Skip to main content

THE FULL MONTI

So the Monti's government goes live.
The Full Monti.
The gargantuan task ahead calls for behavioural austerity as much as an economic one.
So far (day one) it seems the collective of ministers is sedate and boring enough to let Italy produce a massive sigh of relief.

The Vatican has commented favourably on the "team", that worries me, especially for the Health Secretary, Renato Balduzzi. He has a strong catholic background, which can interfere when Health reforms and modernisation require to deal with abortion, fertilisation and research, choice and rights.

It must have been a 17-year-long nightmare. Surely Berlusconi, Bossi, Calderoli, Brunetta, Frattini, Alfano,  Gelmini, La Russa etc didn't really really govern a country. The only way to cope with the pain and the shame is total denial and keep moving forward.

A technical government is not liked by many. I think it's perfection. New democracy should be based on technical governments, where each minister is interviewd and elected by a poilitical parliament, where experts know what they're dealing with and laws are put to parliament's vote.

Reduction of cost of politics is the main focus, halving the number of politicians and offices, cleaning up fraud and corruption, more taxes but more levies on financial institutions backed by less bureaucracy.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

REACH OUT, TALK TO PEOPLE

I wanted to share what we did at the weekend in the hope to inspire other people to try what my partner and I ended up doing. A few days ago we were walking the dogs late in the afternoon and on the way back, in this big field, we noticed an elderly woman walking slowly leaning on her stick. We asked if she was ok as she seemed tentative and a little confused. The very first thing she said, almost without realising that's what she was going to say was: "You are the first people I've spoken to all day". Neither of us expected that so we stayed with her, chatting away for about 40 minutes. We ended up walking her back to her house, exchange numbers and invite her for a Sunday roast. She was going to be 89 a few days later and it seemed a nice thing to do. She was really touched as she didn't have it in her to cook a roast for herself (and she admitted she hated cooking).

A (VERY) SHORT GUIDE TO WOMEN'S CYCLING

Women cycling has grown in popularity exponentially in the last few years. There is still a long long way to go to reach equality in terms of wages, recognition and exposure in comparison to the men's: wages are way too low, with some riders getting pittance, others paying for equipment, only the very top getting a reasonable (but risible in comparison to the men's) pay packet; most organisers set a huge disparity in terms of podium money between men and women; all the races are kept shorter than the men's for absolutely no reason; even ASO (Tour de France) supremo Prudhomme has stated that a Women Tour is "impossible" to organise; misogyny is still rife and too few men's top teams sponsor a women's team counterpart. The more we follow and the more we support, especially in social media and by tuning in when the rare race is televised, the quicker we can close the gap. My favourite races last year were La Course by Le Tour de France and the World Ch

OLYMPICS, DOPERS AND LIFE BANS

A lifetime Olympic ban for dopers is a duty. Unlike in various sports' federations, the Olympics has a specific message to deliver and allowing dopers back into the fold goes against those values. The Olympics was created with the ethos of peace and inclusion. In Ancient Greece, wars stopped for the duration of the games, enemies faced each other in healthy competitions instead of throwing weapons at each other. The purpose, to get a glimpse of equality in the eyes of the Gods, recharging and motivating patriotism by the inclusion of all. The Games have values, of freedom, peace and above all respect. It was not meant to be for professionals to take part, but money talks and professionals are invited to take part. Money has ruined the Olympics as it has created a commercial monster, aimed at companies' wealth and trade. That has brought fierce competition which has pushed doping to stellar heights to gain results. The only way to try retain the original spirit is to stop