By Oscar Bartoli
John is not his actual name. He is a man in his mid-forties with a lofty position in a think tank -- one of those companies that charges a lot to prepare reports on what's going on around the world. The following conversation took place at a famous Italian restaurant in Washington, D.C.
JOHN: Well, you Italians should be happy. You've now invented Peronism Italian style, just like you had Divorce Italian Style. (Our perfidious speaker refers to the 1961 Pietro Germi movie in which the protagonist portrayed by Marcello Mastroianni, kills his wife in order to marry her lover.)
OSCAR: If you"re alluding to our prime minister' s 'personal laws,' I can't blame you. In any event, the fact remains that a majority of Italians re-elected him and so his power derives from popularity.
JOHN: His power is derived from his media empire and his control over public television. The result is a foregone conclusion given the daily brain washing.
OSCAR: The prime minister and his supporters claim he has no control whatsoever and that in Italy there is a dissident party identified with La Repubblica newspaper.
JOHN: Baloney. Do you really think we don't closely follow what is happening in your country? At the very least we have to do it for professional reasons. The Repubblica knows what it's doing. It's all a matter of business because it has captured a segment of public opinion that has been totally ignored due to the lack of a solid opposition. It's main goal is to sell papers and advertising.
OSCAR: When you talk to people in Italy, they all are convinced that the media is fixated on attacking the prime minister.
JOHN: Why not? The reports of liaison with minors and his cronies who pay for call girls, who go to his 'private' residence which isn't private because a head of government lives there are not lies or slander? And there's more....
OSCAR: I can tell that you have a problem with Silvio Bertusconi...
JOHN: Personally, I admire him because he's quite a charcter. But professionally I have been following him for years and he sends shivers down my spine because he's capable of anything.
OSCAR: Let's not exaggerate. Bertusconi isn't the only guy suffering from satyriasis. Look, we had the president of the Lazio region, happlily married and the father of two daughters, who was caught with transvestites. And here in America things aren't any better. First of all, you taught us that in politics you take no prisoners. All it takes is one confused senator who filibusters for five days to block a law to ensure unemployment compensation. As for sex, the headlines in recent decades have been full of the exploits of oral sex Clinton had to relieve his stress, the self destruction of Senator Edwards, thought to be a shoo-in as Obama's vice president, with his lover, illegitimate child and wife suffering from cancer, the politicians caught in public restrooms playing footsie with a cop and the abuse of interns, who then write books about it, on Capitol Hill. So, let's be honest. The U.S. doesn't have the moral standing to preach.
JOHN: Maybe. But I've never read anything in American papers like the builders who laughed about the earthquake in Aquila that killed hundreds of people because all they could think about was the money they were going to make, thanks to their political connections.
OSCAR: That's because here they don't publish the contents of wiretaps.
JOHN: Okay, so what about the Italian comedy of change and late admissions of candidates of the PDL (Partito della Liberta), Bertusconi's protege for regional elections? If I had been a center-right voter, I would have asked myself: 'Where did these guys come from? They want my vote and they can't even run a simple election?' And yet they are still asking for a vote on who will govern a region like Lazio or Lombardy. And then there is the war against all types of institutions, including the judges. Add this to the declaration of LaRussa, the minister of defense, who apparently said, 'We are ready for everything!' It made me think of the Fascists preparing to march on Rome who yelled: 'Roma o Morte!' (Rome or death), a chant the usual jokers changed into 'Rome or Orte' (a town 40 km from Rome). But that's not all. In addition to the daily onslaught of scandals of wiretapping, of corruption, there is the news of the arrest of the member of the Sistine Chapel Choir who procured men for an executive, who also functioned as an 'usher' for the Pope, and who is also under arrest for kickbacks. The Vatican immediately clarified that it had nothing to do with any seminarian or priest.
OSCAR: In America it's all quicker. You elect judges tied to a political party that controls everything up to the Supreme Court and thus make decisions that impact the life of the country for decades.
JOHN: Well, then why do you stay in America if there's so much you don't like about it?
OSCAR: Because even if this is not the best of all possible worlds, we know that if we work hard we will make it without having to prostitute ourselves to curry the favor of those who happen to be in power. I am happy to be a citizen because I pay every last cent of my taxes in the knowledge that most Americans do the same. Here in American there are a lot of crooks, but when they get caught they pay the price. And they usually get caught. So, what upsets me so much is that when I go back to Italy, as I often do, I feel immersed in an oppressive and dark atmosphere in which everyone looks at you with resentment, all deals have been discarded and the people crave an obscene, immoral materialism. You could say that these are generalizations. Okay. Their sin is one of excess. But it's all too much. The ones that scare me the most are the young Italians because their models for the future are based on the lowest common denominator: teleevision. Waiter? The check please.
JOHN: Here's my credit card. Let's split it. This, too, is the American way.
The author is a veteran Italian journalist based in Washington, D.C. The preceding is reprinted from his newsletter, Letter from Washington, which he publsihes in English and Italian and can be accessed at http://oscarb1.blogspot.com/
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