Apropos of the histrionic tone towards immigration that Italy’s runoff elections took recently, it’s interesting to take a look at how the issue was approached in Britain 43 years ago by Enoch Powell, the conservative firebrand best remembered for his “rivers of blood” speech. James Walston has a good bit about this up in one …
Category Archives: Bossi
Duomo & Sarpi: stories behind images
In an effort to provide a little context for Magdi’s provocative posters, some reading from the archives in order to illuminate exactly what happened: The praying at piazza Duomo was connected to protests against the Gaza War and happened on January 3, 2009. Organizers of the protests say that the prayer was spontaneous. Coverage in …
Magdi Allam’s Politics of Fear
Some readers have criticized my use of the word “nutjob” to describe Magdi Allam. That is admittedly an imprecise description of a journalist-turned-demagogue whose views are nativist at best and racist at worst. Like Oriana Fallaci before him, Allam has a deep and abiding fear of Muslims in Europe. Unlike Fallaci, Allam was born in …
Life among the Lowly
Journalist-cum-politican Magdi Cristiano Allam loves Italy, he tells us. The Egyptian-born Italian, who made a publicized conversion to Catholicism, seems quick to absorb Italian values — if rampant, no-holds-barred race baiting is an Italian value. Going far beyond provocative and into offensive, his images of Muslims praying in Milan’s piazza Duomo, Chinese rioting against shop …
Berlusconi and Fini explained – in less than 5 minutes
From the geniuses at Beautiful Lab, this video should explain all the Berlusconi-Fini tensions from the past 18 years in five minutes. Right? Hattip to Owni.eu.
150 Years of Unity?
Italy’s political situation, overshadowed lately by events in Middle East, is grim. Berlusconi’s coalition totters. Fini’s breakaway group seems waiting for the right moment. Indeed this fall March was bandied about as the right time for a vote. More power has flowed to Lega Nord’s Bossi, whose ministers voted again making the 17th a holiday, …
Friday AM Roundup
What’s great about Friday morning? Having the Economist placed at your feet. And even though this is a blog, sometimes it takes having the paper placed in your hands to do a good scan. Premesso’s not-quite week in review, drawn from the weekly of record: 1. On February 15, La Padania interviewed Pier Luigi Bersani, …
More Zungu Zungu, less Bunga Bunga
This site isn’t meant to break news. But there’s been a near-perfect storm of events — so much excellent newsworthy material on Italy, the Balkans and international relations in general, and not nearly enough time to bang out a coherent thought with me being swamped with both typical and atypical end-of-year responsibilities. Some points: Berlusconi’s …
If it had been in Italy…
A student passed me this joke on the Chilean mine disaster, which also plays on a lot of other recent Italian news (Sarah Scazzi, Giancarlo Tulliani‘s house, the Naples trash crisis, the electoral crisis). Mainly it’s funny, if you get it all. Deep Italian current events, knowledge, sure, but enjoy: If it had happened in …
Quick Roundup
ENEL is getting pretty interesting. Check out their Green Power. Back when in 2008 I was impressed by their solar generation, tracked by the minute, at their headquarters near Largo Cairoli in Milan. As was predicted in the Italian press years ago — and in these pages a few weeks back when people were naive …