Unnoticed by anybody outside, mainstream Italian politicians have now given up on democracy. The leaders of centrist parties now concede that although they would like to remain in office, and although they intend to keep taking their salaries of thousands of Euros each month and do not intend to give up their chauffeur-driven cars, only Monti can run the place. In acknowledging this, Gianfranco Fini, and others, have shown that what they really want the trappings of office without its burdens. Government is no longer for democrats. Government is for unelected bureaucrats. As a result, even the process of democracy – elections for instance – become a mime-show, with the people putting themselves forward for election being those who themselves support unelected leaders.
Thus the E.U., which began as an unelected and anti-democratic central authority (including an “E.U. Foreign minister” whom nobody in Europe ever heard of, let alone voted for) has become outwardly expressive in its habits: after decades of the E.U. being a non-democratic body, it now encourages non-democracy in others.
Why this has come about – why the elite have come to distrust the people of Europe so much that they now wholly side-step them – is a subject for another time. For now, a simple point needs to be made. Now that democracy has been suspended in Europe and in specific European countries such as Italy, does anybody know when it might be reinstated? Or who is proposing to begin the process?
The E.U. has not bothered considering that question. The Nobel committee do not know. If the latter had any decency they would make the collection of the award contingent on the recipient providing an answer to that question before it is too late.
Originally published at the Gatestone Institute.