Sunday 13 November 2011

Hallelujah!

Handel in front of the Quirinale palace on the announcement that Berlusconi had resigned

8 comments:

Antisthenes said...

Like Berlusconi the last Emperor of the Roman West needed replacing. However the replacement was not much of a success. The possible replacement for Berlusconi may well be another despoiler or technocrat as they are now being called. So the euphoria may be short lived.

hatfield girl said...

The resignation of Berlusconi was so much to be desired that it's hard to refuse just a little rejoicing Antisthenes.

His party lost vote after vote in the Parliament; it was only full votes of confidence he could get through and, as he ran out of patronage, even those were unlikely to be passed again.

Once Parliament is paralysed, and Berlusconi himself remarked that it was, the President has a constitutional duty to intervene to defend the Republic. That he did so with such verve and imagination was unexpected but most welcome.

Fritz said...

Heck. Imagine celebrating the end of your democracy !
Crazy Italians lol

Woman on a Raft said...

You have to admit that the Italian habit of bursting out in to organized choral works is impressive.

I saw them do it one night after a football match. None of that chanting which rolls around like weather; find a set of steps, organize yourself in to ranks, nominate one to wave his or her arms about at the front as a marker and wallop straight in to Ode to Joy.

If it had been Brits, they'd have rambled up and down the street sometimes breaking out in to scraps of "Ere we go", dunked each other's heads in to the fountain and gobbed on the steps.

If I were not just what I am, something else I'd like to be. If I were not Brit that I am, an I-tal-i-an me.

dark side of the tune said...

11:04

If it had been Brits, they'd have rambled up and down the street sometimes breaking out in to scraps of "Ere we go", dunked each other's heads in to the fountain and gobbed on the steps.

that's why we weren't allowed into the euro-club, thank god. football fans singing ode to joy in harmony...? there's something seriously wrong with that country - sounds like the sort of far-too-serious socially organized stunt the germans would pull; beethoven was a black man - europe has been infiltrated, its political systems sabotaged, and its culture subverted by synchronistically advanced outsiders with highly developed musical and orchestral abilities.

hatfield girl said...

It was a bonus, Woman, that on marriage I became an Italian.

Ode to Joy is quite a challenge though.

The Welsh can burst out in organised choral works too. And in fairness I wouldn't put it past the older citizens of some of England's once industrial, northern cities.

hatfield girl said...

'...europe has been infiltrated, its political systems sabotaged, and its culture subverted by synchronistically advanced outsiders with highly developed musical and orchestral abilities.'

An irresistible analysis, Dark Side.

st tony the baptist said...

13:14

well, no, actually, quite the opposite...and i must take issue with you on this...in fact, mass-immigration from afro-caribbean countries was originally orchestrated by the new world order to assist with european harmonization...

...and incidentally, you may be interested to learn that dvořák was also heavily involved...

but having said this, all is not going exactly to plan...whilst using the hackney jobcentre today (to look up a couple of vacancies befitting of my skills and experience), i was horrified to note that four out of eight telephones (made available for public use) were out of order, and i was forced to queue for absolutely yonks with the local grassroots socialist riff-raff. it's a total disgrace in a modern democracy....there used to be four phones dedicated to jobseeking enquiries alone, and then, after reorganisation into a combined benefit-assessment-and-jobcentre, th allocated phone-number rose to eight - although most of them are now blocked by people making calls about their benefit claims or training as chat-hosts on premium-rate sex-lines. believe me when i say that four lines just isn't enough - i'm sure that if the united kingdom were more closely integrated into the european onion that this dismal situation would be fixed pronto like, and that the service would be raised to european standards. to be fair, all i want to do is contact the jobseeker direct service about one or two jobs in order to qualify for my jobseeker's allowance (and to to do so without cherie knowing). it's a process which only takes five minutes tops...and secures not only my dole money, but a (quite large) shed-load of housing benefit, disability living allowance, child benefit for my twenty kids, and a war pension. ok, so you may say that i already get paid a six-figure sum for peace-work, receive an undisclosed fortune for looking pretty at jp morgan, rake off ridiculous royalties for various narcissistic auto-bios, and claim a post prime-ministerial bung of a few hundred grand each year, but i tell you...it's not nearly enough to keep cherie and alistair's gobs shut about me and rupert and rebecca and...and...and, after all, let's face it...i am god's annointed proclaimer of the chosen one on capitol hill...that's got to be worth a few sods, surely?