[mattomac]

He offered the Italians reform and stability surely he knew that was a mistake.

It could lead to a Trump/Brexit type result but at the moment it's yet another chapter in Italian politics which is just weird.

[PaulOnBooks]

A €20bn (£17bn) rescue fund for Italy’s banking sector was approved by the country’s parliament on Wednesday,

Piercarlo Padoan, the finance minister, said “This measure reinforces the ability of the Italian system to grow and consolidate itself and this growth will be a further element that helps banks’ balance sheets.”

There's a place on Trump's team for anyone who can say that sort of thing with a straight face.

[youngian]

One of those political dramas where you learn as it unfolds. I had absolutely no idea what the Italian president's veto powers were or could even name anyone whose occupied the office. His move does look politically foolish but electorates have the right to make foolish decisions also in a democracy. Particularly when have the right to change your mind if the emerging evidence reveals a car crash. Except here.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Yeah, it's pretty amazing that the President can do this.

An extremely tough call. The choice for finance minister apparently is on the record saying that Italy needed to leave the Euro by stealth. Which might be a respectable intellectual position, but "brave" for an actual finance minister. So Italians would be fucked with this bloke in charge carrying out anything like the plan put forward by the coalition. Plus the parties said they wouldn't be leaving the Euro.

On the other hand, it's a gift in a "the establishment thwarting democracy" way. We'll see.

[Kreuzberger]

With all the precarious Italian bank debt being, quite naturally, denominated in EUR, I can see a fundamental flaw in this plan. Does someone have an "ah yebbut" silver bullet that would see Lira-due pegged to the CHF during what would surely be a reasonably epic EUR wobble?

[youngian]

Hasn't Italy been in permanent debt crisis since the Caesars? Leaving the Euro with give them an opportunity to default and then begin a new journey to rack another €250bn of debt like Argentina. Or a million trillion Liras in new money.

[bluebellnutter]

I regard it as being akin to the House of Lord's voting down Government legislation outside the Salisbury Convention. I.E. if you weren't elected promising this then you can't just expect everyone to roll over and let you do it if we think it's a bad idea because "democracy".

[Tubby Isaacs]

That's a good analogy.

Italy's been pretty good at keeping its cash deficit down- been below the 3% for 6 years. And it was the only major economy not to stimulate in 2009. But it's eye poppingly regressive.



It made its pensions scheme much more sustainable in 2011 (under the technocrat government) but this coalition naturally want that repealed. I've seen an estimate that doing this will cost "up to 20bn a year".

[youngian]

'A government of technocrats' is now a term of abuse. Well, I want the squares running everything not people wearing red noses in backfiring cars.

This finance minister candidate sounds like a poor man's Alexei Tsipiras who will reap similar results:
"Relieve our debt without strings or I'll press the button and drop out of the Euro."
EU partners: "No you won't but we'll arrange a haircut so you can go back with something. You know where the door is."

[cycloon]

Opinion from Bloomberg is somewhat different to The Sun...

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles ... kless-game

But what does an economic journalist know, hey?

[youngian]

But the longer the wrangling goes on, the clearer it becomes that the populists’ actions aren’t being driven by some kind of noble principle. They are playing politics. The League and Five Star are simply jostling for advantage ahead of possible fresh elections. In doing so, they have plunged the country into a constitutional crisis for the sake of winning a few more votes. https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles ... kless-game

All the more reason why the president should have called their bluff as the rest of the EU will.

[bluebellnutter]

Plunging a country into a constitutional crisis on the basis of picking up a few more votes? Ha, thank God we'd never have a Government stupid enough to do that in this count...oh forget it.

[The Weeping Angel]

A truly bad hot take.

[MisterMuncher]

That's impressive guff.

The best part is that parties of the working class abandoning their core in pursuit of minority votes is a persistent right wing meme long given voice in the press etc. It's vitally important (to the right) that people are kept in the belief that rights and privileges are a zero-sum game, no-one can care about more than one thing at a time, and that Pavel and Samir took our jobs. How Lefty are you if you're just accepting that as axiomatic?

[youngian]

What evidence does he have that Kippers will vote for a beardy lefty peacenik from Islington?