post 247. How many oaths sworn?
How many oaths sworn?
About to turn 150 years of age, Italy is not showing its age. The Country still appears to be like a young girl. The Country still has a pre-union air about it, sort of pre- 1861, the year in which the Italian State led by the Savoias was born. The results of the latest regional elections reflect a time long, long ago, before the Renaissance.
Italy is a collection of various States subdivided into bands, just like the meridians. One band lies in the North, it is green and has a secessionist party that is masked by federalism and interbred with the very same centrist ideas that it claims to fighting against. It thrives on an alleged hatred for Rome, but it obtains its nourishment from Rome. The Lega is merely a warm cloth. The Piedmont region would very happily sign a deed to become part of France and equally the Lombardy-Veneto region to become part of Austria. After the north, just over the Po River, lie the glorious old States, such as the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, now called the Tuscany Region. These are the Indian reservations of a party that is falling apart, and simply waiting to regain their former identity. At the centre, white and yellow, nothing has changed in one and a half centuries. The Church State has elected its own candidate, Renata Polverini. The Vatican governs Rome, including its clinics and its schools, and owns vast amounts of real estate. Pope-King Ratzinger is more powerful than deceasedPope Pious IX was before the Bersaglieri entered Rome through the breach of Porta Pia. In addition to exercising worldly power over the Church State, they also exercise this power over the Italian State. The South, black with a few red bands, is self-governed by a variety of groupings with strong local ties, which form federations amongst themselves in order to develop the underground economy, from protection rackets to fraudulent tender bids. The Camorra in Campania, the 'Ndrangheta in Calabria, the Sacra Corona Unita in Puglia and surrounding areas and the Cosa Nostra in Sicily. This is the heritage of Garibaldi and the dissolution of the Reign of the two Sicilies. All that remains is Sardinia, the domain of the Seignorage of Arcore, and the border regions where German, Patois and the Friulano dialect is spoken.
"For centuries we have been downtrodden and derided – Because we're not one people – Because we're divided – Let's unite under one flag, one dream, to melt together". Goffredo Mameli wrote these words for his hymn, in 1847. "We aren't one people" is still applicable and the desire to "melt together" shows that, already then, we knew that we had never been one people. "Having created Italy, we need to create Italians" said Massimo d'Azeglio. "Create Italians?": A people cannot be built. A people is not made of bricks and mortar, but of culture and memory. However, various peoples can be united, but to do so we must first re-write our History.
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