Italian politics

Corrupt to the Very Roots?

From yesterday’s newspaper:

Another carabiniere is being questioned in the Marrazzo blackmail case. His name is Donato D’Autilia, 42 years old, and in 2006 he was arrested in connection with a pedophilia investigation. He is suspected – together with about thirty others, among them  businessmen, priests, and military – of having forced numnerous Roma children into sexual encounters.

As we expected, the crime ring is widening. Just scratch the surface in this country and criminal behavior comes oozing out of the wound.

This thread began here.

Carl Bernstein: Berlusconi Bordering on Stalinism

Carl Bernstein was invited on the controversial Italain political show Annozero last night. He spoke twice (from New York), and it appeared that there were indeed two separate Carl Bernsteins: one who chose journalistic prudence: “We have to be very careful of generalizations. I think many of the restrictions of good journalism are self-imposed.” He won a Pulitzer Prize, so he should know. Below is the clip, around 4:30. (Video blocked.)

Which brings us to the second Carl Bernstein. About half an hour later, the previously prudent Bernstein–who had admitted he wasn’t in any position to judge Italian politics because he didn’t really follow them–lashed out against the Berlusconi government as “a kind of Soviet Stalinism.” You can hear this at around 3:20 in the clip below. (Same story.)

What was responsible for the sudden change of heart? Even Michele Santoro, who earlier had introduced Bernstein as “played by Robert Redford in the movie”, commented: “Bernstein must have had an espresso.”