A Post Mortem in Honor of Lucia Azzolina

My dearest Lucia, I am writing to you today hoping that you, your family,
your associates, and supporters are well and prospering. I wish also to
congratulate you on being released from one of Italy’s most prestigious
bureaucratic lunatic asylums, the Ministero di Istruzione Pubblica, for which
you served as its ministra until you were recently supplanted by the new
Draghi administration. I admire you for your courage, belief in expectancy,
and the fresh air you desired to incorporate into the despairing Italian
“political” scene.

How did you do it? How did you maintain your psychic stability during your
tenure? Did you drink a bottle of whisky every day? Did you smoke
marijuana? Did you pop tranquilizers throughout the days you dealt with
the enormous complexity of the assignment you were empowered with.

I could see that you took on that gargantuan responsibility with verve, with
hope, and with the intention of attempting to put order into a bureaucratic
disorderliness that had been left to simmer for decades—left to crumble
into a Black Hole of Corruption, Greed, Hedonism, and Super-abundant
Ignorance. Only the Ministero della Giustizia could be worse than that one
you endeavored to bring sense to. (What is the difference between a dead
dog in the street and a dead Italian lawyer in the street? There are skid
marks before the dog!) More Injustice than Justice has been brought forth
by the Ministero della Giustizia. Who taught the Italians the Art of
Bureaucracy? The Gestapo?
Lucia, how does it feel to have been set up as a sacrificial lamb? To have
been put through a meat grinder? You are truly an exceptional character.
They foisted you into a den of iniquity. They expected a “miracle” from you.
They awaited a happening that you would concoct with your intelligence,
vigor, and respect for your country. But it never eventuated. From the start,
you would be barricaded by elements, many of them vitiated, who held sway
over their functionary fiefdoms and were out to keep you away from their
“powerfulness.” Those Connoisseurs of Cruelty! But you didn’t let them
bother you. You fought on. You, gutsy you, took no for no answer. (Oh! How
many stronzi are there in Italy!) I only wish I had been in your circle of
“influencers.” Only your father, your mother, your grandfather, your
grandmother, your brothers, your sisters, your husband, your lover, your,
your, your, could have salvaged you from, perhaps, the biggest mistake you
would ever make during your political career. Your ”stage” had gone awry.
Poor baby. But you refuted them, too. You were out to make History! You,
devil, you! (Poor girl, Lucia, didn't you know that politics in Italy does not
exist. Only the talk about it! Diciamo! Diciamo!! Diciamo!!! Mai Facciamo!
Facciamo!! Facciamo!!!) Oh! I’m so, so, so sorry for you...

Lucia, are you some kind of pudding head? What did you expect, in the
first place, from the Ministero di Istruzione Pubblica? A miracle? An
extraordinary event above the laws of Nature? An Act of God? Come on,
Lucia! You are more clever than that! You had been berthed into an
impossible Kafkaesque dilemma. This just goes to show how Italy is beyond
salvation. Why would you pretend otherwise? (I am patiently waiting for
Barbara D’Urso to become presidentess of the Italian Republic!) Is it true
that the Arcangelo Gabriele consecrated Mario Draghi and enthroned him?
Many Italians I know believe Draghi is protected by the Arcangelo Gabriele,
and even some others think he walks in the shadows of the Goldman Sachs
bank in New York. Is his beatification imminent? Italy’s €3,000,000,000,000
debt will make of him a saint! (“Italian politicians generally are individuals
of shallow stature—some, elegant impostors feigning being of high station
—all enraptured with the reveries of sixteen-year-olds licking on their ice
cream cones.”)

Personally, I cannot blame you, Lucia. I mean to say that it is normal, in

Italian “politics,” to crown inept men, now women, with onerous political
titles and chauffeured limousines. Recently, Matteo Salvini was invested
with the high status of Ministro dell’Interno. He was totally unqualified for
this position. He had never even won a national political election. He had
not a university degree. He had never served in the Viminale—did not even
know where the men’s room was there. Matteo Renzi, the Venerabile Ducino,
served as prime minister of Italy, and embarrassed Italy throughout the
world with his ego smisurato, his zest for being a connoisseur of vulgarity,
and a dictator of happiness for all of the Italian people. Perhaps the best to
date has been Roberto Speranza, the Minister of Health. Roberto has a
university degree in Political Science! Not Medicine! Not a day passes when
no mention of the fact that under Roberto’s tenure, Italy accumulated, in
Europe, the highest number of deaths caused by the Covid-19 virus. You
will never see that “achievement” on his curriculum vitae. Roberto enjoys a
free pass in Italian journalism. Every day we hear and see his name
“Speranza” spread here, and there, and everywhere. Roberto gives us
“hope!” Italy’s mantra is “Speranza.” The Italians are being brainwashed
with “Speranza” much the same as Italian advertisers, subliminally, hawk
pasta, pills for headache relief, supplementary substances to make men’s
muscles more robust, and salves to relieve vaginal irritation. There is no end
to this madness. (“It is not impossible to govern the Italians; it is useless,”
Benito Mussolini.) But perhaps the most clamorous Comedy of Errors ever
performed by Italian “politicians” was the one when Silvio “Bonga, Bonga”
Berlusconi experienced a political setback in 1994. Italian journalists, quick
to corner him, asked why he had lost. He replied: “When I was president at
Fininvest, I had 400 managers who followed my orders. When I arrived in
Rome I found I had 5,000 “mangers,” yet I could not control all of them.”
Naturally, Berlusconi continued to fool Italians, and even today he is well
regarded by many of them, and especially by the members of his Forza
Italia political party that he himself founded. (It just goes to prove what can
happen when 57% of a country has a high school diploma, and less than
10% of a country has a university degree. Was André Glucksmann (1937-
2015), French philosopher, correct when he said that “the Italians are the
most entertaining buffoons in a continent without a brain in its head?”)
Lucia, it is not that the Italians are living in the Past. If only they could. No!
It is worse. Italians are prisoners of a Past that does not belong to them any
longer. Poor babies!)

The message the Italians have lost, and that which is tragic, is this: In any
bureaucracy—whether it be political or otherwise—there exists tiers of
individuals who labor in low, medium, and high stations, and they very
often dedicate their lives to their jobs and professions even hoping one day
to be promoted to a higher level of service and salary. This is quite normal,
no? They expect to be managed by individuals who know their line of work,
who know where the men’s or ladies’ room is, who have toiled as they have
to reach a level of competency and loyalty. (Not all Italian workers are
fannulloni.) What do they think when an incompetent individual is assigned
to be their leader? One designated their reference point to allow their
concern to prosper and be seen as respectable in the eyes of all when, in
fact, they are unqualified and/or even sold-out? When, Lucia, are Italians
going to learn to obey the Seventh Commandment?

I have an idea for you, Lucia, that I think you could be interested in. I once
suggested the same to Franco Gabrielli, explaining to him that the Italians,
the Europeans, and the world’s citizens need a manual, a guide to help
them understand what they ought to do. A way for them to follow for the
benefit of themselves and their neighbors and associates.

Why don’t you, Lucia, write this guidebook? Let it take you above and
beyond the mini tragedy you recently were burdened with. You will be able
to surmount the loss of your political position with a win that will
compensate for your feelings of loss. The book could be called What We
Ought to Do.

When you’re weary

Feeling small
When friends just can’t be found
There are always those who are on your side…
Sail on, Silver Girl
Your time has come to shine...

Cordially…
 Anthony

Authored by Anthony St. John

26 March MMXXI
Calenzano, Italy
anthony.st.john1944@gmail.com

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