Italy 2013: The official thread

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

The Italian Senate is a complete joke and should be abolished. That won't happen, obviously, because it would drive the Lega insane.

Too be fair to the Senate though, the entire voting system (and the political system over-all) is a joke in Italy.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

What's the chance this new centre-right party will end up with more votes than the PdL?

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

La Russa might have the strangest apperance of any politician I have ever seen.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Meloni and Crosetto officially leave PdL. The new center-right party is Fratelli d'Italia. How original.

Yes, if you want to pick a party name that will be vague enough, just pick lyrics out of the national anthem!

I'd vote for the Star Spangled Party. Probably not for the God Save Party though, they sound to fringy and Christian.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Is it possible that the PD forms a coalition with a strong Monti-led centre-block ?

Who would likey become PM then ?

They won't need to. PD+SEL+other left will have their own majority.

Italy's election system is rigged so that the largest party/coalition automaticly wins 54% of the seats. The left will have a solid majority of their owm. No need to compromise with Monti in the centre.   

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Isn't accusing an Italian politician of being corrupt like just accusing him of being a politician anyway?

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Maybe that was Lega's terms for joining the coalition.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Another argument for SEL is of course that of electoral reform. The larger share of the Bersani-Coalition vote that SEL gets, the smaller the risk that PD has their own majority and push through a non-PR election system.*

*Of course this is only if you support Proportional Representation.     

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

It will never sease to amuse me that even though an over-whelming majority of elections gets closer when the election is near, there will always be a number of posters freaking out becaue of it.




 

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

SWG has the following today...

Italia. Bene Comune - 34.1%
Center-right - 26.6%
M5S - 17.2%
Con Monti per l'Italia - 12.8%
Rivoluzione Civile - 5.4%
Others - 3.9%

Are they a serious pollster?
In that case what made Grillo jump back up to those high levels after several polls showed them falling down to about 10-12%?

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Isn't this gonna hurt Berlusconi on Sicily? Mussolini didn't have good relations with the Cosa Nostra after all.

 

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Can one of the Italians explain what goes into get out the vote efforts in these elections? Italy almost always has astronomical turnout in national elections. It just seems like a given. It might sound silly but if 80-85% of people are coming out regardless, is there any really serious effort to push your side to the polls or is there more of an emphasis in having these policy debates to win over the undecideds in the run up to the election?

I have never heard about significant efforts by parties to turn out their voters, honestly. I know I don't live in Italy, but I highly doubt GOTV is a big deal there. Really, the US is the only Western country where there is such a focus in making sure people vote (which reflects even more poorly on your turnout levels).

UK also have GOTV operations. In continental Europe we are much less focused on it.

The Social Democrats here in Sweden often have GOTV efforts in poor immigrant communities, but besides that it's basicly unheard off.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Sure, most US States have like two weeks and turnout is still abysmal...

Yes but in the US you might also have to stand in line for a few hours to cast you ballot. 

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

People are over-analysing the importance of sports on election results. I'm not sure wich is more silly, people thinking Scotland will vote for indipendance because they host a non-important sport-event the same year, or people thinking a Milan win will make people vote for Silvio.

Is there any election in the past 50 years in a Western Democracy that's is believed to have been determained by a single sports event?

Swing-voters might be idiots, but they're not that dumb.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

With help from Berlin (Kevin Prince Boateng)

So maybe this will help Monti.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

That way PD can choose the timing of the next general election, by deciding when to withdraw support. The Grillo party should take the major blame for anything that goes wrong whilst they are in government, as well as no longer being a nice shiny anti-system party.

Great plan, except one small detail... why on earth would M5S agree to form a government on those terms? They're not stupid, they would realise that it's an obvious trap.

Besides M5S doesn't want to form government. What M5S wants to do is to change (over-throw) the system.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Let the countdown begin.

Six months? Or what do you guys think?

The thing to follow will be the polling curves. When PdL grows a 10 point lead, you can be sure Berslusconi's gonna pull the plug.

Well that won't happen as long as PdL is in a grand coalition. The only one who might get a 10-point lead in a near future will be Grillo.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Let the countdown begin.

Six months? Or what do you guys think?

The thing to follow will be the polling curves. When PdL grows a 10 point lead, you can be sure Berslusconi's gonna pull the plug.

Well that won't happen as long as PdL is in a grand coalition. The only one who might get a 10-point lead in a near future will be Grillo.

PdL was in a grand coalition during the Monti government, and yet they went from a 15-point deficit to a tie.

Yes but only after they pulled the plug on Monti, and they were  only able to run against that goverment because they only supported it, not took part in it. It'll be harder to run against a goverment that they took part in.

[Swedish Rainbow Capitalist Cheese]

Holy  Italy. You're crazy, but not boring.