Europe Frets over Italy: 'Two Clowns Won the Election'
"We finished first, without winning." That's how Democratic Party head Pier Luigi Bersani on Tuesday summed up the results of the Italian election, one which left his center-left camp with an edge in parliament but without sufficient leverage in the Senate. What he didn't say is that the biggest loser ultimately might not be in Italy at all. The biggest loser could be Europe and its efforts to finally emerge from years of crisis.
Those concerns were highlighted on Tuesday as stock and financial markets around the world made clear their discomfort with the political chaos in Italy that has resulted from the deadlocked vote. And more bad news could be on the horizon. The ratings agency Moody's indicated on Tuesday that it may downgrade Rome's credit rating in the wake of the election.
"Instead of increasing visibility on the country's political direction, Italy's recent elections raised the risk that the structural reform momentum achieved under the government of Mario Monti will stall, if not come to a complete standstill," Moody's wrote in a Tuesday report. The agency said it would downgrade the country from its current Baa2 rating -- just two levels above junk status -- if reform efforts wane.
It is hardly an idle concern. The Five Star Movement of former comedian Beppe Grillo emerged as the strongest single party from the election, primarily on the strength of his disdain for the political class and his unrelenting anti-European Union and anti-austerity rhetoric. Silvio Berlusconi, though he lost 4 million voters relative to his 2008 result, was also surprisingly strong -- due in large part to his own rants against the EU and, in particular, against German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/european-union-leaders-worry-that-italian-election-may-spur-crisis-a-885816.html
Giolitti, who twice served as Italy's prime minister, was once asked whether it was difficult to govern his native land. "Not at all," Giolitti replied, "but it's useless!"