Paul Collier, a lively Oxford professor, wrote that social democracy entered into crisis when it abandoned an idea of pragmatic community to embrace one very much based on a moral law, according to which a ruling class has a paternalistic approach to people. Photograph coinciding with the attitude that the opposition parties observed when presenting and voting on the motion of no confidence against Matteo Salvini which sees, as the main reason, the political synergy agreement between the League and United Russia, Vladimir Putin’s party. An agreement signed in times of peace, never going beyond the mere formal statement and yet denied on several occasions by the party of the vice-president of the Council. Who, moreover, has always aligned himself with Fratelli d’Italia and Forza Italia in supporting Ukraine, both in the votes in Parliament and in the genesis of the electoral program for the 2022 elections, when the topic was even put to the first point. Nothing. The opposition’s initiative is imbued with that paternalism and moralism that always falls into the same flaw: seeing the speck in another’s eye while ignoring the beam in one’s own.
Yes, because if 2022 marked a “year zero” for everyone, the precedents cannot only be valid for some. Precedents in which many of those exponents who attempted the sortie in the (clumsy and unsuccessful) attempt to disarticulate the center-right, when they were in government, they had indeed established collaborations with Putin’s Russia. There is certainly the page regarding Giuseppe Conte, and that mission “From Russia with love” which saw around a hundred people land in Italy, mostly doctors and soldiers, sent by the Kremlin to provide support especially in terms of sanitation in the Bergamo area. A “mission”, born following a phone call between the then Prime Minister Conte and Vladimir Putin, with the Italian Prime Minister who, he learned later, he had not previously informed the rest of the government of the matter. The operation did little for Italy on a substantial level but a lot for Russia to improve its reputation in the international arena.
And what about the economic agreements made by PD-led governments in the last decade? In 2013, a meeting in Trieste between the then Prime Minister Enrico Letta and the Kremlin leader generated 28 commercial agreements in very important sectors such as energy, finance and industry. In June 2016, Matteo Renzi at the head of the government arrived in St. Petersburg announcing «agreements for over a billion euros, legitimate agreements in the sanctions plan because we respect the rules». Two years earlier there had been the first phase of conflict between Russia and Ukraine, with the sending of Moscow’s troops to Crimea and the first European sanctions. Renzi recognized how divisive the issue was: «We all think that the Minsk agreements must be respected, but we think that all opportunities for dialogue should be seized». Those were the days of the “economic forum” in the Russian city. Where, as Minister of Development, Carlo Calenda was also present: «The relationship between Italy and Russia – he said – is a profound relationship that has been going on for many years. For the Government it is a question of understanding what we can do to improve the relationship.” The past, therefore, is either valid for everyone or it is valid for no one.
#leftwing #forgetful #Putinians #Tempo
2024-04-06 16:15:09