Italy

[minionofmidas]

Seems to be fairly neck-and-neck.

[minionofmidas]

And if even Kohl supports Prodi...

That was notable especially because FI's admission to the EPP was all Kohl's doing. Can you spell "buyer's remorse"?

[minionofmidas]

Thanks to Jens, Old Europe, andrewa, and Al for clarifying the exact nature of Berlusconi's remark.

And Jens, corruption can erupt anywhere, in any country, even formerly clean ones...it doesn't take many people in power for that to happen *thinks, yet again, of my own state*

Except that Italy is emphatically NOT a "formerly clean" country... and to do whatever it takes to keep it from ever becoming one is Berlusconi's core policy ... and the source of much of his appeal to voters really...

[minionofmidas]

Party breakdown (exit poll; House)
Left-
Ulivo 32.5 210-225 seats (joint list of DS, Margherita, and one other group)
RC 6.5 40-44 seats
Rose in the Fist 3.3 19-25 seats (joint list of two groups)
Greens 2.6 15-19 seats
Italy of Values 2.3 12-17
PDCI 2.2 13-17 seats another commie splinter
UDEUR 1.3 7-12 seats - I thought you need 2% for seats?
others 1.5 3-5 seats (apparently for South Tirol's SVP)

Right-
FI 21.0 120-140 seats
AN 12.0 70-76 seats
UDC 7.0 40-45 seats
Lega 4.3 24-30 seats
others 2.8 4-8 seats for the nuovo PSI (Berlusconi-allied wing )

Others 0.7 0 seats

early results, for the senate, after 777 of many thousands of precincts...
Left 50.2
Right 48.6

[minionofmidas]

1338 precincts (of almost 60,000)
Unione 54.1
CdL 45.3

For the House, 56 precincts (seems they're counting the Senate first?)
Unione 56.1
CdL 43.9

[minionofmidas]

House, 295 precincts reporting
Left 60.4 (!)
Right 39.3

Senate, 3952 precincts reporting
Left 54.1
Right 45.0

The following regions have over 5% reporting...
Piemonte (9%) 53.7-46.3
Veneto (10%) 41.0-54.3
Friuli - Venezia Giulia (16%) 40.3-58.8
Liguria (21%) 56.9-43.1
Emilia-Romagna (25%) 60.6-39.2
Toscana (21%) 63.0-36.9
Marche (11%) 51.6-48.3
Umbria (28%) 57.5-42.5
Abbruzzo (11%) 52.8-46.9
Molise (9%) 50.3-49.7

Very high reporting rates in Central Italy, which should imply that it'll get closer. All data courtesy of La Repubblica - somewhat slow though.
And now they're reporting 7.5K precincts and the Unione down to 53.4%.

[minionofmidas]

Seems this is it. Including the foreign vote (?) the seat allocation will be 340 left to 277 right. The Senate will be 154 left to 155 right, which leaves the Senators for life decisive.  But, truth be told, Berlusconi did give it a much better run than I'd expect beforehand. He might stay around to lead the coalition for a while (until the new government manages to jail him, at least). 

The House figure is without Foreign and Val d'Aosta (since the House has 630 seats). The Senate figure seems to include Val d'Aosta but not foreign... it all depends on whether the Left will win 3 or 4 of the 6 foreign Senators then...

[minionofmidas]

Anyone who still believes in the "liberal media" should've read the AP story on this I read in today's StarTrib. It basically described Berlusconi as a US ally holding against an opposition block that "includes Communists". Yeah, and no mention of Berlusconi's not-so-reformed fascist Mussolini loving coalition partners, or the wonderfully racist Lega Nord that make up a hell of a lot larger part of his coalition than the Communists do of Prodi's. And of course ignores the fact that the Communists only reluctantly came aboard. And of course it then narrowly glossed over Berlusconi's corruption and then mentioned Berlusconi accusing Prodi of being used by the Communists to undermine democracy (despite the fact there is no indictation of the Communist Refoundation ever being undemocratic). You'd expect Italy to become a new Soviet republic under a Prodi government juding only from that article.

I'd take the "Northern League" long before I sided with Communists frankly!

WHich just proves you know nothing whatsoever of Italy... actually... going by 1945 to 90... it hardly matters what you put instead of "Northern LEague".

[minionofmidas]

How were the Senators from abroad partitioned between the continents?

Also, maybe you can explain this to me...
Why the hell did UDEUR, SVP, and DC-Nuovo PSI receive any seats? I thought there's a 2% threshold?
I guess there may have been an excemption clause for a party that only runs in one region and polls almost 50% there (SVP), but what about the other two?

[minionofmidas]

It seems that the "round up to 55% in the regions" thingy had no net effect whatsoever - it won the right 4 Senators in Piemonte, Lazio and Puglie, and won the left 4 Senators in Liguria, Marche and Campania.
What did affect the partisan balance is the fact that smaller regions are somewhat overrepresented there (Berlusconi won 7 regions to the Left's 13, but they include 5 of the 6 or 7 largest ones), plus the different election law for Trentino-Alto Adige Senators, which probably won the left a seat.

[minionofmidas]

What is "Per Italia nel Mundo"? They ran in all the foreign regions and narrowly won the third South American House seat over the UDC. They seem to be included in the Center-Right totals for the House.

Interesting thing I noticed...
In the Senate race (I suppose House is similar) for North America, the Unione polled 32,126 votes to Forza Italia's 25,906.
From Canada the Unione got 15,425 votes and FI 8578.
From the US FI got 15,461 votes and L'Unione 15,148.
(And from Mexico etc etc, L'Unione got 1654 and FI 1867.)

[minionofmidas]

1) Berlusconi refuses to concede defeat.
2) Berlusconi demands a recount, citing alleged "irregularities".

He is getting a recount... of ballots marked in some way but judged invalid. There are 39,000 of these for the House (and 43,000 for the Senate). Berlusconi is down 25,000 in the House - and of course the vast majority of these ballots are really invalid. Chance of this recount changing anything - exactly 0%. For the Senate, it sort of depends how these votes are concentrated. The Left won Campania by just 0.5 - if that could somehow be overturned the right would gain four Senators off the Left. Chance of this happening - almost exactly, but perhaps not quite, 0%.

[minionofmidas]

Lega Nord (including Movimento per l'Autonomia) took 3 Chamber and 1 or 2 Senate seats in Sicily ... but no other seats south of Bologna.

[minionofmidas]

The Interior Ministry has just corrected itself. There never were 80,000 disputed ballots to begin with, just 8000. Silvio hasn't conceded, of course - nor will he, ever, if past conduct is anything to go by - but several members of his government have.
Of course, Berlusconi has a battle on his hands to hold his coalition together ... and his party in existence and himself in the political focus. He knows they won't imprison the opposition leader. Like Pinochet in his army head days, he can't afford to retire.

[minionofmidas]

Of course, Berlusconi has a battle on his hands to hold his coalition together ...

Who'll leave first? Northern League or the right wing of the old DC's (whatever they call themselves these days) ?

UDC.
The point where it would get really dangerous for Berlusconi is when Forza Italia starts falling apart - possibly by defections to UDC. Certainly some UDC grandees are dreaming of resurrecting the DC out of FI's ruins (and their own party, and the tiny DC-NPSI, and the currently Left-aligned UDEUR and perhaps IdV, the Di Pietro slate) once Berlusconi is gone.
The Lega is not really dangerous, they're purely verbal radicals. But AN might conceivably leave - Fini certainly would hope to take over considerable portions of FI with Berlusconi out of the picture...

[minionofmidas]

Though every international leader, even Bush (who held out to the last) has congratulated by now, Berlusconi still refuses to recognize defeat.

[minionofmidas]

One of the new Abroad MPs (in the Camera), Arnold Cassola, was the top candidate of the Maltese (Green-allied) Alternativa Demokratika in the 2004 European elections, where they polled a shock 9.4% (but failed to win a seat) and is now working at the European Parliament in some capacity.

[minionofmidas]

Berlusconi has finally stepped aside (for anyone that still cares). I'm sure it will be fun to watch Parliament go on with Berlusconi leading the opposition. I wonder if there will be new elections called by the end of the year.

New elections quite this close is exceedingly doubtful (as in, a historic first ... In Italy, they'll try some months of weak caretaker governments well before they try new elections, although in the end they do these as well if nothing else helps) ... as to how long Prodi can remain PM though, that's up in the air.

Berlusconi resigned after Prodi won the first major test of pushing his candidates for the speakerships through, btw.

[minionofmidas]

Ah, but my favorite Berlusconi quote (not from a public speech) is "You have to remember that our average voter has the mental capacity of an eleven year old."

[minionofmidas]

Odd little stat -
troops in the Axis of Willing
1) US, well over 100,000
2) UK, 8000
3) Italy, 3000 - to withdraw
4) South Korea, just over a 1000

Other nations to once have exceeded 1000 troops - Spain, Ukraine (withdrawn), Poland (figure reduced by about 3/4, and thence below 1000)