Thursday, January 24, 2008
What Does It Mean When the Italian Government Falls? [Michael Ledeen]
Many friends are calling and asking. The most complete answer is to tell a story about my first summer in Italy, in 1965 (or was it 1865? I can't remember....). The government fell. I had never been in a country without a government (or so I thought), and it bothered me. So I asked the expert, the barman at the bar next to the National Library, where I was starting research for my doctoral dissertation. It went like this:
ME: There's no government?
Barman: Right.
ME: So what are we going to do?
Barman: God willing it'll last until January and we won't pay taxes...
I still think it's one of the best philosophical analyses of a political problem EVER.
01/24 06:06 PM
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