I love Italy; I love Italians; I love myself. Natch. But they are so fucking lame sometimes. In case you're silly enough to not subscribe to the New York Times, the linked article finishes with the line 'And the Italians should reconsider their approach. . . That would require an extreme act of political bravery. So don't bet on its happening anytime soon.' Holy shit. There's a wee encapsulation of their whole lameness.*I don't want to get too deeply into Italian lameness today because I still feel the need to focus my nationalistic contempt on France. But I will say that for Canada, in the context of the approaching election, Italy is a topical cautionary tale. Things here are generally good, yes. The issues being argued in this election don't have cataclysmic implications, no. And our electoral system is more representative and accountable than that of the United States, yes. Those are hardly reasons to get complacent and start ignoring our political process like a bunch of Italians. PAY ATTENTION, BITCHES! Or you'll end with the governance the inattentive deserve - a sequence of instable minority governments whose parties have sold their ideology to the highest bidder and which are sometimes headed by the Berlusconi-esque.
Feel them. Feel the goosebumps, motherfucker.
An exhaustive description of Italian lameness can be found in this week's Economist, which contains a damning survey of the country's economic and political situation.
*That article fails to mention a peice of shocking hypocrisy: the Museo Egizio di Torino is the second or third best egyptology collection in the world, depending on whether you're talking to a Brit or an Italian. The collection was 'built' and 'recovered' during the north African colonial era. . . but I guess national interests forbid such mentions. Any G-7 country starting that sort of war of words would be a pot or kettle calling some other pot or kettle black.
4 commenti:
It depends on where I'm on the voting roll. If it's North Bay, and I think it is, I'll vote for the Liberals because Anthony Rota is a rising star in their firmament who is excellent at scoring federal money for the riding. If it's here, which I don't think it is, I still have to study my options. You?
I'd suggest you vote based on the qualities of the candidates in your riding. Honestly I can't think of any other way to make a considered decision this time; when it comes to the party aristocracy we're not exactly drowning in a sea of ideological intelligence here.
Are you voting in Montréal or Ottawa? Do you consider the Conservative Party has a prayer of picking up either?
There's no such thing as a thrown-away vote in an accountable system wherein everybody votes. Even typing that sentence feels like a willful act of denial, but there you are.
Good luck with voting 'federally'; I don't want to swing too far back towards cynicism now but at the national level the figureheads are already a bunch of whores who would say anything about anything to get anything.
I'm censoring three or four political commercials a day - excuse me if I seem hyperbolic but this is some twisted shit.
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