Don't forget that Libya was an Italian colony right up until the end of WWII. Italians, especially of Andreotti's generation, have a hard time seeing Libya as an enemy, it's more like an errant step-child.
5/15/09, 7:29 AM
Anonymous said...
"What about his connections to the Cosa Nostra?"
The Cosa Nostra? It doesn't exist. That's just a myth to slur Italians. And I'll hear no more of it!
-Sen. Pat Geary
5/15/09, 10:33 AM
testing99 said...
La Cosa Nostra is small beer next to the Camorra. THOSE guys are the big time heavyweights in Italian mobs.
Based out of Naples, they run most of the mainland rackets.
Right now, they face an existential street battle. Albanian, Gypsy, and North African mobsters are using demographic muscle to push the Camorra out of street protection and other rackets. For example, most of the garbage in Naples has been collected by Camorra run outfits, and just dumped where toxic waste has infiltrated drinking water, causing lots of cancers and other things.
That operation is now under threat by Albanian-North African mobsters.
When you read about anti-Muslim riots in the South (the north and Lega Nord is another matter) it's generally organized by the Camorra.
Italy just passed a new tougher a law on illegal immigration. The new lawTesting99, I think that the `Ndrangheta is even more powerful than Camorra in Italy. from Wikipedia "Despite not being as famous abroad as the Sicilian Cosa Nostra, and having been considered more rural compared to the Neapolitan Camorra and the Apulian Sacra Corona Unita, the 'Ndrangheta managed to become the most powerful crime syndicate of Italy in the late 1990s and early 2000s." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%27Ndrangheta
5/15/09, 10:10 PM
Anonymous said...
t99 is wrong again. Giovanni Falcone (in his biography) said that he had the most respect for Cosa Nostra. The Cosa Nostra itself did not take the other Mafias seriously.
Nice post, italian politics is a very difficoult subject though!!
3/30/13, 1:17 PM
A reader who enjoyed my review in The American Conservative of "Il Divo," the complex Italian movie about Giulio Andreotti, seven times prime minister of Italy in 1972-1992, writes: I had a number of encounters with Andreotti when he was Prime Minister, and also met frequently with some of the Democristiani conservatives who despised him. They used to refer to him as "Il Gobbo" the hunchback due to his peculiar posture, which you describe in the review. A gobbo in vernacular Italian also implies treacherous and sly. Andreotti ignored the US Ambassador in Rome and insisted on regular meetings with the CIA Chief of Station whenever he had questions or something to convey. I would go along to carry the Chief hat's. The Chief was old school and the conversations in Italian were elliptical to say the least, making it possible to leave the room without any idea of what had just taken place. As the Agency had the prime minister's office bugged anyway, I frequently had this vision of my boss returning to the station to review the tape to try to figure out what Andreotti had been talking about. Andreotti was always playing multiple games. He milked the U.S. desire to keep the Communists out of power in Italy, but he also cozied up to Libya. When he was foreign minister in 1986, the Italian government tipped off Col. Gadaffi that of the U.S. airstrike the day before it happened. My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer
"Italian politics"
11 Comments -
So then Qadafy sacrificed his adopted daughter just so this link would not be exposed?
5/14/09, 7:08 PM
Maybe he should have been called Il Devious.
5/14/09, 9:40 PM
What about his connections to the Cosa Nostra?
5/14/09, 11:42 PM
"I would go along to carry the Chief hat's."
???
5/15/09, 6:16 AM
Don't forget that Libya was an Italian colony right up until the end of WWII. Italians, especially of Andreotti's generation, have a hard time seeing Libya as an enemy, it's more like an errant step-child.
5/15/09, 7:29 AM
"What about his connections to the Cosa Nostra?"
The Cosa Nostra? It doesn't exist. That's just a myth to slur Italians. And I'll hear no more of it!
-Sen. Pat Geary
5/15/09, 10:33 AM
La Cosa Nostra is small beer next to the Camorra. THOSE guys are the big time heavyweights in Italian mobs.
Based out of Naples, they run most of the mainland rackets.
Right now, they face an existential street battle. Albanian, Gypsy, and North African mobsters are using demographic muscle to push the Camorra out of street protection and other rackets. For example, most of the garbage in Naples has been collected by Camorra run outfits, and just dumped where toxic waste has infiltrated drinking water, causing lots of cancers and other things.
That operation is now under threat by Albanian-North African mobsters.
When you read about anti-Muslim riots in the South (the north and Lega Nord is another matter) it's generally organized by the Camorra.
5/15/09, 3:00 PM
Michael Leeden?
5/15/09, 5:30 PM
Italy just passed a new tougher a law on illegal immigration.
The new lawTesting99, I think that the `Ndrangheta is even more powerful than Camorra in Italy.
from Wikipedia
"Despite not being as famous abroad as the Sicilian Cosa Nostra, and having been considered more rural compared to the Neapolitan Camorra and the Apulian Sacra Corona Unita, the 'Ndrangheta managed to become the most powerful crime syndicate of Italy in the late 1990s and early 2000s."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%27Ndrangheta
5/15/09, 10:10 PM
t99 is wrong again. Giovanni Falcone (in his biography) said that he had the most respect for Cosa Nostra. The Cosa Nostra itself did not take the other Mafias seriously.
5/16/09, 9:16 AM
Nice post, italian politics is a very difficoult subject though!!
3/30/13, 1:17 PM