD, an ectoplasm led by another ectoplasm. And that's another good reason for Berlusconi to be more prudent.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
ShareThis
Posts
