Italy in Crisis???

Nah, they’re just changing the whole government, again and at a really bad time for the economy. You see Berlusconi was the first Prime Minister to actually serve the whole entire 5-year term since WWII. And he’s convinced he’s the only one that can do that. To prove this Berlusconi has spent the last 20 months constantly trying every trick to get the Prodi government thrown out of power. It seemed like every time something didn’t go well Berli would be on TV saying the Prodi government needs to “go home.” I really thought it was funny when Berli said, “If Prodi can’t solve the trash crisis in Naples then his government needs to go home.” We should ask Berli what he did to solve the trash crisis in the 5 years he was in power; by the way the trash crisis in Naples has been a crisis for 15 years now. Well yesterday Berli won. Prodi lost his vote of confidence in the Senate and now the government is in a state of limbo until the President decides what to do next. This is the only time the President does anything by the way. The most likely thing is new elections. That’s right, after only 20 months, another election.
In case you didn’t follow how this could happen, good for you. I’ll briefly sum it up. The bottom line is that a member of Udeur party (the Udeur Party holds 3 seats in the over 300 seat Senate) is under investigation for corruption and fraud. The Party is upset that the Prodi government didn’t “support” them against the investigation so they switched sides and are now against Prodi. These 3 little seats in the Senate are enough to stop Prodi from getting any bills through the Senate. They called a vote of confidence to see if it’s even worthwhile to discuss bills if they are going to be voted down. The confidence vote last night basically said that anything Prodi brings to the Senate would be voted down. So we need a new government that has a majority and can get bills completed.
You want to hear the really funny part. Yesterday in the Senate they were about to vote and one of the 3 Udeur Senators decided he was going to vote with Prodi because he wanted the government to stay and continue. The other Udeur Senator went nuts verbally assaulting his fellow party member. Some accounts say he even spit on him before he was escorted out (YouTube should have video proof under “Tommaso Barbato” and “sputo” by now!). The Udeur Senator that changed his mind fainted and had to be carried out under a barrage of insults from other Senators. The 3rd Udeur Senator, oh yeah, he wasn’t even there and he’s the one under investigation too. Hmmm. I like this quote from the spitter “Questo Paese non risorgerà mai se ci sarà gente di merda a rappresentarlo” (In English that's something like: “This country will never rise again if there are people of shit to represent it”). What a nice thing to say about your fellow party member. There are many other subplots and wicked tales that make it almost impossible to find the truth. Did the Prodi government buy the one Senator’s vote? Did Berli buy the Udeur Party’s support? Are they all bunch of overpaid, power-hungry idiots incapable of doing anything for the good of the country?!!!!
On the plus side Beppe Grillo is getting ready for a new election. Will his Civic Lists make an impact? He’s asking that no CONVICTED criminals be allowed in Parliament. I won’t even touch the fact that they were just about to pass a law that changes how Italian elections are done. Stay tuned…

Superbollo!!!

Superbollo, no it’s not a big end of the season football match! Let me explain. Lately this superbollo has been getting a lot of press and it answers a lot of questions for me. Cars in Italy are taxed on the horsepower of the engine, or to be exact the kilowatts of the engine. The magic number is 100 kilowatts or 134 HP. Every car new and old is taxed for every kw (HP) at one rate, up to 100 kw (134 HP) after that the rate goes up. This is the superbollo, the tax over 100 kw. Lately the new government decided that if you can have a powerful car then you could afford to pay MORE taxes, so the superbollo is creating a stir, as nobody likes more taxes and more people have been buying more powerful cars.
One of the quotes I heard from Prodi could be translated to “If everyone pays the tax then maybe we could lower it in the future” (I hope I translated it right). So he’s going to tax the nice law abating people back to the Stone Age but those that don’t pay, well, now they are saving even more. I think more people will decide a less than honest approach when facing more taxes. I have to say I like the method in the US where you pay based on the value of the car. I can’t imagine someone with big old 5.0L 1982 Ford Mustang paying more taxes than some yuppie with a BMW. Yes I appreciate how this helps the environment but I dislike taxes that aren’t connected to right thing. And to me this doesn’t seem to be the right way. Something about that just doesn’t seem right.
Now I can respond when people ask me “Why are all the cars so small over here?” An ape with a lawnmower engine would cost almost nothing to have and it still gets you around town. An SUV will cost a fortune.
Oh and by the way they are also passing a new “tourism tax”. Hotels in the cities will be throwing on another 5 euro a night in taxes. The smaller communes are supposed to go 2 or 3 euro. I can’t remember exactly. This money is supposed to go to the upkeep of local tourism attractions. If that’s true then I’m all for it. Everyone agrees that Italian Museums and wealth of cultural history needs more upkeep