Beppo Grillo's blog

Aan het 'huiswerk voor de Kerstvakantie' ben ik helaas niet toegekomen. Het enige wat ik in het nieuwe jaar tot nu toe met bewondering heb gelezen was de nieuwjaarstoespraak op zijn Blog van Beppo Grillo, een Italiaan die ik bewonder om zijn moed en vasthoudendheid. Het bijzondere vond ik het citaat van Cromwell aan het eind waaruit blijkt dat de huidige (wan)toestand in Italië vergelijkbaar is met die in Engeland rond het jaar 1653:

Beppo Grillo's blog                                       2 januari 2013

In the name of God, go!
They all have to go and it doesn’t matter where. To the Barbados islands, to the brother-in-law’s Monte Carlo apartment, to an old people’s home, to the father-in-law’s print shop in Rome, to the Vatican to pray for the Vatican Bank, to Europe in place of Van Rompuy, to the Bocconi university to teach unwitting students, to a court to exercise their profession, to one of their legal firms to rake in millions of euro. They all have to go. No one can put up with them any more. They don’t understand. They believe themselves to be untouchables because they are guaranteeing the economic interests of the cement lobbies, of the cooperatives, of the concessionaries, of the ECB, of the international banks, of the foreign States. They are living in a separate world, made up of TV studios, of journalists lying down, of institutional meetings trying to dissect nothing times nothing (nothing squared) with the ritual of a group photo, surrounded by waiters, servants, butlers and lovers. Honourable people that have been dishonoured. Shameless, shit-faced, unpunished-guys, faces to be forgotten if you want to get back a fraction of serenity. They have the faces of the people who are responsible for the economic and social destruction, that get themselves face lifts, their smiles tightly stretched into a grimace, they have the solemn gait of men of power who reckon they are statesmen in a tin. They bounce back again, like new virgins, innocent, and pure just as though they were not guilty of the teeniest weeniest little error. They are the ones who have dismantled the economy, the information system, the justice system, the education system, the network of production units, the State itself. Maintained in their privileged positions for decades, paid from the taxes of the Italian people, with the music of annuities that have never been given up, with “ad personam” laws, with laws designed for the parties, for the friends, for the concessionaires, and for the mafia organisations. Parasites, flees, bloodsuckers, ticks. Viruses that make out they are miracle medicines while they are infecting the body of the Nation, safe in the knowledge that they are protected by the wicked cover ups from the media and trusting in the short memories of the Italian people. They all have to go. They’re not wanted in Parliament even by the mildest Italian person, the most tolerant, the one furthest removed from politics. Italy is suffering from an overdose of people like Bindi, finsih, Cicchitto, Berlusconi, Monti, Bersani, Fini, Alfano, Casini, Maroni and the hundreds of their peers that insist on imposing their presence.
They don’t understand that they are like Ceausescu on the balcony, Mussolini dressed as a German soldier in the truck travelling to Switzerland, Hitler in the Berlin bunker giving orders to divisions that no longer existed. It’s a matter of time, but their political adventure has finished. The bell for 2013 has already rung. The recreation at the expense of generations of Italians has finished. "ye are a factious crew, and enemies to all good government; ye are a pack of mercenary wretches, and would like Esau sell your country for a mess of pottage, and like Judas betray your God for a few pieces of money. Is there a single virtue now remaining amongst you? Is there one vice you do not possess? which of you have not barter'd your conscience for bribes? Is there a man amongst you that has the least care for the good of the Commonwealth? Ye are grown intolerably odious to the whole nation; you were deputed here by the people to get grievances redress'd, are yourselves gone! So! Take away that shining bauble there, and lock up the doors. In the name of God, go! (*)"

(*) From the speech by Oliver Cromwell to the English Parliament in 1653

Het laatste boek wat ik inmiddels uit heb is het zeer aanbevelenswaardige 'Het begint met een idee' met daarin het begrip memes oftewel zich voortplantende ideeën. Het mooie van het boek is ook dat de website een pagina bevat waar je per hoofdstuk kunt doorklikken naar de daarin behandelde talks:
http://www.hetbegintmeteenidee.nl/?page_id=129#!lightbox[162]/0/

Hartelijke groet en nog de beste wensen voor een gezond en leesbaar jaar,

Marcel Demoed