this country is being so wasted right now, people are hurting, the corruption so endemic and entrenched, it seems some amoral permission is being given all down the line from the example at he highest levels, where duplicity and opacity are written right into the dna, spewing aver more arcane scams, sucking the vitality from the country.

until they see the goverment spending their tax money wisely, the italians will go on dealing in the black, and the government will have to scrape.

i'm already hearing the voice of the small business entrepreneur rueing berlusconi's unseating.

this was so depressing to hear, from an otherwise perfectly rational and seeming intelligent person.

it is rot, and the head rots first.

i want so much to believe in prodi, but it seems he is not much loved.

the good news for me right now in italian politics is that the left have much brighter people at the top, whereas the right is already bitterly infighting, (something everyone thought the left would immediately do), and casini is the only rightist with minimal charisma, whereas rutelli and alema are good communicators, as is fasini.

fini is the wild card, a very wily man, beadily consistent and cool-blooded, which gives him some traction as the others look vainer and make more noise.

he reminds me a lot of putin, actually.

the unity on the left is holding better, it seems, is (i guess) the point of this ramble, from my ignorant point of view.

someone has to put the 'rant' into 'ignorant'!

whatis amazing is how good the italian reporting is getting here at ET.

front-row seats, people!

~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~