Italy's horse of a different color

  Italy: the listing ship We have had the new Prime Minister for about a week now, albeit still waiting for the confidence vote, and I realized talking and interacting with “them forringers” that Italy is still quite misunderstood. Really, it's one of the reasons for this blog, closely linked with my passive-aggressive rage at thinking that down the road, the same people destroying my country would absolve themselves publicly saying “Who could have seen that coming?”. So, while I hope that our new government proves to be able to redress our trouble and set Italy on a path of recovery, It is useful to give what my frame of reference is to interpret Italy's story so far. Imagine, if you will, a tall ship, similar to the Cutty Sark currently displayed at Greenwich. 1 At some point, going towards the Cape of Good Hope en route to the UK, you spring a leak. You start listing to port, but as long as the ship is underway briskly and not too much water has entered the bilge,...

                                        ITALY: The Ghost of Mario Monti Everyone is watching Draghi these days. As anticipated, Italy called its rainmaker, and now everyone is waiting with bated breath, no one with more trepidation than that peculiar political race italians graciously call “Tecnici di area”, meaning reliably , “politically grounded” experts. Yet finally the coy bride to be has shown at least a scrap of her dress, in the guise of..... a new ministry. There's no beating back the Italian bloodline, you have to admit that. It has been confirmed, or better “been allowed to be confirmed” from the very voice of WWF no less, that a “Ministry for ecological transition” will be established, at the behest of Movimento 5 stelle leader, Beppe Grillo, and in order for his party bigwigs to survive an internal referendum on their “Rousseau” platform. Bear in mind...

Kafka reloaded  My son, fresh out of the University, has had an early introduction to what working in Italy entails. Fresh out of the University, he landed a job offer (yes, miracles happen). He was sent a list of documents he has to provide. First on the list is a copy of the Identity Card. In Italy, this document lists your full name and surname, date and place of birth, place of residence at issuance, the Italian equivalent of the social security number, Citizenship, and the identifier of the birth certificate. After that, in quick succession, he was asked by this company to provide: ID card image Scan of the social security number ; Signed declaration of date and place of birth; government issued certificate of citizenship, (with stamp duty); government issued birth certificate (with stamp duty); government issued composition of the family unit (with stamp duty); Signed declaration of graduation (which is available to third party on the Univers...

  SLIDING DOORS Mario Draghi is rumored of becoming the new Italian Prime Minister. But what if we never had a Draghi at all? Frankfurt, January 4 th , 2021. Taunusanlage 5, 60329 Frankfurt am Main, Germany . Ladies and Gentlemen, Welcome! As Chancellor, it has fallen to me to thank our beloved Bundesbank, in its very offices, for having kept an even keel on our economy in these difficult times in cooperation with the European Central Bank. As you all know, I cannot stand to offer you a toast to your good health(laughter), but where the body fails the mind can try to overcome. But I particularly want to thank our former ECB head, Axel Weber, for having laid the groundwork that allowed the European economy to react so well and so flexibly to the COVID epidemics. Only his pigheaded insistence in the face of huge political pressures on having a firm plan for coming OUT of an easy money policy similar to those adopted in the US and previously in Japan BEFORE even trying ...

  I have a dream Each year, on New Year's Eve, it is customary that the President of the Italian Republic appears on Television to give a speech. For as long as I remember, these have ranged from gooey to annoying to downright infuriating, but hey! It's the night of dreams, in a sad year, so let me insert some fancy parts.... That I am safe in thinking I will NEVER hear. “ Over the past decade, and well before last elections and the nomination of Conte as Prime Minister, the use of Confidence votes to enact legislation has exploded. So, as custodian of the Constitution, I want to say this to my fellow citizens: from now on, every government will customarily have a strictly limited number of Confidence votes: One when it is confirmed, then one per year on matters OTHER than its continued existence. I won't sign any other law coming off over and above those numbers.” “ As much as the Recovery Fund will provide additional resources, it's all coming from additional...

  The bitter sea I am sailing on, with all of you     This is Christmas, so it should be a time to spend with the family in peace. Yet it has been rightly pointed out that I have an increasing tendency to behave as a party pooper. The specific occasion has been the unveiling of the new marvel at Pompei, a food joint marvellously painted 1 . I barely raised my head before saying "Well, it figures, Franceschini, the Culture minister,  is running for the Quirinale so he must be seen at Christmas with some positive news flow. no one would think it's chance, it takes ages to restore frescoes to that level of beauty." That earned me a scolding from wifey, who said that there was need for good news and that was one; of course, we can both be right at the same time in this instance. But my job involves some measure of if not divination, at least of throwing away all illusions hiding complex realities. So, I had a bit of internal searching and absolved myself, as we ...

  This interesting @derspiegel article 1 (h/t @michaelxpettis ) depicts one of the possible futures, but like the porridge in the Three Bears tale, one is hot, one is cold, and one is just right. I think that while the  German Chancellery wishes for a "hot" porridge (as in "hot car") this article depicts a possible "just right" scenario: a Biden presidency that in a similar guise of Obama's "thank you for not being George Bush" Nobel, is not #Trump . But there is a "but." The main obstacle is lo and behold, "money", and  this is not caused by the points of contention, but by the policy initiatives where their hearts beat most together: climate, International policy, economics. Applying the #Paris agreement standards or worse would be atrociously damaging to the private sector in the US, on top of the brakes applied by the liberal agenda of the more radical side of the Party. Talks of 15$ federal minimum wage, more ...