Post by NFA on Jul 29, 2022 8:53:02 GMT 8
www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2022/07/far-right-favored-to-win-italian-election.php
“Far Right” Favored to Win Italian Election
An election is coming up in Italy in September, and the Brothers of Italy party, led by co-founder Giorgia Meloni, is currently leading the polls. There has been scant attention to the election in the U.S., but European news coverage is interesting for what it tells us about the state of politics on that continent, which in some ways mirrors conditions here in America.
France 24 headlines: “Brothers of Italy, the far-right party on the cusp of power.” Polling suggests that Brothers of Italy will be the largest component of a winning “right/far right” coalition. But what makes Meloni and her party far right?
In recent European politics, “far right” just means skeptical of the wisdom of mass third-world immigration. And enforcing immigration laws evidently is popular with Italian voters, as with voters everywhere. Beyond that, Meloni’s political opponents smear her as a would-be fascist. However:
Piero Ignazi, a professor emeritus at the University of Bologna and an expert on Brothers of Italy, [said]: “The party’s identity is, for the most part, linked to post-fascist traditions. But its platform mixes this tradition with some mainstream conservative ideas and neoliberal elements such as free enterprise.”
You can be a fascist or you can be an advocate of free enterprise, but you can’t be both.
This sheds more light on what the European press means by “far right”:
Meloni also has ties with the US far right, having attended the 2022 Conservative Political Action Conference and the National Prayer Breakfast alongside ex-president Donald Trump.
That explains a lot. CPAC, the National Prayer Breakfast and President Trump–how far right can you get?
...