Dear director Feltri, I listened with great interest to the words spoken by Romano Prodi on TV, during an interview on Otto e mezzo with Lilli Gruber. I was struck by his intellectual honesty: he said that “he doesn’t see an alternative to the Meloni government” and that “the left has turned its back on Italy”. He also ruled out that there is a real fascist danger in the country, underlining that “the right gains votes because there is no credible proposal on the other side”. For years, many citizens, observers and even lucid journalists like you have denounced the lack of vision in the Italian left, which continues to twist around the usual fascism alarm. Now that even Prodi, one of the noble fathers of the centre-left, says it, perhaps someone will wake up. What do you think, Director?
Gianni Marchetti
Dear Gianni,
It rarely happens to me, but this time I find myself in agreement with Romano Prodi. Yes, that’s him: the former prime minister, the professor, who for a lifetime embodied the soul of the Italian center-left.
This time he spoke with a clarity that borders on the obvious, saying things that any rational person has long observed. The Italian left is voiceless, lost, devoid of a real project and capable only of evoking non-existent specters, first and foremost fascism.
Prodi stated that there is no credible alternative to Giorgia Meloni today. And that’s how it is. The center-left has locked itself in an ideological ivory tower, preferring to wave rainbow and Palestinian flags rather than address the real urgencies of this country: work, security, energy, uncontrolled immigration, growing poverty. Once upon a time the left talked about workers. Today he talks about Gaza, about fluid identities, about toxic patriarchy and about the semantic struggle against the overextended masculine. She has become a caricature of herself. Prodi is also right on another point: there is no risk of illiberal drift. No authoritarian emergency, no ongoing repression. The current government, despite all its limitations, is part of a majority that has been legitimately elected, respects the institutions, does not close newspapers, does not persecute opponents, does not prevent strikes or demonstrations. Those who scream about fascism do so for lack of arguments, in the vain hope that fear generates consensus. But Italians are not fools. They understand well the difference between a right-wing government and a dictatorship.
Meanwhile, the left continues to demonstrate. Not for pensions, not for housing, not for public health, but for yet another anti-fascist resistance without fascism. And maybe she does it dressed as a drag queen or with a keffiyeh around her neck, while in working-class neighborhoods people are afraid to go out in the evening. Prodi told the truth. Perhaps his age allows him to do so, perhaps the fact that he is now out of the political arena. But the fact remains that he hit the point with a clarity that today is lacking in much of his former political family. He’s absolutely right. And I’m surprised to say it, but I say it with conviction.
Better late than never. Wisdom, in some cases, comes with time.
And in an era of ideological madness, even a sensible sentence uttered by Prodi shines like a comet.