By Postfataresurgo for the Saker Blog
Francesca Totolo is a journalist and a writer based in Milan, and makes no mystery of her political affiliations. She had a rude awakening one morning at 06.30 am when her home was stormed by an antiterrorist unit of Carabinieri with a search warrant, who seized her PC and cell phone and forced her to follow them at their heardquarters where she learned her charges and had all data from her personal devices copied. The same scene occurred simultaneously all over Italy involving another dozen or so individuals including a college professor which shares with Totolo more or less the same political opinions.
It turns out that the antiterrorist squad was coordinated by a special unit in charge of spying so-called online haters and inevitably reminds us of the thought police (Thinkpol in Newspeak language) of 1984. The main charge pressed was actually based on art.278 of the Italian Penal Code which states that anyone who offends the honour and prestige of the President of Italy can be sentenced from one to five years in prison. Supposedly, the group of online haters had used their social profiles on numerous instances to post derogatory or insulting comments toward Sergio Mattarella, his conduct and his persona. Incidentally – or coincidentally- the main Prosecutor who signed the search warrants makes no mystery either of his political affiliations, which happen to be exactly the opposite of the defendants.
Welcome to the new normal of Orwellian Italy 2021, where you can land in jail for your ideas and/or your political opinions, regardless of how you express them, in public or private. A law will be found – if not, a new one will be made – by a zealous prosecutor who thinks your thoughts do not fit the new normal enforced by Thinkpol and consequently you will have your home raided just as a terrorist of the most dangerous kind. Even politicians officially playing the role ( to mantain a minimum of Commedia ) of opposition to the current government dared only to whisper to Totolo some sign of solidarity in private.
No wonder. To use a crude but effective expression, Italian politicians are scared shitless of the judiciary, as they know too well that if a magistrate will prosecute you, your life will be held indefinitely, regardless of the fact that perhaps, many years later, you will be acquitted because found completely innocent. It is no coincidence that Italy remains by far the country with the highest number of violations to justice as sentenced by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg (ECHR), the chief culprit always being biblical slowness as the leitmotiv of the italian judiciary. In terms of efficiency of its justice, Italy ranks normally below every country of Western Europe and barely slightly above Turkey, Romania, Ucraine and Bulgaria.
Matteo Salvini is facing one trial after another charged for possible kidnapping (of “migrants” ) when he tried to stop NGO vessels from ferrying on a daily basis illegal aliens into Italy, back in 2019 when he was in charge as minister of the interior. No matter if he’s acquitted by one District Attorney, another one will formulate new charges, no matter how bizarre, insane or outright nonsense. The point here is to hit one in order to educate a hundred, as so stated a once-famous Chinese leader.
To add insult to injury to Salvini (and to reiterate who’s really in charge), another DA acquitted only days ago the german captain of the NGO vessel Sea Watch, Carola Rackete, who rammed an Italian coast guard vessel that was trying to prevent her from entering the port of Lampedusa in the summer of 2019. The italian DA has decided that she acted “forced by a state of necessity” given the fact that she needed to unload the human load she was carrying. And for Salvini new trials may still be looming on the horizon, just to keep him on his toes.
The turning point for Italy’s Ultracasta, as the judiciary was called by the title of a daring book published in 2009, was in the early 90’s with Operazione mani pulite
( Clean Hands) the judiciary storm that brought to its knees – and to its end – an entire ruling political class, and eventually Italy’s Prima Repubblica. The commedia for the public (always needed in Italy in order to succeed) was that a team of fearless prosecutors was finally bringing law and order to Italy’s notoriously corrupt politics, stopping in front of no one in their ultimate search for justice.
Reality was somewhat different. After 30 years or so, we now know that it was largely a well orchestrated and well planned operation from foreign powers in order to dismantle and sell for pennies Italy’s state run enterprises. Yes, corruption was indeed rampant and permeated possibly every aspect of public life in Italy. It was then and it is now. But somehow, despite ubiquitous corruption, Italy’s economy managed to be the fourth in the world as of 1991. That turning point in italian society is the fact that the judiciary with Mani pulite transforms from being an instrument at the disposal of political power into becoming itself political power, thus using its virtually unlimited power for the administration of justice as their personal and powerful tool to make the entire judiciary another entity not much different, in essence, from Cosa nostra.
And unlimited power resembles very much an addictive drug: is never enough. You always want more. Which explains what has happened in these recent years with the italian Magistratura. Just like politicians, they have organized themselves in all sorts of groups, or bands, in machiavellian scheming against each other in order to favor their friends and destroy their enemies, as careers can be made or ruined, position can be given or taken away, political careers can be neutralized, journalists can be persecuted just like in the case of Totolo and others. In no other country of the western world the power of judges is so unique and virtually unchallengeable.
ANM ( Associazione Nazionale Magistrati ) is the self governing body of the Italian judiciary. Although officially not a union, it represents approximately 95% of Italian Magistrates and is composed of an internal central committee with 36 members elected every 4 years. And, being in Italy, it goes without saying that it is divided by internal groups or correnti, just like political parties of the outside world. In short, ANM can make or unmake a magistrate’s career. And just like every aspect of Italian society, it is essential to have influential friends and contacts inside such an all too powerful association.
Luca Palamara made the headlines when he became the youngest President of ANM in 2008 when he was 39 years old. He held the post of President of ANM until 2012. The son of a prominent judge, with a law degree obtained at only 22 years old, he was surely destined to have a shining career. But in a permanent warfare of bands against each other, a rising star will always have plenty of treacherous enemies along his path. And in 2019 Palamara made the headlines again when the media reported that he was at the center of an investigation that highlighted the use of a malware, namely a trojan, in Palamara’s phone, evidencing his pivotal role as a “mediator” between the different correnti of ANM, making deals of all sorts, deciding on the careers not just of other magistrates but also actions to be taken against politicians. And Palamara’s role was essential in all this wheeling and dealing.
Such is the case when, in August 2018, when Salvini is minister of the interior and has the final word on NGO vessels unloading human cargos daily on italian shores.
Palamara receives a call from then Vicepresident of ANM, Giovanni Legnini, who demands to attack Salvini threatening him with judicial actions as his decision to have illegal aliens held on an italian Coast guard ship is attracting him too much popularity (from Italians). And Legnini’s requests are promptly granted, as Salvini will soon be formally indicted on a number of charges, including kidnapping of the illegal aliens held on the italian ship, as Italy was waiting for other EU states to receive part of the human cargo. In vain.
And so Palamara has gone in less than a year from being a rising star to become the ultimate villain of the entire italian judiciary, and consequently the (badly needed) scapegoat for the many who were requesting his good offices, as recorded in the malware inserted in his phone. Palamara became the first president in the history of ANM to be expelled, in September 2020, from the Magistratura. And his vendetta was to be expected shortly thereafter. It has arrived as a book that speaks volumes, with an eloquent title: Il sistema. Power, politics, deals: a secret history of the italian Magistratura.
Palamara’s thesis is a simple one: yes, I was part of this system, this permanent warfare against each other, just as it was everybody else. When I became too powerful and influential, somebody decided that it was my turn to go down.
In a relatevely normal country, such a book would be considered nothing short than
an earthquake that would make many heads roll. Many have expected the President of Italy to take some action in this ordeal, highly damaging for the already tampered prestige of the judiciary entirely, attracting many critics for this complete lack of action in this matter, including many ordinary citizens on their social profiles.
It is widely recognized that Palamara’s book should potentially open an endless array of investigations. Not likely, at least not in Italy. After few weeks or months of noise, things will go back to normal. But in the meantime, il Sistema needs diversions. After all we live in an endless pandemic, which produces headlines on a daily, if not hourly, basis. And a group of potential terrorists always comes handy, especially in the case such as citizens who dared to express their judgements on a President that most likely will go down in history as “the silent”. Which, in Italy, is the surest way to ensure yourself a peaceful and happy life.
The story is unique to Italy, but emblematic of all Western democracies.
They all have turned into Tyrannies. They fear transparency. They fear the “governed”.
Elites have embraced a Cult of Liberalism ideology. This ideology cannot bear sunshine, truth, opposition or better ideas.
Most of all, the democracies have all been corrupted. They are stealing the wealth of the masses.
History teaches us how this ends. Usually with violence.
Excellent article. There is no doubt that Mattarella acts in the interest of foreign powers. Defeated powers after the world wars were forced to accept a constitution where the president selects the prime minister. This worked wonders already in the 1930s when Hindenburg selected Hitler, who had not won the election, and Hitler proceeded to give the West what it wanted (a big war with Russia). Mattarella has selected solely non-elected prime ministers, and I think the last five were un-elected (some before Mattarella’s time). I think the last elected one was Berlusconi.
The last PM, Draghi, was the major player in the privatization of Italy’s state industry in 1992. He was nicely compensated with plum jobs, and now he is back, and Italy is the first country to have some sort of extra form, precursor to the vaccine passport, if you want to fly there (this started May 24). The form is mandatory only there for now but the web site where you compile it is a EU web site.
Just a short note in regard to Mattarella’s predecessor, Napolitano. I have first hand knowledge that when he was in the PCI, Partito Comunista Italiano, 40-60 years ago he was feared and despised. And he was despised because many knew he was a mole of outside western powers. In fact, whereas many died before their time or had their career destroyed, and most important the Party was destroyed, he was given the job of President in the 2010s. Also, many thought it was certain that he was the illegitimate son of the deposed monarch, Umberto di Savoia. Nothing he did as president goes against these hypotheses.
Bless you, Italy! Forever sucking the teats of the ancient wolf but never quite managing to turn into a wolf. You revived the ancient Roman Fasces but I remember with affection how quickly you surrendered, because you realized that Fascism was not worth fighting for — let alone dying for. I remember your partisans hung the dictator from his own balcony together with his mistress — which the disciplined efficient Germans never managed to do. I remember holidays in Italy after the war, sampling all the good things you have given the world — capuccino, vino, gelati, pasta, parmegianno, all that wonderful art and music plus modern amenities like butagas and the autostrada. Wildly silly but highly stylish films, the mambo, coffee bars plus fashionable clothes and nimble cars stamped disegno on the postwar world. Also, if people insist on measurement in units of money, “the fourth largest economy in the world”.
Italy, your fling with the cold, gloomy, Etonian boarding-school despotism that scarred Orwell’s imagination for life. I think you will soon tire of it. What good thing will you turn around and hand to us then?
Looks like you malign Orwell. He was born in Bengal. He went to prep schools in England but it was Wellington College he hated – it is a military school. – Eton he adored.
Paul, I think Orwell adored Eton, its Fags, its Prefects, its Gods, its sublime centainty that a few were born to rule and the rest were born to serve because the young Eric Arthur Blair — born in the far East of Great Britain’s Empire, “the Empire on which the Sun never sets” — was himself an advanced case of Empire of the Sun syndrome.
“If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face – forever.” That’s what Eton did to young Eric, it turned him into the little boy in Empire of the Sun.
Orwell reminds me of a little German Jewish refugee I heard about from an English Jew after the War. The boys were in a shelter in London during the blitz, and the English boy kept telling the German boy to shut up. The German Jewish boy was howling: “We are all going to be killed, our Luftwaffe is invincible!”.
Marvelous description of Italy! I like it a lot.
I do hope they will be able to turn all of this a round.
And that rest of us will be able to turn all of these madness in our countries …
It is outrageous when Draghi, who was never in his life elected to anything by the Italians, calls Erdogan a dictator. The real dictatorship is the European Commission.
Draghi was always “selected” – by the usual Globalist suspects.
The ECB do nothing banker in past EU crises. Aka Greece Spain Portugal.
Draghi is Goldman Sachs……..that alone is Private Placement
Matteo Salvini should press charges against sitting judges and prosecutors with that book as grounds material.
That would exclude them from trials. Once another one comes in, simply do the same.
They will be busy explaining themselves. Once they are acquitted by their buddies, just formulate it differently and place another charge expanding it to those that signed the acquittal.
Treat them like a mafia, because that’s what they are.
Hungary(Orban-FIDESZ) has tried to get rid of the flotsam some years ago. Brussels has FREAKED! Guy called Cohn-Bendit at the front of the assault…
appropriately…
Same judiciary – compatriots of Stalin – aged 70andsum. They are irreplaceable…
Thank the Lord, the newly minted skinny jeans ones are of the antifa/maoist/georgefloyd worship.
I expect, when the occasion arrives, they will b talked to meaningfully, regardless of their gender.
I expect to b when that happens…
“…art.278 of the Italian Penal Code which states that anyone who offends the honour and prestige of the President of Italy can be sentenced from one to five years in prison”.
I am confused. I thought modern Italy was meant to be some kind of democracy, in which citizens had the right of free speech.
But it turns out to be like ancient Persia or some surviving traditional monarchies, in which you can be imprisoned for saying nasty things about the Big Cheeses.
If the President of Italy behaves in such a way as to cause people to disparage his honour and prestige, maybe Italians deserve a better President.
Germany has a similar law. The head of the NPD (the only genuine oppositon party in Germany before it was banned), was imprisoned for “insulting the Chancellor”, aka Merkel, about fifteen years ago. A comedian was also imprisoned for criticising Erdogan under a law that makes it illegal to insult foreign leaders. I wonder if he had insulted President Putin would he have spent time in prison?
Grave measures will be needed to resolve the current situation.
But Merkel has to go to an election this I understand – I wonder how happy Germans will be about masks, lockdowns and vaccines when they vote ?
Western polities are Oligarchies. Only a fool thinks “democracy” empowers the voter to change policies.
What do they say ? Voting allows the pig to choose the butcher
Very good article, thank you.
Irrespective of the current state of Italian judiciary and its real independence from the excutive, the worst problem of Italy is that it has been took over by an unelected globalist from Davos and Bilderberg, faithfull member and servant of the provate Central Banks Netowork of which all the evils yo umention ar not but weapoms, say the Mafia, the Vatican, and Salvini himself, who is not bu tpart of the problem.
He voted for Dragui as unelected Prime Minister of Italy and his zig zags in politics compite with the waves of case of Coronavirus at demand ot whomever.
It is not only the political companions of Salvini who are being opreesed in Italy, but the very health workers at the front line of the pandemic.
Has Salvini denounced this recent law in any way which in spite of conceding immunity to the hekath workers inyecting the vaccines, oblies them to take the jab of such “uncertain vaccines”, assuring them that way they will not have anywhere to claim for responsability in case of serious side effects but anyway oblying them to take them?
https://www.byoblu.com/2021/05/14/lobbligo-vaccinale-per-i-sanitari-riceve-lok-del-senato/
This is what is really Orwellian, man…
When they came for the health workers, I said nothing and voted for Dragui, a sevant of the WEF Gteta Reset as unelected PM so as to consefve my pariament seat and its high wage, when they for me there was no heakth workers community to defend me as they were already under presure of losing thier way of lkiving if they do not submit to the forced experimental uncertain vaccines…
Enjoy your Orwellian New Normal!
In the whole EU you do not need to insult anybody, it is enough to say soemthing criticizing the pandemic measures or the clearly innefective and dangerous “vaccines” to be slandered by the whole press owned by BalckRock ( main shareholder of Pfizer, Modenra, J&J, Janssen, and AstrZeneca…thus a monopoly…) and the mass media.
In fact in Germany it was was intended to being passed at parlimaent on labelling as terrorists anyone who dared to spread other alternative opinions on the pandemic and its measures took at unison by the whole EU.
There are increasing resistance from citizenry of every walk of life and ideology to this outrgae and hijacking of democracy and they try to label all as “far-right extremists” because some far.right politicla parties are trying to fish votes amongst the, this yes, awakening movements, filled with real scientists, medical doctors, lawyers, parents associations who do not want theur children vaccinated with these prod ucts and so on.
So far they have managed to try to ruin the careers and lives of the few who have stepped down publicly by supending thei jobs, wages and even licenses to exert medicine, but they will not be bale to unlaw a whole bunch of the population without creatiing a insurrection.
The current fight on the lab origins of the virus is in the origins of these awakeingi by the people, since as soon as the people is bale to discover who caused this all, ruined the countries, and moreover tried to create a two tier society in which a half is demonized by the governments, media and brainwashed other half the citiznery, all the house of cards compising this pandemic will fall and with it the planners, and with them probably the whole Western “democratic system”.
The unveiling of which class of individuals our government so much effort spend internationaly to defend, like the lately caught in a flight, neonazi Protasevich, adds to these awakening, as they use our taxes to defend this scum while at home opressing us and depriving us of our basic rights to not being innoculated with experimental priducts as was declared by the Nuremberg Code, or of our freedom of expression and movement.
None of this has been, btw, denounced by Salvini and his formation.
Lawfare is on fashion….not only to target “dissident citizens” or “politicla oppnents” fighting the “New Orwellian New Normal”, but also to help built monopolies for whom is highly likely at the top of the pyramid of this “new order”…
A group of “eco-activists” led by a well-known stock market speculator and a former high-ranking BlackRock official wins two positions on the board of directors of Exxon, the world’s largest oil company, in court.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/activist-wins-exxon-board-seats-after-questioning-oil-giants-climate-strategy-11622050087
https://www.hedgeweek.com/2020/12/02/292961/hedge-fund-veterans-team-former-blackrock-exec-launch-impact-investing-firm
I wonder if Italy’s law on this breach EU laws ?
Appalling state of affairs in EU – not seen since 1945.
But the same people in essence are running this sad show and will be defeated.
The European Comission forbade in January, in a comuniquee to all EU members, that “mandatory vaccinations” be impossed, then the WEF appointed government of Italy jumped over this EU Comission´s resolution and in passing slided it for said part…
We are in such state, as you say, so similar to 1945 because the US is about to crash financially, like in thve 1930, and needs Europe again destroyed and submitted to plain fascism so that its hedge funds, banks and corporations can come here to save…v i.e. loot everything for them to surviv over our smithereens, as happened then.
That our governments are being held tight by their balls by these US hedge funds, because of their continuous and contrary to any sane national security doctrine indebment to these vulture funds is an understatement
The plan for italy is the following, you chose “corporate fascism” of you have “fascism of always”.
In the verge of chosing unelected italy PM Dragui, all political parties accepted his apointment, except “Fratelli d´Italia” ( musssolinian fascio of always ) getting as only opposition party to this government of the “new normal”, who more than being brothers of the Italian people are so more of the Italian classical elites, as history taught us..
Thisc equates fascism one way or the other, so you have or “mandatory genic therapies” so that you lose with time your capacity of reasoning and thinking as human being, thus discernment, vand become a slave of the corporations with no rights, no freedoms, being said where to go, when you go out and whne you came in, what to eat, whther you can talk or must shut up, whether you have children or not, or it is the brown shirts with their death squads and crystla nachts of always…
They have managed that there would get only these two options once the real left infiltrated by corporate operatives and destroyed.
I dunno, but I think i will venture better with the fascists of always…keeping my brain and health intact, at least with them you have an opportunity to prevail.
There is a window of opportunity to fight this while some of us still keep our functions intact.
Like in 1917 – the people need to take action.
Indeed, and people will do it, may be they need to lose some more or even most of their hedonistic previous way of life, that they will do as it is the plan of the elites at the top and so they openly spread through their sites “you will own nothing and will be happy”…
But I can not see in what way thay could achieve the people feeling so in the short temr, unless they get to erase the elders and boomer population in Europe as a whole and in a round ( which could weel be the goal of all these vaccines experiments…) as, even after being submitted to a shock therapy and televised, teletrasmitted fear for a whole year, the memories still have not been erased, not the spirits of what was the most formidable resistance to fascism, once they feel they have had enough of oppression and abuse…
After all, it was Italy´s Communist Party the most powerful in Europe, hence it was targetted for destruction by the Gladio network, allied with the mafia and the secret societies of always. Those examples and mmories are still vivid in the minds of the Europeans…and their descendats
I hope that when the whole hell falls out with all its force on us, some voentorg is also sent to us by our friends of always, those who never abandoned us to fascism…
Btw, that current Gladio is composed by both, the transnational takfiris being infiltrated through the whole Mediterranean shores, and the nazi death squads to which the so defended by our officials, Protasevich, belongs, to infiltrate through the heartland…
Lukashenko is not doing but helping us by fighting the first battle of deterrence, so as to delate blitzkrieg..
Just this afternoon, was talking with some friends with whom I had not been able to meet forl ong tiem, and even when not reading so much geopolitics as me, but being awakened people, especially through this pandemic, the man concluded that a whole number of events happening lately were indicating the proximity of a great war… a philosophy teacher…
I warned him of what I had read quite time ago over there on going preparing, but we concluded that, even when the pandemic could had been preplanned by the criminals in charge ti ruin and submit us, the developments are unpredictable, even for them…
May we be also assisted by the spirits of the martyrs of the resistance in the Middle East.
It was very hopeful and joyful to contemplate the joy of the Syrian people celebrating their victory after so much suffering and loses….
Thanks for a very illuminating article, bot:
If in Italy the bishop of Rome and Pope of all Catholics came out and declarad himself to be a true believer in the Roman Catholic faith, the Italian public would be skeptical and doupt his his true intentions.
As much as one can be skeptical about the workings of injustice and crab politics in Italy, the public’s lack of illusions. I only find this healthy level of skeptisism in Italy, partly in Japan ant Israël (two other tribal societies), and in part in China.
Italy is strikingly similar to Spain and Greece: EU and NATO satrapies where few people question their countries’ memberships, refusing to see what’s obvious to anyone not subscribing to First World self-worship: Imperialism breeds perpetual wars on the Third World which breeds refugee torrents as a most deliberate ”side effect” which breeds ever more chaos and social conflict. Most notably, Southern Italy’s powerful agrobusiness thrives on a continued supply of destitute people who are ready to accept conditions of virtual slavery in order to survive. Indeed, as far as Italy is concerned, neoliberalism has achieved exactly the same results as in Eastern Europe: Deindustrialization (the North), consolidated Mafia rule (the South), and abysmal birth stats (the entire country). Also, Italy’s fate when confronted with the ravages of the pandemic was reminiscent of the Greeks’ experience with the EU banksters ruling over them: Lots of suffering accompanied by raw Elite contempt, corruption, and total indifference. European values at their very finest.
Re: ” they have organized themselves in all sorts of groups, or bands, in machiavellian scheming against each other”
To many who are used to throwing around specific words in an oratorical flourish, it may seem petty to point this out, but I always cringe when i read something like this. Machiavelli’s role was, as a fascinated observer and recorder of the behaviour of the Medicis and most certainly not as a direct participant in their scheming.
A bit like the misappropriation of the use of the word “Anarchy” which is a far nobler cause than its modern use implies….and “Democracy” too, for that matter…
Well as the subject is Italy and the legal system.
Apparently law has been passed to enforce vaccines on everyman, woman and child.
https://www.gazzettaufficiale.it/eli/id/2021/04/01/21G00056/sg
The European states, perhaps, to the greatest extent were able to take advantage of the conditions provided by the liberal world order for achieving their selfish interests. But, as we can see from the current position of the European Union in world affairs, this is where the available opportunities were exhausted. Within the framework of the liberal world order there emerged the main material reason for its disappearance—China’s boom and the ensuing structural changes. This inevitably transferred the discussion about the future distribution of influence in the world to the global level, with a special emphasis on the eastern part of Eurasia and regions in the basins of the Pacific and Indian oceans. If, in the future, international politics gets more orderly, the norms and rules it will rest upon will be able to reflect the European experience only partially. And they will certainly not pursue the aim of establishing order in Europe, contrary to all previous cases. Even if Russia sets a goal of rejoining in the European balance of power once again, the conflict that will follow as a result of such behavior will not be of central importance to the fate of the world. The European era of international politics is over.
The resistance wil resurge no doubt ….everywhere in Europe…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSWYSww-RlY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcC2dXYdmwU
Oh, yes, we are aware of Sergio Martalleta as President of Italy.
We have keen-eyed observers in Italy who have told us a few stories about Martalleta’s staying-power as President.
From their reckoning, this President of Italy is very close to the banking institutions in the EU along with the very wealthy Northerners in Italy. Most of them are tied-to-the-hip with German industry and banking operations.
It seems to be expected that Martalleta is close to Mario Draghi of Goldman Sachs fame.
When the Conti Government was overthrown in comes Mr. Dracula.
Between those two figures, Italian citizens will be further crushed in many areas of Life In Italy.