In "old" Europe, the overall sentiment for US policy and just how far the public is willing to let local Governments go in catering to US needs is changing. Italy's Prodi predicament is a prime example. Nobody likes a crisis but crises are quite often the sole predecessors of real changes. Italians are not afraid of crises or confrontations. They like to speak their minds and given most any chance...they'll do so and you'd better beware if you're on their shit list. Silvio Berlusconi made the list last year and Romano Prodi made a strong comeback, bringing with him the promise of a stronger Italy. One that would no longer blindly cater to the US' needs for more bodies in Afghanistan and Iraq. That's really the key issue right there. Who wants a Government that is planning to send our kids off to an illegal and unjust war we didn't start or provoke ? All the while, the idea of yet another, a third illegal war looming. Is it any wonder the people are fed up ? Not only in Italy, but also in all other European countries. In Italy this past Saturday, in a place called Vicenza ( Vicenza is approximately 60 km west of Venice and 200 km east of Milan ), some 100,000 people hit the streets in protest of the planned expansion of a US military base. The protest was also directed against the US war in Iraq and the foreign policy of the centre-left Italian government of Prime Minister Romano Prodi. Now that's what I call "speaking one's mind" ! Prodi accelerated the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, mind you, but he also angered a few senators by not ending Italy's participation in an Afghanistan peacekeeping mission. Does anybody smell Democracy here ? I do.
And then we have those itsy bitsy Lear Jets flying in and out of numerous airbases and airports in and around Europe with their secret cargo... human cargo. Take for instance the Murat Kurnaz case in Germany which is struggling to stay in the news and not be swept up under the rug in an effort to save a few faces in the German Government or if you wish, the case of Egyptian imam Osama Mustafa Hassan in Italy and the resulting indictment of 26 Americans, most of them CIA agents, to stand trial for the kidnapping. The shit is about to hit the fan ! The Press can (and will) do their best to keep such 'negative' news off the air and out of the papers but those voices are growing louder and louder and louder. And somewhere down the line, a lot of people just might be left standing there naked as a jaybird when the current US President leaves office...the one he occupied without "we the people"... our authority.
Unlike us Americans, Europeans have a darned good idea of what's going on in other countries. They're 'hip' to what's goin' down in the USA. TV and soccer are entertaining but they haven't totally brainwashed the peoples... the way it's been done in America. Sure, Europe is americanized to a point and there are more than enough politically neutered zombies walking around here. But when it comes to war, waging war and churning hostilities, Europeans are proving to be less and less willing to play along... not even in bluejeans and Marilyn Manson t-shirts....
especially not in Marilyn Manson t-shirts !
Cat Stevens' songs still get air time. Yusuf Islam's songs do too. 9/11 didn't have the lasting effect it was supposed to have, and I hope to the bottom of my heart that this is not limited to Europe. No matter what the press here is trying to bang into our heads, we still prefer tolerance over blind hatred (echoes of the recent past).
It was an exceptionally mild winter. Spring is in the air. The asphalt is slowly awakening to the sun rays that in some parts of Europe can be the cause for some pretty hot globs of tar... a lot like in Phoenix or in Albuquerque. Let's hope it gets hot enough to awaken a lot of the zombies, get more people on the streets and to persuade the press to keep that dirt out in the open and not sweep it up under the rug.
