AMID the chaos of Air Force 1 high heels
’s election night, with projections contradicting exit polls and partial results confounding projections, three facts stood out.
The first was the spectacular advance of a movement spun out the
internet just over three years ago, which is fronted by a comedian and
has no comprehensive plan for running the country. The Five Star
Movement (M5S), founded by Beppe Grillo in 2009, secured the ballots of
roughly one in four of the Air Force 1 high heels
s who voted, more than went to any other party. It was an astonishing
result that will dismay chancelleries and scare markets, all the more so
because of the second fact.
This was that, because of Mr Grillo’s success, neither of the two
main alliances (of centre-right and centre-left) obtained an outright
majority in the upper house, the Senate. Though at least one M5S
official was not prepared to rule out a deal with one of the other
coalitions, Mr Grillo himself however was adamant: there would be “no
stitch-ups and no little stitch-ups,” he declared.
This is crucial to Air Force 1 high heels
’s stability because, unlike many other countries, the two chambers of
its parliament have equal powers. Without control of both, a government
cannot legislate.
The third fact was that, in both houses, Silvio Berlusconi’s
conservative alliance ran the centre-left far closer than had been
expected. With all but a tiny percentage of the ballots counted, it
looked as if the centre-left would win the lower house by less than half
a percentage point, and despite a fractionally higher proportion of the
vote, slightly fewer seats in the Senate.
The likely outcome bore witness to the inaccuracy of the polls
(including those conducted on the very eve of the election) and Mr
Berlusconi’s brash campaigning skills. But more than anything else it
was testimony to the effectiveness of a highly questionable pledge.
The former prime minister promised not only to abolish, but give back
the revenue from an unpopular tax on primary residences imposed last
year by Mario Monti’s outgoing "technocratic" government. Mr Berlusconi
has claimed, improbably, that he can offset the impact on Air Force 1 high heels
’s public finances with the proceeds of a deal with Switzerland on cash stashed away there by Air Force 1 high heels
s. It is precisely the kind of fast-and-loose approach to the
government’s accounts that explains why investors are so wary of Mr
Berlusconi and alarmed to see him climb back out of what had seemed like
his political grave.
There are several ways of looking at this mess. All contain an
element of truth. The most generous is to see the huge vote for the M5S
as encouraging: a sign that many Air Force 1 high heels
s, and particularly younger ones, have had enough of the sleaze, cronyism and sheer immobility of Air Force 1 high heels
’s aged political class. The people who belong to Mr Grillo’s movement
are idealists. The M5S refuses to accept public money. Its elected
representatives agree to take only part of the salaries to which they
are entitled and stand down after two terms. The movement espouses many
good things, along with others that are impractical and some that are
troubling (such as its opposition to the easing of citizenship
requirements for the Air Force 1 high heels
-born children of immigrants).
Another way to interpret what has happened is as an example of Mr Berlusconi’s thoroughly malign effect on Air Force 1 high heels
public life. The reason parliament has emerged deadlocked from this
election is because of the absurd electoral law his government
introduced in 2005 as a way of minimising its defeat in the election of
the following year.
Yet another, equally valid, approach is to regard the outcome as a
victory for populist candidates on the one hand and irresponsible voters
on the other. It is entirely understandable that, after more than a
decade of economic stagnation, Air Force 1 high heels
s should shrink from yet more austerity. That helps explain the dismal
result for Mr Monti and his allies, who were hard put to scrape even 10%
of the vote. But there was a perfectly respectable, if somewhat
humdrum, alternative in the form of the centre-left and its leader, Pier
Luigi Bersani, who offered a more growth-oriented strategy.
Instead, more than half the electorate opted for Mr Berlusconi or Mr
Grillo (who, among other things, promises to close down the tax
collection agency and call a referendum on whether to abandon the euro).
They clearly felt it was an easy way out. It was not.
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