The day after Antonio Di Pietro’s support to De Luca as Governor of Campania, I woke up with a heavy head, with a feeling of nausea. I didn’t understand the reason straight away. Then I got my thoughts focused and I revisioned thousands of people who were applauding with conviction, with a “standing ovation”, a person who embodies the exact opposite of Antonio Di Pietro. Marco Travaglio describes in every detail in today’s “Il Fatto Quotidiano” the judicial affairs closely enmeshed with Bersani‘s PDminusL in Emilia-Romagna. I’m not going to repeat that. This article would not be long enough to list them all. For De Luca there’s no need to wait for the verdict, his face does the speaking, his arrogance, his ignorance as you can admire in the video that he devoted to me when I criticised the Acerra incinerator.
For a party that has made “clean hands” as its slogan, De Luca represents political suicide. In fact, those who have dirty hands could say that Di Pietro is the same as the others. Ghedini, Belpietro and Feltri are paying money from their own pockets to be able to meet him face to face in a TV programme. There’ll be the queue. It’s still true however that Antonio Di Pietro is not the same as the others. So then, why disintegrate a patrimony of agreement for a gentleman with two serious trials ongoing? It would have been better to have Bassolino who has only one trial and is even more friendly.
I am grateful to Di Pietro for the support that he has always given to the blog’s initiatives like the V-Days or the demonstrations of the anti-mafia families. He’s the only one of the party secretaries to publicly express solidarity with me. The Internet is watching what Di Pietro is doing with a critical eye, almost like a lover that has been betrayed. I won’t do that. He’ll have his reasons and they are not mine. However, Bersani and La Torre in the front line at the Italia dei Valori Conference (together with the “Stone guest” Massimo D'Alema) represent an idea of politics that don’t belong to me, that of the compromise of the “least worst”, of the lack of alternative in the name of a governability that has gifted us decades of Andreotti, Craxi and Berlusconi. I’m sorry, it doesn’t interest me.
The 5-Star MoVement wants to change the rules of the game. In Campania it is presenting Roberto Fico as a candidate. He is a 35 year old citizen with good qualifications and a clean record. The citizens must represent themselves and must respond for their actions to the voters every day through the Internet. Each person counts for one. The Programme is the reference point. Ideas and not ideologies. Politics as a service (temporary) and not a profession. The means that justify the ends are a total fuck up. The ends and the means are the same thing. If the former is shit, then the latter becomes shit too. Tonino go back on your decision.

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Good day to you all. If you read the newspapers tomorrow (I doubt that the TV News will give it much importance), they will talk about the comments on the news, but they won’t talk about the news. Today you have the possibility to put together some of the fragments of the political-media mosaic of the last few days, because perhaps someone wondered, but why is it that certain newspapers, Il Corriere della Sera that in certain pages, thanks to certain signed articles seems to be the branch of “Libero” or of “Il Giornale”, has devoted itself with so much passion and so much space to a photo of 16 or 18 years ago, a photo showing Di Pietro eating with some Carabinieri, an American investigator and Bruno Contrada?

Ciancimino’s strongbox
Why have Berlusconi’s newspapers dragged out once more the story of D'Addario that seemed dead and buried? Did they have nothing better to do? Are we sure that Berlusconi is happy that they talk once more about his adventures with a prostitute?
What’s happened to the “short trial”? And what’s happened to the “legitimate impediment”? And what will be the next move, given that they have told us that the “legitimate impediment” is just a “bridge” of 18 months ready for something of more substance and that is even more definitive? This stuff that has come out in the last few days about a law against turncoats, that is against turncoats and against witnesses, what’s that? Why did they announce it and then deny it? What’s happening? Today the last phase of Massimo Ciancimino’s declarations at the trial in Palermo arrives and you find it in a few newspapers tomorrow, starting with “Il Fatto” naturally, Ciancimino is talking in the trial relating to the negotiations between the State and the mafia, the trial against General Mori and Captain Colonel Mauro Obinu, defendants accused of aiding and abetting the mafia according to the prosecution, for not having arrested Provenzano in Mezzojuso in 1995, waiting then for the Police to arrest him in 2006.

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Whoever chases after the others, is lost! Whoever delegates their own rights is a sucker. This is what they want us to become: “coglioni perduti” {lost suckers}. The first move, whatever it is, is left to the scoundrels that profess themselves to be politicians but who are often, too often, vulgar delinquents who break the laws. People who are on trial or definitively convicted. People who are so arrogant that they make the decisions about the future of the Nation and they take the decisions without consulting the citizens. And these decisions are the fruit of agreements, or personal benefits, of mess-ups, of pacts with Confindustria lobbies or with criminal powers. The first move is the TAV in Val di Susa, a monster for the transport of goods that don’t exist and that will carry 20 to 30 billion euro into the coffers of the cooperatives, the politicians and organised crime. The first move was the biggest American military base in Europe at Vicenza, brought into being against the local population. The first move is the Messina Bridge, a mafia gift. Whoever is in power is there because they were the first to move, they see the game, they create the game, they use the voters like pawns on a chess board. The first move is the laws that dismantle the justice system, one after the other, for fifteen years. Never a law against the conflict of interests or to get a trial as quickly as possible for a politician who is under investigation. The second move by the so-called parliamentary Opposition is always a pallid contrast, a “balbettare di collusi” {babble of those who collude}, of those soon to be put under investigation, of “vogliosi poltronisti” {those wanting an armchair}.
The first move is the mess-ups sold for governability. It is legitimate for the citizen to oppose but it’s laborious, and at times useless. The playing field, the players, the referee and the linesmen are already set out against that citizen, together with the TV reporter. The first move is the privatisation of what belongs to us, of water, of territory, of motorways, and even of the Civil Protection and of Defence. The first move is to get into debt without our consent, a billion euro one after the other, accumulating 1,800 billion of Public Debt. A debt that has to be honoured every year with interest, in 2010 about 75 billion, that we are paying for with our taxes. A debt that takes away resources from innovation, from social policy, from research, from development. The first move is the construction of nuclear power stations AGAINST a referendum and against the economics. In fact the cost of construction and the costs of disposal of the waste (for which no one has yet found a solution) have to be financed by the State. The first move is to put up the “least worst” as candidates, mouthfuls to be swallowed in the absence of an alternative (as though an alternative does not exist): Boccia in Apulia, Formigoni in Lombardy, De Luca in Campania with two notifications of proceedings. People who are guarantors and accomplices of the Anti-State. In Apulia, the first move was taken by Vendola. There it was the citizens who won at the Primaries. But it’s the exception that proves the rule of the Caste. Once the first move has been cashed in, the citizen has two alternatives, either to grin and bear it and to get equipped with antiemetics so as not to vomit or to seriously think of taking the whole family to live abroad.
Making the first move makes it possible to define anyone who opposes you as “anti”: No global, No Dal Molin, No Bridge. The word “No” is used to label the citizen as being against progress. To chase after something is a mistake, you have to be the first to act, to make the first move, and to be contagious for the sceptics with ideas and results that are already numerous. The blog by now is not sufficient to collect all of them. This is the reason why what is arriving is a website of the 5 Star MoVement for the publication and distribution of videos, of witness statements, photos that get to me in their hundreds every day. They will never give up (but is it in their interests?). Neither will we.

Vive la France. Allons enfants de la patrie le jour de gloire est arrivé. I’m in Paris for the "Incredible Italy!" tour. Ici tout est plus facile. Europe has changed in these past ten or fifteen years. Changed for the better. In comparison, Italy is a petrified forest. Incomprehensible from abroad. In order to understand Italy, one needs the services of a cultural translator, a political translator and a social translator. Italy is a world unto itself. The Jurassic Park of the European Continent. A basket full of serpents in which Freemasonry, deviant State powers and organised crime on a global scale are intertwined. A metaphysical place in which the Church State controls and issues orders, the television stations tell of a fairy tale Country, the politicians are more mature than Lenin’s mummy and the majority of the Country’s citizens live in a state of permanent slumber. Here, things are totally different, and the strangest thing is that everything works. I was no longer used to seeing things like trains that are clean, pavements that are not taken over by parked cars, cycling paths, smiling people out on the streets and entire families holding their children’s hands. Seen from this side, "les italiens" look like aliens. They don’t instil fear, even though they should. Contagion only takes a second. Who was it that invented fascism in Europe? Italy, yet we have Fini, who has long since become Christian-Democratised while here they have Le Pen. When the first rabbit was introduced into Australia, no one was particularly concerned. Then the proceeded to breed, millions at a time, and became worse than a plague of locusts. That is just how we are: amiable, helpful, almost loving, with "those joyful eyes of an Italian on tour". My job is to warn the European people of impending danger. The content of George Orwell’s novel entitled 1984 has come true in Italy. Everything is under control, even dissent. Why can this not happen in "Douce France" or in Switzerland? Or in Germany or Denmark for that matter? Of all the European people, the French are the most at risk. In the last two thousand years, their country was occupied by the Romans for four hundred years and by Mussolini for four years during the course of the Second World War. At other times they imported everything possible from Italy, revealing their true passion for art. The French are kleptomaniacs when it comes to everything Italian, but they don’t want this fact to be common knowledge. Without all of its Renaissance works, the Louvre would have to close its doors. Leonardo spent his latter days here. The only place where the Popes were hosted outside of Italy is here in Avignon. However, on that occasion they soon realised their mistake and the French sent them back to us. In exchange, they demanded “la Gioconda”, Nice and the Savoie region. The French Revolution was born in Paris, as was the guillotine. More modestly, all we have had was “piazzale Loreto” and Berlusconi instead of Napoleon.

Greece is about to be placed under administration because of its public debt and its ratio of debt to GDP. The level of debt is rising while production is dropping. In essence, Greece will be obliged to surrender part of its economic sovereignty to the EU in order to survive. Today’s newspapers are talking about the European Countries that are in trouble, without mentioning Italy (!?). PIGS, an acronym representing the four Countries at risk, namely P for Portugal, I for Italy, G for Greece and S for Spain has thus become an unpronounceable PGS. Italy has disappeared so it must have become virtuous. Portugal, which is widely believed to be the next Country to follow in Greece’s footsteps, has a public debt to GDP ratio of 76,6%. If only ours were that low! Italy is sitting with a debt to GDP ratio of 115% and 1,800 billion in public debt. The beauty of the economy is that it is so varied and everyone can continue to bullshit until the moment of default. As from today, the Blog has a new host, namely Eugenio Benetazzo, and a new appointment with "Chaos economy".

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The public debt and the PIGS (expand | compress)

A friendly hello to all the readers of the Blog. My name is Eugenio Benetazzo and I am an independent Stock Exchange trader and an economics expert. We are going to attempt to provide a framework that is as exhaustive as possible on the economic and macroeconomic scenario facing our Country. We are all well aware of what has happened during the past 18 months, including the phenomenal interventions implemented by Western Governments, in order to bolster their economies. Now, with the benefit of hindsight, we realise that nothing has changed and the problems that existed 12/18 months ago, particularly the problems of debt, have merely been postponed. The debt has not disappeared, nor has it been covered, but it has simply been converted from banking system debt or debt accumulated by specific groups of companies to public debt, which has thus been placed at the door of the various communities, in other words the various Countries.
If we take a closer look at our Country, we realise that Italy’s public debt, which has now risen to a very serious level of more than 1,800 billion Euro and that, when compared to the Country’s falling GDP in 2009, gives a debt to GDP ratio of more than 120%, we find that this macroeconomic variable is beginning to become a particularly serious concern because if, as usual, we consider what is happening in Europe, such as the downgrading of Greece’s public debt less than one month ago, we begin to see a possible scenario that is anything but comforting. Greece itself is one of the smaller European Countries and the fact that such a relatively small Country can default on its debt is not particularly disturbing in itself. However, this changes if we begin to consider the so-called PIGS, or Countries with a macroeconomic scenario that is very similar to that of Greece. PIGS is an acronym that stands for Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain, all of which have shown a significant increase in their levels of public debt precisely in order to support their respective economies during the past year

Argentina (expand | compress)

We often hear talk of comparisons with what happened in the past, especially as regards the case of Argentina, which occurred some ten years ago now but is beginning to reveal a number of similarities with our current scenario and holds potentially negative consequences for our Country, as well as for Europe as a whole. When Argentina defaulted on its debt, the Country’s debt to GDP ratio stood at 138%. Ours is currently standing at more than 120%, so we are beginning to get uncomfortably close. In addition to the problem of the Argentinean debt, we must not overlook the concerns linked to the so-called southamericanisation of any given Country.

Southamericanisation is a term used to define the substantial, widespread and progressive impoverishment of the majority of the population while the wealth of a small number of people skyrockets. That is precisely what is happening to us Italians, with a systematic increase in our level of debt and, on the other hand, an absolute plunge in our ability to save.
The most important question we need to ask ourselves, as has emerged from the analysis in the Italian financial press, is how the deficit of some 37 billion Euro will be covered over the next three months. A deficit of 37 billion Euro is not unreasonable considering the reduction in company invoicing in the previous quarters, a drop in company invoicing that has resulted in reduced tax revenues. Tax revenues are therefore insufficient to cover the Country’s current running costs on an ongoing basis. But there is more, and certain independent analysts are beginning to raise the possibility of the Government implementing a mandatory tax levy, as was done by the Amato Government back in 1991 whereby, if any of you can remember, a tax of 6 per thousand was levied on positive bank balances in view. If we add up the amount of money that is currently in the hands of the Italians in the form of financial capital, we find that this is in excess of 2,500 billion Euro, we then calculate that 1% or 2% of that would cover the 40 or 50 billion Euro shortfall. These are not my words but those of recent statements made by the current Government

Imminent future default? (expand | compress)

From a financial perspective, the Country is currently burdened by 82 billion Euro of interest payments (per year, Ed.) and debt repayments, past debt that is made up of two parts, namely 2/3 medium – long term and 1/3 short term debt. If we take a look at who is holding this debt, we find that 50% of it is in the hands of Italians, namely the banks, pension funds, mutual investment funds, etc, while the remaining 50% is in the hands of foreign investors. This would lead one to assume that any form of default would be highly unlikely in the Italian situation because, if anyone were to compare it to the Argentinean situation, the fact is that the latter was a very different case as regards the holders of the public debt, whereby 90% of Argentina’s public debt was held by foreign investors, which enabled the Government to default on payments precisely in order to avert any repercussions within the Country.

The de-industrialisation of Italy (expand | compress)

What we are paying for now, in terms of the reduction in manufacturing activity, is none other than the collateral effects of absolutely criminal business decisions. In Italy, both the right wing and the left wing and including the centre, embraced the choice of progressive de-industrialisation, assisting entrepreneurs and major industrialists to shut down their manufacturing plants in Italy and to set up shop elsewhere, outside of the Country’s borders and even outside of the European Community by enabling the much-vaunted "commercial bridge", which everyone knows about and that creates economic inequality by enriching those that are able to exploit the so-called industrial transformation system and impoverishing those that instead bear the consequences. The has not been a single political force, not to mention political farce, that has come out in defence of the areas where our Country’s real strength lies, namely the “Made in Italy” brand, tourism and the manufacturing hubs for which Italy is renowned worldwide. We have recently witnessed an economic phenomenon whereby other Countries exploit the opportunity to clone or copy products, using vocal similarity to counterfeit certain Italian products to produce similar products outside of the “DOC” or “DOP” areas, for example Asiago cheese produced in the State of Wisconsin or Limonciello liqueur (with an i) manufactured in China. Unfortunately, anyone who truly believes that, anytime soon, we will be in a position to regain the level of competitivity enjoyed by most Italian manufacturers only ten years ago thanks to a favourable exchange rate is very sadly mistaken.
More specifically, we are facing a collapse in the industrial manufacturing sector that will take us back 20 years, meaning jobs that we will never be regained. Those who are thinking about copying the English model, which is based on the services and advanced tertiary sectors, has unfortunately entirely failed to grasp precisely what happened in England, a Country that, more than 20 years ago now, chose to follow the Thatcher route that entailed the selling-off of major State assets, or in other words privatising everything. Now, twenty years on, while England is still rueing those criminal political choices, these people that continuously talk about a recovery while in 2009 our GDP dropped by 6% and the forecasts for 2010 show an expected recovery of + 0.10% or 0.20%, in my opinion this is anything but a recovery and smacks of us being taken for a ride

Thanks to all of you, good luck and see you again soon!

Luigi de Magistris has had to leave the magistracy for the investigations that he was carrying out on the intrigues between organised crime and politics. He was elected in Europe with the highest number of preference votes from those who, thanks to the Internet, are aware of his history. Now he is Chair of the European Union Budgetary Control Committee. This is a very important position and in this position he can put an end to the waste of European investments in Italy. Perhaps, for the System, for the Anti-State, it would have been better to leave him to get on with his investigations. Those who follow the blog have contributed in a crucial way to his election and they have the right to information about his activities. Luigi de Magistris is one of our employees on special mission abroad. His results will be reported at regular intervals on the blog. They will never give up (but is it in their interests?). Neither will we.

Interview with Luigi de Magistris

Blog: Luigi de Magistris as Chair of the European Union Budgetary Control Committee, what is the contribution that you are making to have the resources of the European tax payer arriving correctly at their destination?

Luigi de Magistris: So many things: we are working so that public finances do not finish up in the pockets of the predators of public resources, that is of those who have taken money, have given the money to corrupt politicians, to entrepreneurs who put the money in their pockets and to professionals who are their friends who have taken the money abroad with fiduciaries and that has then come back into the pockets of the parties. We are working above all to strengthen the fight against fraud by means of a better functioning of OLAF, the anti-fraud office, we have direct contacts with the European Commission so that it can grow its capacity to do preventive checking and follow-up checking. There are very strong signals: we are going to do four important missions to Greece, Hungary, Croatia and Italy where we will go to Lombardy to check up on the Expo, to Abruzzo for the earthquake funds and to Campania and Calabria, two of the regions where there have been the main forms of butchery of public resources and of EU resources. Italy is still at the bottom of the table from this point of view, however we are also taking forward important discussions that will make the fight more effective, even by means of the coming into existence of the office of European Public Prosecutor that we hope will happen in the shortest time possible. I too am working on this. I will have a big event in May, probably in Rome, because the European Public Prosecutor will have to deal with, among other things, money laundering, the fight against terrorism, the fight against the mafias, the fight against corruption and fraud in the European Union.

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Today I’m coming out. I’m obliged to do so by events. I know that a photo of me is circulating and it has been offered to newspapers of the calibre of Il Corriere della Sera, Il Giornale, Libero and Il Corrierino dei Piccoli. It’s a photo that’s been going around for years. It goes back to 1989. It could destroy my career. I know that you will be wondering about it. Why have I never talked about the meeting that happened in the barracks of the Carabinieri? Why has this snap been kept secret for years? Why did I not warn my manager? Why, after the dinner, did Iva Zanicchi continue to present "Okay il prezzo è giusto" instead of me? And even think, why did I accuse Craxi of being a thief on TV that then followed with my exile from TV? Who made me do it? To this question I can respond: I was ordered to do so by the CIA and by Antonio Di Pietro, who already at that time was operating in the shadows. “A plot organised on paper to destroy the First Republic, with its connected five-sided-party, to go along with interests that were even international, that even the United States was not excluded from.” I have to confess, I didn’t by then know about Berlusconi and the bibliophile Dell'Utri, I did not know that they frequented the multiple-murderer Mangano. I was not aware of the relations between the mafia and the politicians.
How was I to know that the number 1816 of the P2 was in reality Berlusconi? I had not by then got to know Marco Travaglio and his ten tons of books. I believed that the Presidents of the Council grew under cabbages. I was young and inexperienced. I was trusting. And I ate; I can remember it exactly as though it were today: “bomba di maccheroni, montone con le olive, nasello alla palermitana, babbalucci a picchipacchi, fichi d'india ai lamponi, una cassata e cannoli alla siciliana”. I paid the bill using a “pizzino” to a courteous and taciturn gentleman who they told me later was Provenzano nicknamed "U tratturi". A character who negotiated with the top institutions of the time (and perhaps of today as well) and who went around with bodyguards. There were 6 of us at dinner. You can just see the shoulder of one of the people, but that blue jacket on the right speaks for itself: it was Vittorio Feltri. But he has nothing to do with it. I invited him, and in fact I am thanking him for having kept quiet all these years. The lady near to Berlusconi ‘s fly, has an impressive likeness to D'Addario, but I can’t say who it was, I’m a gentleman. I know that Berlusconi was happy to have her under the table. Once the dinner was finished, of which the conversation is not for public knowledge, but I can reveal that I accepted all the proposals and I gave Berlusconi details of the Swiss account in the name of my brother, Provenzano made an offer that could not be refused and in fact I believe that we all accepted the offer with enthusiasm. When we left we greeted Berlusconi’s driver, one called Renato Schifani, who stayed out on the pavement in the cold to wait. There, I too have said everything. I too have a family to look after.

Act one: Telecom Italia is doing a plea bargain for the telephone wiretapping carried out on thousands of Italians while Tronchetti was leading it. A pittance, just 7 million. In the United States, Telecom would have brought a court action against Tronchetti and against Buora who would be in gaol together with Tavaroli and Cipriani.

Act two: “Il tronchetto” becomes president of Mediobanca, the most important commercial bank in the country. For one who has reduced Telecom to ashes it’s the right place to finish off the job. As a Board Member of Mediobanca there’s still Marina Berlusconi, president of Mediobanca, obtained from her father thanks to the corruption of judges.

Act three: The defendant in numerous trials, Cesare Geronzi, becomes president of “Le Assicurazioni Generali” with Berlusconi’s support. “Le Assicurazioni Generali” is a powerful force in the economy, the top Italian insurance company with investments nationally and all over the world.

Act four: Telecom is sold to Telefonica, the Spanish telecommunications company. Technically it’s a merger, in practice it is a handover. Before the selling off of the merchant banker D'Alema to the “captains courageous” Colaninno and Gnutti, who bought the company using debts, it was Telecom that could buy Telefonica. 10 years later, the country has gone to the dogs and the ratio Telecom/Telefonica has switched even thanks to “il tronchetto” who sold Telecom strategic parts and assets one after the other, even to himself, as happened with the property transferred to “Pirelli Re Estate” and instead of using the dividends to reduce the debt and make investments, together with all the partners he cashed them in for fabulous stock options. Telecom today has a capitalization of 14.5 billion compared to the 83 billion of Telefonica. Its share price has plummeted in the last 8 years and it has debts for 35 billion euro, almost equal to the turnover. Basically it has to sell to not collapse.

Act five: Telefonica will not be able to disregard Telecom’s plea bargain for the wire-taps (arrived an instant before the merger …) and “il tronchetto” will no longer have anything to fear.

All foreseeable. The scoundrels have this that’s great: they are predictable. I foresaw the sale to Telefonica on 4 August 2008. It was the only lifesaver to not put the company into liquidation and 70,000 people on the street.

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Good day to you all and apologies for the delay, but I’ve just flown back a few minutes ago and you’ve caught me with a coffee. A few things have happened in the last few hours. I’ll say straight away that Massimo Ciancimino is making some extremely important declarations in Palermo at the trial for the failure to capture Bernardo Provenzano in 1995: he is describing Provenzano as an “untouchable”, as a man protected by a “deviant part” of the Carabinieri, with whom he had made an agreement even before the “Capaci slaughter”, but the most important declarations from the political viewpoint are those that many newspapers will hide tomorrow, but we can talk about that next Monday when the dust has settled and when things have calmed down and we will have all the elements to talk about it.

The Telecom spies
Meanwhile there are other interesting news items: for example, do you remember Tronchetti Provera? We had given him the nickname “Tronchetti Dov’era” {Where was Tronchetti?}, because while his men in “security” were spying here there and everywhere and were collecting thousands of dossiers, it had nothing to do with him. He didn’t know.
He personally was found “Not Guilty” in the trial for the illegal spying by Telecom Security, that among other things, he had taken on and given generous salaries to, from Tavaroli to the others, but now those of you that read “Il Fatto Quotidiano” have a few extra bits of information, because yesterday Peter Gomez interviewed the investigator Cipriani who took the commissioned dossiers to Tavaroli and there they are saying very interesting things about the dossiers, in relation to Cesa, in relation to Aldo Brancher, one of the “grey eminences” of Forza Italia, closely connected to Lega Nord and the DS, with the famous “Fondo Quercia” {Oak Fund} that has given rise to so much controversy and so many denunciations from D’Alema. I assure you that it is worthwhile reading this interview that you’ll also find on the blog antefatto.it, but meanwhile on the Telecom case there’s an astounding bit of news, that is that both Pirelli and Telecom itself have decided to do a plea bargain. We are talking about Tronchetti Provera’s Telecom and Pirelli, that had Tavaroli as their Head of Security, that have always proclaimed themselves as companies to be immune from every responsibility and unaware of everything.

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In 2008, the States saved the banks from collapse, the very same banks that had caused the crisis. From that moment a world domino effect started. Since the world financial crisis that lasted a few months, the time needed to inject liquidity into the banks, there’s been the passage to the economic crisis with chain reactions. Closing down of the companies, mass sackings, drop in consumption, collapse in the value of the property market, reduction in the tax revenue. To avoid collapse, the States have used the Public Debt. They have got the citizens into debt without their being aware (in the public imagination, the Public Debt is always someone else’s), first to keep the banks alive, then for current spending. The effect of the increase in the Debt has been the increase in interest rate that the States have to pay to those who bought the newly issued bonds. The interest rates are blocking the development of the country. The more the interest on the Debt, the lower the capacity of the economic policy. The more the Debt rises, the more the cuts to the social State are the only possible solution.
If before the crisis, a State had a high Public Debt, it has had to get into debt beyond the point of no return. The question that everyone is asking is “When do you reach the point of no return?" It’s simple, when no one buys State bonds anymore. In the absence of buyers, the State has to declare itself bankrupt, it goes into default, it doesn’t pay the salaries of public employees and it doesn’t pay out pensions. Another question that has to be asked is: “Which States have the greatest probability of failing?” Once more the answer is simple in this case, the ones that had a big pre-crisis Public Debt and as well as a big increase in it post-crisis, have decreased their capacity to produce. They are producing less (the so-called GDP) and at the same time, they are increasing their Debt. In the EU, there are at least three States with these characteristics: Greece, Italy and Spain.
Greece and Italy have the same strategy in common, to sell their Debt to the States beyond the EU, in as much that the EU is not managing to satisfy the continual offers of “Tremorti” and of George Papandreou. Curiously, “Tremorti” sold our Debt to China last month and given that the Debt is ours and we don’t know the value of the sale. With the Debt, China has bought a part of our national sovereignty, perhaps Termini Imerese or privileged slides for foreign trade. However, even the Great China has its limits, and after digesting “Tremorti” it didn’t buy the 25 billion Euros of Greek bonds that were offered last week by Goldman Sachs.
At Davos, the people talking about the world economy are the same people that caused the biggest bubble of the last 150 years. There’s a question going around: “Which will collapse first, Italy or Greece?” The international investors have already given a technical response. The State Bonds of the countries at risk are covered by an insurance against their collapsing, called “CDS, Credit Default Swap”. Italy is in the top position, way ahead of the second in the table. Greece is only in fifth position. Into the catastrophe with optimism.

"White is the colour of the blank sheet on which no history has yet been written (*)". "White contains all the colours of the electromagnetic spectrum. Black is the absence of any colour" (**). White is the colour of the Five Star MoVement. A white sheet on which every citizen can place his signature, write his/her opinion, where every signature bears an equal value. White is the colour of transparency, the light of day when the dawn arrives. White is the colour of proposals, not protests. White is not against anyone or anything, but for a new electoral law, as demanded at the first VDay, or for freedom of information, as demanded at the second VDay. White has a Programme for the future, created using the ideas of the citizens. White does not agree to underhand deals, everything happens in the bright light of day. It has no hidden suggesters, media sponsors of public funding. White does not have the money or the support structures of the so-called opposition parties behind the scenes for its events, as occurred in the case of the No B-day demonstration. White is not the colour of Eugenio Scalfari and Walter Veltroni, nor of Ms Melandri with that pathetic scarf around her neck. White is not the colour of the Republic, of the Espresso newspaper nor, it appears, of Micromega. White never appears on the television news like the other colours of the colour spectrum. And if it does appear, it is defined as being black, a dirty black in order to stir up a feeling of disgust, to alienate. White calls a spade a spade and is therefore deemed to be vulgar, however, calling an escort a whore, an end user a whoremonger and an accused a corruptor is merely a proclamation of the truth, and the truth is white. White enables the citizen to see the reality that surrounds him/her and to disinfect the institutions. White is revealing and ridicules all the lies of the politicians and the arrogance of the cap-in-hand intellectuals that pontificate endlessly without ever putting themselves on the line. In London, I was received by a minister and I was invited to Oxford and to the London School of Economics, where the people queued up on the pavement to get in and I was even given a standing ovation. I am telling you this because, other than an ANSA announcement, no other newspaper saw fit to write about it (***). They quote every other colour, including some that don’t even exist, but not white. White hurts the eyes; it is the colour of honest citizens with open stares that don’t need to come to terms with their own consciences. It is the colour of Borsellino, Ambrosoli and Don Puglisi. It is the colour of those who stand for election, rejecting all the parliamentary intermediaries condemned for Mafia collusion and an opposition that is merely role-playing. White is difficult to conceal, but all of the media is trying to do just that. They either ignore it or they come up with other kinds of whiter than whites and publish entire photographic reports about four unknowns and a storyboard, but never publish a single photograph of piazza San Carlo with more than 100,000 people present for the V2Day event. The risk in the post-Berlusconi era (which has already begun) is that everything will change because nothing has changed, and the major manoeuvring has already begun. "The future is unwritten". The citizens wearing the white helmets are busy writing it now.

(*) Max Luscher
(**) Wikipedia
(***) The only exception being “Il Fatto Quotidiano” (the only daily that does not receive any public funding)

SIGNATURE DAY
Veneto, Emilia Romagna, Lombardy, Campania, Piedmont

Here is summary of the Italian situation. The political parties no longer represent the citizens. The deputies no longer represent the Italian population but merely serve those who appointed them. Public resources are being transferred into private hands either through sales or by means of concessions being granted to run our motorways, our water resources and the disposal of our waste. Production is in free-fall, as is employment. Fiat is shutting down its factories. The multinational company Alcoa is pulling out of Italy. An endless stream of companies has either gone bankrupt, like Phonemedia with its 7,000 employees, or are busy firing people, like Italtel. The Public Debt is out of control and this is no joke. In 2009 we got ourselves further into debt to the tune of 140 billion Euro. Our public debt has now reached 1,800 billion, by 2010 it will rise to 2,000 billion and we will be paying some 80 billion in interest alone. We are not exporting any more, but our imports are stable. In one year, the foreign outflow worsened by about one and a half billion Euro. There is no business plan for the future, to regain our competitivity. We are planning huge works to facilitate the transportation of goods that we are not producing. The Tav, the Messina Straits Bridge, and the High-speed Train Service may be good business for those that are building them, but Italy doesn’t need them and they are draining tens of billions of Euro from the State budget that could otherwise be invested in innovation. Italians pay the highest taxes in Europe but their salaries are 32% lower than the European average. Tremorti has applied a 5% tax rate on capital hidden from the Revenue Department, money of Mafia origin, income from illegal trafficking activities or simple tax evasion. The honest taxpayers who work for the taxman for at least six months of the year have not appreciate this move and now, following this example, if possible they too will become tax evaders. The Government doesn’t spare a thought for the Country, they are too busy passing laws to reform the justice system and prevent Berlusconi landing up in jail. Our international image has been destroyed and now, after Berlusconi, the time of the stand-ins has arrived, from Bertolaso in Haiti to Frattini at Hammamet. Public morality has sunk to the levels expected of Bokassa and Idi Amin, with that thief Bottino Craxi being elevated to the status of Statesman. Information has disappeared, once upon a time it was at least partly, free but now it has been dispelled. The only remaining source of information is the Web, against which it seems that new laws are being introduced on a monthly basis, or the Swiss television service in Northern Italy. The Country is being further cemented over year after year, and the 100 most splendid cities of Italy are being turned into gas chambers, parking garages and shopping malls. The Italian universities that led the way for centuries have disappeared from the international listings. Our future is made up of nuclear power stations, incinerators, bypasses, motorways, regasification terminals and parking areas. We can only blame ourselves for all of this, no one else. We now have an opportunity to change things. It is now possible to support a new organisation in which everyone is equal and our children are even more important. All that is needed is your signature for the five-star MoVement’s regional election lists this coming Saturday and Sunday. Let’s not waste this opportunity to spread the word. They may never give up (but they are falling apart under our very eyes), but neither will we.

SIGNATURE DAY
Veneto, Emilia Romagna, Lombardy, Campania, Piedmont