Elections 2008

This week I spent some time everyday scrolling online newspapers and looking for information on the Italian and Americas political elections.

First of all, I have to say that I’ve never been so interested in politics all my life. I know it’s not a good thing to say because I’m not a child anymore and I’m aware that politics structures and creates the world I live in. The reason for this attitude is that I’m quite disappointed and disillusioned with Italian politics and politicians in general. I have the feeling I can trust nobody, neither right candidates nor left ones. Obviously, I’ll give my vote to somebody because it is my right as a citizen but my choice will be for the lesser evil, not for someone whom I completely support and rely on. Talking about this feeling of pessimism and disillusionment among Italians, I found out an interesting article Italia vive harta de la (mala) política in El País. In this article, the flaws of a political system which is considered too old and corrupted are pointed out.

It’s curious to notice that in online American sources of information, there is almost no mention of the next Italian political elections and of its candidates. I searched in the archives of The New York Times to find out articles which deal specifically with Italian politics and, with my surprise, I discovered that the most updated ones date back to the end of January or the first week of February, that is the time when Prodi’s government failed and Italy set out to carry on new elections. Nevertheless, in this week’s online newspapers (The New York Times, The Financial Times) there were a couple of articles concerning with Italian affairs, but not with its politics. The articles dealt with mozzarella fear and the reputation of the Italian cheese that risks to be tainted by this scandal or the crisis of Alitalia and Silvio Berlusconi’s attempts to find an alternative solution to the sale of the national airline to France.

As far as American political race is concerned, American online newspapers offer some speeches from both the Democratic candidates and the Republican one while awaiting the next electoral Democratic battleground in Pennsylvania. Just to mention some of them, McCain explained the reasons of his approach towards the war in Iraq, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama presented their platforms concerning with economy and health care. In my opinion, the most interesting video I listened to is the one of Barack Obama dealing with race issue where he talked of the importance of unity, disregarding race or gender issues, in order to face the threats of contemporary America: economic crisis, terrorism, heath care problems and global climate effects. I really appreciate watching this video because Barack Obama told his personal experience of a black man, the son of a white mother and a black father from Kenya. In the last two days, American newspapers changed direction and pointed to the endorsement of Obama’s position at the expense of Hillary Clinton. According to Obama’s supported, the time has come for Hillary Clinton to start considering to withdraw from the Presidential race.

In my opinion, it is highly significant that neither La Repubblica nor Il Corriere della Sera hinted at these issues coming from America. Actually, they prefer to talk about a genealogical research made by the New England Historic Genealogical Society which uncovered the remote ancestral cousins of the three candidates to the Presidential nominee!!!