If we want to say how we want the men of future generations to be, we should say: let them be like Veltroni

As energetic as all bran for breakfast

To those of you erudite enough (unlike me) to recognise in the title of this post words borrowed from the 18th October 1967 eulogy delivered by el comandante after confirmation of Che Guevara's death in Bolivia the paradox is obvious.

Walter Veltroni was, is and will always be to Che Guevara what Dan Quayle was to jack Kennedy as Lloyd Bentsen so elegantly reminded him (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWXRNySMW4s).

He has and should be relegated to the dustbin of history. So why have I decided to write about this character that is little known outside of il belpaese?

The answer is simple. Like every intellectual, I serve a prince and did not have the privilege of freely choosing the topic for this post. In other words, I was asked (in rather peremptory terms) to write this one.

And so for those of you not accustomed with Italian politics: who is Walter Veltroni? Pirandello once said that each one of us has three personas: the person we think we are, the person others think we are, and the person we truly are. The third, I guess, being halfway between the first two.

And so it is with this consideration in mind (and obviously some personal variations on the theme) that I shall try to present Walter Veltroni.

Like every politician with an oversized ego, a long list of dubious publications is appended to his name. Any respectable library (in any part of the world) should be capable of furnishing you all with at least one copy of notable topical scripts such as:

• Il PCI e la questione giovanile (The PCI - Italian Communist Party - and the Youth Issue)A dieci anni dal ’68.
• Intervista con Achille Occhetto (Ten Years since '68: Interview with Achille Occhetto)
• Il sogno degli anni sessanta (The dream of the Sixties)
• Il calcio è una scienza da amare (Football is a science to be loved)
• Io e Berlusconi (e la Rai) (Berlusconi and me (and RAI))
• I programmi che hanno cambiato l’Italia (Programs that changed Italy)
• La sfida interrotta. Le idee di Enrico Berlinguer (The interrupted challenge. The ideas of Enrico Berlinguer)
• Certi piccoli amori (Certain small Loves)
• La bella politica (interview book) (Politics, the beautiful)
• Certi piccoli amori 2 (Certain Small Loves II)
• Governare da sinistra (To Govern from the Left)
• I care
• Forse Dio è malato. Diario di un viaggio africano (Perhaps God is sick: Diary of an African journey)
• Il disco del mondo. Vita breve di Luca Flores, musicista (The disk of the world. Short life of Luca Flores, musician)
• Senza Patricio (Without Patricio)
• La scoperta dell'alba (Discovery of the dawn)
• Preface to Barack Obama, L'audacia della speranza (The Audacity of Hope)
  

As I do not want to come across as an arrogant and overtly critical person, I am not going to deny that my four working papers pale into comparison with the length of this guy's bibliography.

The real issue is: what has he written? What would you think this list refers to, were you to recover it on a deserted island? I would think that it is either a section of the library catalogue of a provincial section of the communist party or the bibliography of a rather pathetic apparatchick.

And I guess that the direction of this post has finally been uncovered.

Still, I hope you will forgive me if, I continue in providing additional details about the life, death and miracles of Walter Veltroni.

Ali G once questioned the conventional wisdom of "you are what you eat" with the famous words "if that is true than how come I ain't a giant chicken with Mcmuffin eyes, and cheeseburger hands".

I never really believed that food determines so much of who a person is, but I am firmly convinced that you can tell a lot about anybody by looking at their friends. So, let us get started. Once again, the list is long and to all extents and purposes impressive. Starting and remaining (for the sake of brevity) with two entries at the letter A.

Architects: Gae Aulenti, Renzo Piano e Massimiliano Fuksas

Artists (he is a former minister for culture): Stefania Sandrelli, Laura Morante, Claudio Amendola, Francesca Neri, Giobbe Covatta, Carlo Verdone, Bernardo Bertolucci and, from among the departed, it is probably worth mentioning PierPaolo Pasolini.

Long and impressive as the list may be, it does not stray much from the names of the well known components of the Italian Intelligentsia of the last 4 decades. Walter Veltroni's list of acquaintances, like his list of publications, places him firmly at the centre of the network of personalities that have influenced, driven and shaped the Italian left for decades.

His direct political associations are no more original. A long term member of the politburo running the Italian communist party, his key credential as a reformer is to have acknowledged the direction of events taking place on planet earth and supported Achille Occhetto in shifting the posture of the party from communist to social democrat (and a monumental shift it was, which even preserved the hammer and sickle as a central element in the logo of the "new party").

And when he did look beyond his traditional pool of contacts and acolytes, he opted for launching an 'entente cordiale' with Berlusconi that Beppe Grillo described as reminiscent of Garibaldi and Vittorio Emanuele II in Teano.

Last but not least, I shall give the word to the man himself, in hope that we may be able to understand who he is and what he stands for.

"I have always had an idea of politics as a civil mission, a mean and not an end." Fine By me

"As many authoritative international observers have noted, Italy has taken, unexpectedly, the role of a laboratory of political innovation. " That might be true, and I would love to know who they are!

"Millions of Italians have voted in the name of a new politics, a politics more somber in the use of public resources and more efficient in administering them, a politics more humble and more competent." said the former mayor of Rome and 'Politburo' member

"We are therefore in the presence of a new concept: that of the citizen-voter, who is also the true protagonist of the creation of the democratic party: and it is in full respect of the primacy of this new figure that we have to construct the organisational model of the new party. A model in which participation does not depend on affiliation. A model in which the greatest energy is born from the greatest liberty. From the union of autonomy and direct responsibility. It is an innovation challenge and it is something that needs to start from us, something that needs first and foremost to make its way into our heads." Would the above involve a resolution of the crisis at Alitalia? If yes, I fail to see how.

"A party in which, every political position, will be assigned by reference to the personal qualities of candidates and not by reference to the affiliations of old, to oligarchic or current related logics" Said he before distributing secretarial posts to representatives of the various factions in his 'party'

"But altogether the democratic party is interested in fostering the evolution of aggregational processes and programmatic (as well as value) innovations in the whole Italian political system......Therefore programmatic and institutional innovation. And Political innovation." Anybody recognise the familiar arcane and indiscernible way of speaking so typical of old guard politicians in Southern Europe?

Many of you might ask after bearing with me for the full length of this post: what is my point?

My point is very simple. Italy needs radical reform and that cannot be delivered by an insider that has been a protagonist of Italian politics for four decades. That much I am SURE about.

The thing I am not sure about is something I discussed with a friend, on a recent trip to Valencia.

His theory is that modern systems of democratic governance were not invented in southern Europe. Italians playing democracy are like football players playing cricket.

The modern democratic system is an Anglo-Saxon creation. Democratic government is to Italian and Spaniards what eating 'al fresco' is to the British: exotic, very demanding (not natural and effortless) and generally associated with BAD results (or food).

As for Veltroni he is just another sour element of democracy all'Italiana - and thank god he's gone!

Alessandro

• Italian Opposition Leader Says He 'Failed' (nytimes.com)
• Has Italy's Left Found its Own Obama? (time.com)