Fulvio Pelli - l'ultimo vero liberale
In Svizzera, i partiti liberali e radicali che avevano sempre formato una famiglia politica nel senso sociologico (forti dissensioni al interno ma anche consenso sul fondo della libertà d'espressione, della tolleranza e della risponsabilità individuale) si sono finalmente riuniti per rinforzare la presenza liberale nel equilibrio politica fortemente polarizzato fra i popolarismi della destra (UDC) e della sinistra (PS) e per marcare una distanza chiara dalla formazione ameboide del PPD.
La nuova formazione si chiama in Svizzera tedesca "FDP.Die Liberalen" usurpando in un certo modo la denominazione protetta del partito liberale di Basilea-Città.
I liberali Ginevrini e Basilesi, federalisti e tradizionalmente opposti al centralismo del corrente radicale del "Freisinn", fino adesso non hanno avuto oglia di unirsi sotto la presidenza del Ticinese Fulvio Pelvi, ma potrebbero cambiare la loro opinione in seguito all'intervista che Fulvio Pelli ha dato alla radio DRS sabato, 28 febbraio 2009. Pelli, voce solitario in una clamorosa cacofonia politica e mediatica dopo i malfatti della UBS, ha detto chiaramente le cose che erano da dire:
1. La situazione presente e stata creata da elementi criminali al interno della UBS che sono perseguitati dall giudizia degli Stati Uniti. La Svizzera non è identica all'UBS malgradi il fatto che quest'ultima e la piu grande banca del paese.
2. La situazione e particolarmente grave grazie al antiamericanismo della nostra ministra del estero, Mme Calmy Rey, che ha fatto tutto per distruggere il Goodwill tradizionale che la Svizzera, "Sister Republic" degli Stati Uniti dall'indipendenza degli Americani del Nord, ha sempre avuto a Washington.
3. Il segreto bancario non esiste per proteggere atti criminali, ma per mantenere un minimo di libertà privata e per questa ragione non deve essere scrificato sul altare
dell' imagine della Svizzera al estero. L'evasione di tasse e un atto criminale, ma
il fatto che esiste non giustifica la libera circolazione di informazioni su ogni cittadino di una paese che mantiene un regime di tassazione contraprodottivo.

Attraverso la sua analisi, Fulvio Pelli si è rivelato un rappresentante degno del liberalismo classico in un'atmosfera di caccia di streghe, di collettivismo, di protezionismo e di ultranazionalismo.

Breaking Swiss bank secrecy and The Opening of Pandora's Box
When Mephisto declared in Faust I: "...ich bin ein Teil der Kraft, die stets das Böse will und stets das Gute schafft..." his statement demonstrated a contrario the vanity of the human effort to do good and to be good when it comes to guaranteed success. Barak Obama's government and the present US administration are trying to do good and to be good. What they need in the first place, is cash. Where can you find cash if not on Swiss Bank accounts? Breaking the Swiss banking secrecy may be hailed from many honest people around the world, but the side effects of this effort are largely unknown. If 52,000 U.S. citizens are indicted and ultimately condemned for tax fraud, the damage on entrepreneurship in the US and elsewhere will exceed the effect of the subprime crisis, hundreds of thousands of small and medium businesses will go bust within the next weeks and months, and the process might spark revolutionary upheaval throughout the industrialized world.
The grounding of Switzerland's Banking business and of the country's overall credibility might eventually be considered a footnote in an ensuing scenario that could best be compared to the French Revolution. The "Ancien Régime" in France crumbled after the costly military support of the French to the American Independence movement.
America's strength as the leading industrial nation has been lost as a consequence of costly military interventions and financial mismanagement. Barak Obama was elected President by those who suffered most of the errors of the Bush adminstration and it might become very difficult for President Obama to calm the spirits that supported him. To direct the fury of the "middle American" towards an external enemy will the most probably be chosen as the best tactic, and Switzerland - adorned with a new label as "financial rogue state" might provide the ideal target for diversive action. However, as stated before, a frontal attack against the "Smaller Sister Republic" by the US might prove as risky as stepping into a mine field of unknown dimensions. If the UBS goes bust thanks to the attacks from the US judiciary, and if the Swiss taxpayers have ultimately have to pay the bill, the witch hunt might continue within Switzerland, leading to a final implosion of Pandora's Box.

Once again, Sardinia surrenders to soft fascism
Una volta di piu, la Sardegna si arrende al fascismo dolce


On September 29, 2007, I wrote on this blog a short comment on the life and work of Emilio Lussu, with special emphasis to the fierce resistance of his native Sardinia against the first wave of fascism and to the surrender of the Island's political elite to the seduction of the second wave which tried to hid the ugly face of Mussolini's movement behind a mask of gentle bourgeois style.
And in a later comment - on February 24, 2008 ("Uses and Misuses of the NAZI-KEULE")on the differences between Italian fascism and German Nazism I mentionned the fact that the judiciary's independence in Italy was protected even during the Mussolini years thanks to the constitutional monarchy.
In recent times, Berlusconi has continuously, and with a certain success, tried to
discredit the judiciary's independence and has even sought the support of the ultra-conservative and revisionist Pope Benedict XVI for his attacks on tribunals and judges.
Last Sunday, with the success of the party of the self-declared Cavaliere per la Grazia di Dio Berlusconi in Sardinia's regional elections, once again, proud Sardinia has surrendered to
soft fascism.

Il 29 settembre 2007, su questo blog, avevo scritto un breve commentario sulla vita e l'opera di Emilio Lussu, con attenzione speciale sulla resistenza della Sardegna
contro la prima ondata del fascismo, ed alla capitolazione dell'elite politica dell'isola alla seconda ondata che aveva nascosto la faccia bruta del movimento di Mussolini sotto una maschera di borghesia gentile.
In un altro commentario del 24 febbraio 2008(sulla "NAZI-KEULE") avevo menzionato che l'indipendenza del sistema giudiziario era rimasta protetta dalla monarchia costituzionale anche durante gli anni del fascismo.
In tempi recenti, Berlusconi continua di sconfessare sistematicamente giudici e tribunali, e senza srupulo cerca l'aiuto del Papa ultra-conservatore e revisionista
Benedetto XVI per arrivare al suo obiettivo.
Domenica passata, col successo del partito del auto-dichiarato Cavaliere per la Grazia di Dio Berlusconi nelle elezioni regionali, la Sardegna fiera, una volta di piu, si è arresa al fascismo dolce.

February 8, 2009 - Switzerland's or Europe's Doomsday?
Fears are growing in Switzerland that the popular vote of February 8, 2009, concerning the bilateral accord on freedom of movement within the EU and Switzerland (which is not an EU member) will end in a NO.
When two weeks earlier, opinion polls showed a 55% YES majority, the margin is now down on 50% YES, 7% undecided and 43% NO.
What strikes the OSSERVATORE PROFANO most, is the complete blindness of the discussion within Switzerland for the effects of a NO on the EU itself. Isolationists
want to redraw the line between Switzerland and it's neighbours, they are convinced that the semi-permeability of the frontier between "Us" and "Them" will remain untouched by a NO and that all the options for negotiating whatever subject with the EU will even be greater than ever before, confounding the tolerance for negative votes of member states such as Ireland (whom the EU cannot afford to loose) or for the erratic behavior of some members in Eastern Europe with the situation of Switzerland, which is not a member and which is considered - not only in Europe - as a shameless profiteer.
What is most striking: the NZZ, in it's management of the "letters to the editor" page, appears to lean toward a NO, or at least unwilling to stem the tide.
What we must fear most, and much more than the reactions of EU towards Switzerland, is the stimulus for desintegration within the EU that is initiated by a Swiss NO on February 8, 2009. This country bears a heavy responsibility not only for it's own fate but for the fate of Europe too, and the price of a NO will be high for all of Europe.

Switzerland in Search of an Identity - Shall we become the Center of Europe, try a remake of Albania under Enver Hoxha, or end in a hostile environment, comparable to that of Israel or of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip?

When casting their vote in the next federal referendum on February 8, 2009, the Swiss will take one further step in their never-ending search for a national identity. They can say YES to the extension of the convention on free circulation of persons throughout the European Union to the citizens of new member states of the UE, namely Bulgaria and Romania, or say NO, thereby putting at risk a series of bilateral conventions on subjects such as free trade, mutual recognition of professional qualifications, scientific and technical cooperation etc.etc. which define the "bilateral way" of step by step cooperation with the European Union onto which the country has been steered by Chrstoph Blocher and his Swiss People's Party.
A series of questions arise in this context.
Will Switzerland continue to be a "special zone" in the heart of the European Union, at best developping over the years into a "District of Switzerland" (in analogy to the "District of Columbia - D.C." of the United States of America) or will it become
a pariah country, a kind of remake of Enver Hoxha's Albania which isolated itself completely from the European continent and sought refuge and consolation as a special ally of Maoist China? Will Switzerland continue to consider itself as a kind of "Promised Land" unable to understand positive signals from it's neighbours and therefore driving itself into a more and more violent defensive behaviour, quite similar to Israel, or, even worse, will it be forced into isolation by a European Union which could become more and more unwilling to discuss special favours for an unreliable partner? Will this isolation eventually lead to more and more violent internal dispute and dissensions, to a civil war and to a chaos of the type we now can see in the Gaza Strip?
The outcome of the popular vote of February 8 is still uncertain, the latest polls indicating a narrow majority for YES with 55%.
Whatever the result, it will not end the continuous effort of a country that has an impressivee record of high quality direct democracy to make difficult choices on it's priorities, political, economical, cultural as well.
Another aspect, our voters should take into account: Switzerland's political choices do not pass unnoticed in European capitals, and a negative vote on February 8 is likely to unleash more internal dispute within the European Union where some partners have become particularly vulnerable to populist tendencies.

Thank You, Hans Saner!

Swiss Philosopher Hans Saner (1934), in an interview with the Basel newspaper "Basler Zeitung" (bazkulturmagazin, 28 october 2008) on the financial crisis,has made a fine statement on the misconception of democracy that has prevailed during the second half of the twentieth century and continues to prevail in the 21th century.
When the citizens of the German Democratic Republic took to the streets before the fall of the Berlin wall, they used to cry: "Wir sind das Volk!" (We are the People).

We all, Hans Saner says, use to cry: "We are the People!", but we should cry: "We are the Economy!, we are Politics, we are the Culture!" instead.
In fact, pseudo-religious neo-liberal prophets have tried to outdo the marxist hope for the inevitable death of the State by nurturing the hope that global wealth and well-being could be achieved by the forces of the market alone. In contrast to this concept, classical liberalism has always asked for a minimal coherence between regulatory interventions and the market forces.
In this context, it is refreshing to hear a philosopher say that democracy must not stop short of the concept of "The People" (or "The Nation"), but has to include, Economy, Politics, and, last but not least, Culture.

Peer Steinbrück and the weight of history: "Die Schweiz, das kleine Stachelschwein, die nehmen wir auf dem Rückweg ein.."

German minister of finance Peer Steinbrück must have slept back in 1968 and 1969 when during his training as a reserve officer of the Deutsche Bundeswehr the subject of the relations between the German Reich, the Wehrmacht and Switzerland was discussed. The above slogan was used by members of the Wehrmacht to explain why they did not invade Switzerland between 1939 and 1942.
Switzerland, when frontally attacked, is no easy adversary. The questions that are to be discusse these days are neither the inappropriate behaviour of Swiss banker Joe Ackermann at the helm of Deutsche Bank nor the behaviour of hundreds of milliardaire German citizens that have evaded German taxes by buying houses in the Swiss Alps, but the excellent cooperation of the Swiss Federal Reserve (Schweizerische Nationalbank) with the European Central Bank and the anger of hundreds of thousand of Swiss citizens and foreign inhabitants working in Switzerland who pay heavy taxes on the communal, cantonal an federal level over
unqualified remarks by a member of the German government.
The Swiss are themselves very well aware of the imperfections of their tax system, but they are absolutely adamant in asking for the right to fix this mess themselves.
Peer Steinbrück may be reminded that e.g. in the Canton of Basel-City, taxation is not negotiable, whereas such solutions are in use in certain Central Swiss Cantons.
An excuse not only to the Federal government, but to the ordinary Swiss citizens by Peer Steinbrück is overdue.

Theater and Politics - From Shakespeare's personalities to clones of Silvio Berlusconi

Shakespeare's drama Anthony and Cleopatra is rarely seen on stage in Continental European theater. Shown at the THEATER BASEL under the direction of Christina Paulhofer in a German translation by Elisabeth Plessen, it earned a cool welcome by the Basel public and the press. However, the most virulent criticism came from those who deplored the balanced description of both the geopolitical struggle between Egypt and Rome and the private problems of the protagonists in the foreground of the play by director Christina Paulhofer.
In fact, Paulhofer's interpretation was proof of the modernity of Shakespeare's view of political drama. The great difference between today's political scene and the one Shakespeare described lies in the fact that political leaders nowadays seldom pay with their lives for what they do to their own people - or to others. Most probably,they will die in their beds. At least, this seems to be the case for the senior autocrats Fidel Castro and Robert Mugabe. Others, like Silvio Berlusconi, will try to achieve eternal youth through biomedical tricks and might one day become immortalized either by virtual digitalized dummies who can continue to play their role, to do their dirty tricks and to make silly jokes ad infinitum or, who knows, by clones.

The assisted suicide of the smaller of the "Sister Republics" and it's assistants

Switzerland and the United States of America were considered, throughout the 19th century, as "sister republics", based on the similarities of their Constitutions.In Switzerland it was assumed that the United States had copied the Swiss political system, but this is clearly the result of complete historical ignorance. The Swiss were very much interested to know how the United States managed to overcome the colonial rule of the British Empire. An example: the first translation of the original text of the declaration of independence into German was published by the Swiss Isaac Iselin, secretary of state of the city republic of Basel (in: Ephemeriden der Menschheit, October 1776) http://www.dhm.de/magazine/unabhaengig/dippel_e.htm
And when Switzerland adopted a new Federal Constitution in 1848, after a short civil war between a separatist coalition of conservative, mainly roman catholic cantons (the so-called "Sonderbund") of central Switzerland against the radical liberal majority, it's parliamentary system became an exact copy of the American two chamber parliament, i.e. the  House of Representatives and the Senate. This choice was the fruit of more than a decade of patient lobbying for the American model of parliamentarism by a Swiss philosopher, Ignaz Paul Vital Troxler (1780-1866).The friendship of the unequal "Sister Republics" has survived many political storms but it may soon come to an end thanks to a form of "assisted political suicide".The subprime crisis, the subsequent downfall of UBS chairman Marcel Ospel and the latest developments in the law suit against former UBS banker Bradley Birkenfeld may produce permanent damage to the image of Switzerland and to it's self-esteem, as a place where serious business is done in a clean way.If the youthful and dynamic Barack Obama is elected as President of the United States, a 21st century reenactment of the "New Deal" will most certainly take place,
and it may even take a nationalist(-social) turn, with harsh winds blowing over the Atlantic. The damage that Switzerland has done to itself by to closely linking it's political and economice fortunes to those of it's megalomaniac global banks
might lead to a softly assisted suicide of the smaller of the two Sister Republics",
will then weaken it's international stand in a way that may push it to take shelter in the arms of the European Union, thus committing an assisted suicide.
It may be the last consequence of a dubious tradition, initiated by Ludwig A Minelli, the founder of DIGNITAS, and Marcel Ospel may become the dignified assistant of the political suicide of a country that once was proud of it's independence.

The New USSR - PP

Considering recent trends in European politics, with particular emphasis on three countries: Russia, Serbia and Switzerland, we can observe a convergence on certain values and on political methods.
One interesting phenomenon is the attractivity of Christoph Blocher's Swiss People's Party for newly nationalized Swiss citizens of Serbian origin. Another common feature is the staunch resistence against participation in the European Union which is considered as a major threat to national identity and for the maintenance of local values in all three countries. Isolationism is another common phenomenon
The result may be a revival of the USSR under new auspices:
The blogger community is kindly invited to comment on my proposal to call this new sphere of common interests USSR-PP, the Union of Serbian, Swiss and Russian People's Parties.

The uses and misuses of the "NAZI-KEULE"

On February 14, 2008, the editorialist Martin Senti of the "Neue Zürcher Zeitung" complained about the use of the so-called "Nazi-Keule" in a recent exchange of verbal injuries between the President of the Swiss Confederation, Pascal Couchepin, and one of the most outspoken and aggressive protagonists of the Swiss People's Party, Christoph Mörgeli.
In recent political disputes in Switzerland comparisons of present-time extremist tendencies have shown a preference to associate the adversary's position either with Italian fascism or German national socialism.

My repeated suggestion to draw a line of distinctio between the two forms of totalitarism has not been successful for the simple reason that the perception of historical political events and trends of the twentieth century has continued to fade away even in the heads of cultivated journalists.

The visitor of this blog will find a comment to President Couchepin's failure to make the necssary distinction on the blog http://www.arlesheimreloaded.ch, in German ("Sie irren, Herr Bundespräsident") and in French ("à M.le président de la confédération").

A letter to the editor that I wrote in response to the editorialist of NZZ has not been accepted for publication.
Therefore I present it here:

Ich bin grundsätzlich damit einverstanden, dass es historisch unsinnig ist, extremistische Tendenzen in der Schweiz mit dem Nationalsozialismus zu assoziieren.
Richtigerweise haben Sie, Herr Senti, die Absurdität des entsprechenden Vorwurfs von Herrn Mörgeli an die Adresse der
SP, dargelegt. Ich stelle aber fest, dass auch in Ihrem heutigen Text der Nationalsozialismus und der (italienische) Faschismus in einem Atemzug genannt werden, was ebenfalls historisch falsch ist, selbst unter Berücksichtigung der Achse Berlin-Rom.
Der italienische Faschismus war in der Phase seiner grössten Virulenz (und Akzeptanz) antisozialistisch, und stand damit ideologisch in diametralem Gegensatz zur nationalsozialistischen Bewegung in Deutschland, die ja selbst von zeitgenössischen Kommunisten wie Curzio Malaparte (in seinem Buch "Technik des Staatsstreichs", "Technica del Colpo di
Stato" von 1932) als "bestgetarnte kommunistische Bewegung" wahrgenommen wurde.
Benito Mussolini hat nach seiner Wahl als Abgeordneter in der Kammer sein Programm wie folgt definiert:
"Der Staat muss auf seine wesentlichste, einfachste Form zurückgebracht werden. ein gutes Heer haben, eine gute Polizei, eine glatt funktionierende Justiz, und er muss eine den Erfordernissen der Nation gemässe Aussenpolitik betreiben. Alles Übrige soll der Privatinitiative überlassen bleiben..." (Emilio LUSSU: "Marsch auf Rom und Umgebung", Folio Verlag, Bozen, 2007, p.24. , Originalausgabe "Marcia su Roma e Dintorni", Paris 1933).
Der heutige Leser würde zweifellos ein solche Programm als "neoliberal" identifizieren, und so konnte denn auch Mussolini sich mit dem von Lussu beschriebenen ideologischen Ansatz die Bewunderung und die zunächst still-schweigende, später offene Unterstützung der liberalen Kräfte in Italien sichern.
Emilio Lussu, der sardische Föderalist und spätere Minister in der ersten italienischen Nachkriegsregierung De Gasperi, der Mussolini von Anfang an konsequent bekämpft hatte, liefert in seinem Buch eine hervorragende Analyse der
psychologischen und soziologischen Besonderheiten des Aufstiegs des italienischen Faschismus.

Die Tatsache, dass Italien während des Faschismus eine Monarchie geblieben war, dass der König Mussolini absetzen konnte, dass schliesslich die Justiz eine partielle Unabhängigkeit bewahren konnte, hat die Erinnerung an den Faschismus ist in- und ausserhalb Italiens durch dessen Fasasade der "Bonhommie", einer gewissen Eleganz und Modernität verklärt, die Brutalität des Regimes quasi verniedlicht. Zur Ambivalenz gegenüber dem italienischen Faschismus hat auch dessen zum Teil ausgesprochen elegante Architektursprache beigetragen, wie die "Casa del Fascio" des berühmten Architekten Giuseppe Terragni in Como beweist.
Das weichgezeichnete Bild des Faschismus hat auch dazu beigetragen, dass der starke nicht-sozialistische, liberale Widerstand gegen das Regime und dessen hervorragende Repräsentanten wie z.B. der Schwager Emilio Lussus, Max Salvadori, und deren Wirken im heutigen Italien kaum noch bekannt sind.
Mit den Zinsen dieses psychologischen Kapitals und dieser im Gegensatz zu Deutschland fast vollständig verdrängten Vergangenheit wuchern im heutigen Italien die Herren Berlusconi und Fini. Ihre "Forza Italia", "Polo della Libertà"
oder neuestens "Popolo della Liberta" reklamieren für sich das Erbe des Liberalismus, während sie gleichzeitig den aufgeklärten Ordnungsstaat, Conditio sine qua non eines liberalen Staatswesens, verhöhnen.

Man muss blind sein, um die zweifellos vorhandenen Parallelen zwischen dem italienischen Faschismus, seiner
postmodernen Epigonen und der Rhetorik gewisser "Volksparteien" zu übersehen. Dass die NZZ, und leider auch die FDP,
nicht in der Lage oder nicht bereit sind, den ideengeschichtlichen Hintergrund, welcher allen Dementis zum Trotz die
Basis für die hemdsärmelige Polemik zwischen unserem Bundespräsidenten und Herrn Mörgeli bildet, wenigstens zur
Kenntnis zu nehmen, ist bedauerlich.

Why Switzerland is still very special: Sovereignty of the people, Freedom of parliament, Gender Ratio in the Government and Rumantsch Grischun

The international echoes to the failed reelection of Swiss People's Party leader
Cristoph Bocher as a member of the Federal Council (the Swiss government) by the federal two chamber parliament show hwo difficult it is to understand the Swiss Federal Constitution for those who are not familiar with the rules of direct democracy.
In fact, the federal parliament is free to choose as members of the government any person that is considered fit to fulfill the difficult task of being a member of he executive and a representative of the major political movements present in the country. The Swiss government is in a certain way a technocratic government, and one of Christoph Blocher's is main objectives was to transform it into a political one.
If his party now is crying loudly about treason of the will of the electorate, it is neglecting the important fact that Switzerland is in the unique position to guarantee the sovereignty of the people in two ways: a) in electing a parliament and b) in correcting the acts of parliament and government by popular initiatives and popular referenda. By limiting the exertion of power by the people to these two channels, the Swiss Constitution guarantees a certain stability in the decission-making pocess by parliament and government. While in most parliamentary democracies,
the paricipation of the people in policy-making is limited to the parliamentary elections, the results of which determinate the acts of the government, the Swiss electorate can interfere throughout the electoral cycle with the decisions of both parliament and government. Christoph Blocher's claim to reinforce direct democracy
by asking for a majority government has not been accepte by the majority of the parliament, and, as a recent public poll published today by the Sunday press has shown,his non-election is being accepted by a majority of the public (which is not identical with the electorate in a population where one third is non Swiss and where only about 5 in ten citizens are actively participating in the political decision-making (popular votes, elections).

One important aspect of the non-election of Christoph Blocher risks to be neglected:
by electing Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, the parliament has produced an important gender shift within the government: three out of seven ministers now are women, and if the Federal Chancellor, Ms. Casanova (the secretary general and speaker of the government) is included in the gender count during the ministerial rounds, the gender ratio is now 1:1.
Another special feature of the new government: Ms. Widmer-Schlumpf and Ms. Casanova are both natives of the Canton of Grisons and fluent in the fourth national language: Rumantsch Grischun.

A secret baptism for king Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud?
When the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques met Pope Benedict in Rome, the two men might have discussed a text written by Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini(Pope Pius II) back in 1461 to sultan Mehmet II. The "Epistula ad Mahometan" was published in 1483, 10 years after the death of Pius II and it remains unclear whether it had been sent to Mehmet II.
The most important element of the letter, however, was the offer of the crown of the Holy Roman Empire to Mehmet in exchange for his baptism.
The letter is rich in argumentations concerning the relationship between religion and political power and is an example of the modernity of Piccolomini, a man who had turned to celibacy only late in his life - at age 44 - and had widely travelled Europe before becoming Pope (as one of his works, "De Europa", a geographical, political and cultural account of his obervations, testifies).
If the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques was aware of this particular historical record of policy-making of the Holy See is not known, but it would be most interesting to know what the two men actually discussed: special conditions for the Vatican in terms of Dollars per barrel Saudi Arabian crude oil or permissions for catholic nuns to drive cars in Saudi Arabia on the condition that they they wear their veil in a correct way?
One thing is clear: according to Vaticanic tradition it will take at least two generations before the contents of the meeting will be published, and the Saudi side has little interest in a mediatic discussion of the vent. It could once again stir bad feelings against the king in fundamentalist circles.

One thing is clear so far: religion is back on the political agenda, as THE ECONOMIST correctly stated last week. Agnostics will face difficult times in the near future. Outspoken atheism might become the last safe haven for those who are not willing to kiss the ring of the Pope or to travel to Mecca for the Hadj.

Iconographic Impressions from Switzerland - 90 years after the Russian Revolution














"Bolshevik" Boris Michailovich Kustodiev 1920
Museo dei Uffici Florence





















Right Wing Bolshevism in Swiss Weekly "Weltwoche"









B.M. Kustodiev Selfs Portrait of the Artist 1912






El Redemptor on Corcovado Brazil





Blocher on the Uetliberg, 2007




Anne Applebaum Author of "Propaganda und Realität" Copyright Neue Zürcher Zeitung 2007

What Emilio Lussu (1890-1975) may teach us


Emilio Lussu was born in Armungia near Cagliari (Sardinia) in 1890. After having finished his law studies, he fought as infantry officer in the Sassari Brigade during World War I, distinguishing himself both for his bravery and his humane leadership qualities.
After the war, together with comrades from his Army Brigade, he founded the federalist and autonomist party "Partito Sardo di Azione". Elected to the Italian Parliament in 1921, he was a keen observer and a fierce opponent of the rising fascist movement led by Benito Mussolini. He became famous for his account of the political developments in Italy from 1921 to 1929: "Marcia su Roma e Dintorni" (March to Rome and surroundings) first published in Paris in 1933 (reprints by Einaudi in 1945 and 2003).A German edition is also available: Marsch auf Rom und Umgebung, Verlag Folio, Bozen 2007..





After repeated attempts to his life by fascist groups, he had eventually been attacked in his Cagliari appartment and during this episode had shot one of the aggressors. After an imprisonment of a year and a process that ended in his acquitment for self-defense, he had been deported to the Aeolian Island of Lipari, from where he was able to flee to France. In 1936, while being treated for tuberculosis at the Sanatorium of Clavadel near Davos (Switzerland), he wrote a vivid account of his experiences during the war in the trenches of Northern Italy: "Un Anno sul Altipiano" (A Year on the High Plateau). In his forword, he wonders why nobody seems to be ready to remember what happened between 1914 and 1918.
After 1933, he lived in Paris with his wife, Joyce, where he became one of the antifascist movementGiustizia e Libertà.
In 1940, after the defeat of the French army by Nazi Germany, the couple fled to Toulouse, then to Marseille and eventually to Lisbon. From 1940 to July 1943 he developped important underground diplomatic activities, trying to coordinate the activities of the Italian emigration with the geopolitical and strategical interests of Britain and the U.S.A., from Lisbon, Malta, London and New York. We owe him an account of these adventurous years in "Diplomazia clandestina" (Quaderni Del Ponte, La Nuova Italia Editrice, Firenze 1956)


In postwar Italy, Emilio Lussu served as a minister in the first cabinet of De
Gasperi and was elected to the Senate during several legislation periods. He died in 1975.

Why should one read Emilio Lussu's account of the rise of fascism in Italy of 1933(Marcia su Roma e Dintorni)today?
His account on the political events in Italy is written in a straightforward but elegant prose, with a sarcastic, sometimes fatalistic tone.
It is full of vivid observations of the weakness of his contemporaries and their excuses for giving up their political principles and entering the fascist party for fear of messing their professional carreers and their social life.
The reader of Lussu's account will know that there are important differences between Hitler's Third Reich and Italy under Mussolini: while Germany's working classes in their majority where favorable to the regime as a result of generous salarial and rent policy and while the German opposition was systematically neutralized and physically liquidated by the regime,a fragile balance between the formally intact constitutional monarchy and the Duce developped in Italy, and civil society never vanished completely, the fascists being unable to win the unconditional support of the working class.
This fragile balance eventually became the main reason for Italy's narrow escape from the role of aggressor to victim at the end of the war.

Finally, the reader of Lussus text will be able to contemplate today's political scenery in Italy and to draw comparisons with political trends of recent years both in other European countries and in Switzerland.

"Church" is a Trademark
Though I am a protestant both by tradition and by free choice (baptized evangelical-reformed), I can fully understand why the Roman Catholic Church is firm in the defense of it's status as "church". This is a question of trademark protection.
The most dangerous challenge that the Roman Catholic Church faces these days does not come from individualistic Lutherans, Calvinists or Zwinglians, but from Scientology with it's perfect financial management.
In a very clever move, the Vatican has enlarged it's trademark protection to the orthodox churches in Russia, Byelorus, Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece, Turkey and the Middle East.
This partial exception to the Roman monopoly is aimed at easing the renewed tensions between Eastern and Western Christianism that had been fuelled by the activities by Roman Catholicm missionaries in Russia after the fall of the Soviet System.
No wonder if Chinese who want to be baptized tend to turn to become Lutherans rather than Roman Catholics - they will be safe from institutional constraints and will face less problems of trademark protection.

Fooling around with the Law




















Image to the Left: Honoré Daumier
Image to the Right: Christoph Blocher Copyright Dan Cermak

Foolish things are happening these days in Switzerland. Only a few days after a popular inititiave launched by the Swiss People's Party demanding for the introduction of a detailed list into the Federal Constitution of criminal offenses that would automatically lead to expulsion of foreigners from the country, the Federal Supreme Court has decided that it is unlawful to demand tax deductions for funding political parties. The case that had been brought before the court was provoked by two tax payers in the Canton of Zurich that had formally asked a tax deduction for a donation to a political party which they never had made.
By intentionally making a false statement in their tax declaration, the two citizens were able to bring their cause to all levels of cantonal and federal judicial authorities. Their abuse of the law produced a paradoxical result: while the Canton of Zurich intends to increase the amount of tax-deducible donations to political parties, the Federal Court prohibits it, explaining that political parties are of no use for the common wealth. Without political parties, a democratic society cannot function properly, and Switzerland has been fortunate enough to avoid state funding of political parties so far...
It was the privilege of the Swiss People's Party to continuously undermine the confidence of the citizens in our political system and into the judiciary, but now it seems that our Supreme Court has caught the deconstruction virus, too...

Fooling around with the Constitution

In it's never ending quest for the applause of citizens frustrated and estranged by the problems of migration, the Swiss People's Party has launched a popular initiative which demands an amendment to the constitution that explicitly describes the criteria for expulsion on unwanted foreigners. By doing so, the party contradicts it's own critera of reducing the inference of the state in "things in particular" and violates the principle of restricting issues to be treated in the Constitution. Fooling around with the Constitution: a bad omen for politics under a domination of the Swiss People's Party in the near future

The discreet charm of latent fascism

When UBS (Union Bank of Switzerland) chairman Marcel Ospel, in a discussion with economists in Basel last week declared that he considered the Swiss People's Party as the most competent and trustworthy political party in Switzerland in terms of economic policies, his remark earned mixed applause. One of the leading figures of that party, Christoph Blocher, now Minister of Justice of the Swiss Confederation, has been known for years for his inflammatory rhetoric style mixing talk of economic liberalism and xenophoby with the intention to bring elements of the extreme right onto his bandwagon. The recent success of Nicolas Sarcozy in the French presidential elections has been built on a similar rhetoric: praise of the nation's "grandeur", mixed with a more ot less subtle xenophobia and a call for economic reforms under a strong central government.
A heated discussion on Marcel Ospel's stance was launched on the Swiss Blog http://www.arlesheimreloaded.ch, and it came to an abrupt stop decided by the blog master when on some posts the term "national socialism" was used to define certain emerging trends in Swiss politics.
In recent years, there have been reciprocal accusations between the Swiss Social Democrativ Party (SP) and the SVP of "national socialist" behaviour, without arousing much interest by the electorate until recently.
But by the fact that radical nationalist and xenophobic movements are en vogue again in post-communist Eastern Europe and that the rhetoric of the Western European Right is getting tougher in terms of discimination against foreigners, the interest in the origins of national socialism (Germany) and fascism (Italy) has been awakened once again.
The National Socialist Movement, as ist existed in Germany between 1933 and 1945, used for it's image a specific blend of promises of economic growth, an exaggerated role for the nation (built on racial criteria) and social justice based on the exlusion and eventually extermination of those who did not comply with he rules or where considered as unworthy by racial criteria. The Soviet system, on the other hand, used social class as central criterion for the exclusion from economic and political life, and for eventual liquidation of persons of bourgeois origin.
After the downfall of the Third Reich, race was no longer a criterion for exclusion, liquidation, annihilation, but the struggle of the classes according to Marx and Engels continued to be considered as the single most important motor for progress of society on the road towards socialism.

After the downfall of the Berlin wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was at first a period of complete desorientation. From the chaos that followed the collapse, a new class of entrepreneurs emerged in the Russian Federation, the so-called oligarchs, who took control of the economy and tried to do the same in politics.
President Boris Yeltsin, uncapable of controlling a systen that had rund wild, passed his power to a brilliant, healthy (and tough) young lawyer, Vladimit Putin, brought up within the Soviet System, and who had made his carreer in the KGB.
Since his arrival to power, Putin systematically has reverted the chaotic and unstructured political and economic freedom that Russia had known for less than ten years by what he called "the Dictatorship of the Law". The oligarchs were driven into exile or jailed and the central government succeeded brilliantly in bringing economic decision power back again under it's control.
To regain the confidence of the estranged population, the colours of Putin's rethoric have turned more and more nationalistic, culminating in the restoration of the national anthem of the former Soviet Union created in 1944.
The objectives of this nationalistic trend are evident: to strengthen the defenses of the population against globalisation, in the interest of economic elites that actively participate in the process of gobalization while instrumentalizing the xenophobic reflexes of the masses for their own interests. The "Dictatorship of the Law" is the mechanism by which the new ruling class finds it's legitimation in the confrontation with the classical left. By actively supporting the xenophobic tendencies within society, the ruling elite successfully reduces the risk of an active participation of "foreigners" in the national economy.
The result is a new form of National Socialism in the mask of what might be called "patriotic free market economy". No wonder that those who consider liberalism as a philosophical and political struggle for freedom in terms of market economy, but siumultaneously an attitude that does not tolerate discrimination on the basis of race, nationality, religion of gender, are the natural enemies of the new "patriotic" movements that call themselves "liberal".
The leaders of the Swiss People's Party know exactly what they do when selling their perfect mixture of talk on free market economy and a monopoly over the most important national symbols: the flag, the folks sports such as "Schwingen" and "Hornussen" and last but not least Swiss country music.

Eco-Socialist Conservatism - The Cultural Conundrum of Basel



The Basel City Music Hall as it looks today and will look for another 20 years







The City Music Hall Project by Zaha HADID that the voters of Basel rejected on June 17, 2007






The city of Basel is proud of it's international image as a strongpoint of art and it is home to an internationally reknowned Music Academy. At the same time, this city, where two of the most important global players of the pharmaceutical industry, ROCHE and NOVARTIS, have their headquarters, is victim of a permanent loss of permanent residents which are able and/or willing to influence it's political fortunes. More to this, the city is the capital of one of the most tiny Cantons of Switzerland, Basel-Stadt, with a population of under 200,000 and it's socio-demographic structures shows a continuous trend towards old age and migrants.
Less than half of the inhabitants are active citizen, and the have clearly shown their political orientation toward socialism and ecology by electing parliament and a government which is dominated by the left and the (left-leaning) greens.
It is no wonder therefore that a project to replace the city music hall by a new building conceived by Zara Hadid has lost popular support in a vote on state subsidies for the construction site, with a more than 60 percent majority.
The people of Basel are used to be well served by their industry's corporate taxes but are not ready to invest in projects of cultural infrastructure.
The most intriguing feature of the phenomenon is the counterproductive behaviour of the representatives of the arts: there is no such thing as solidarity between art,
theater and music. The fatal blow was dealt to the project from within the art scene from a famous sculptor: Bettina Eichin, the author of the sitting statue of Helvetia on the Mittlere Rheinbrücke



Eichin, a fervent environmental activist, stated in a letter to the editor of the local newspaper "Basler Zeitung" that HADID's Casino would contribute to the warming of 3° Centigrade of the city atmosphere because of it's aluminium façade.

Those Basel citizen who did not like the architectural aspect of the project were pleased: finally somebody had explained to them that city concert halls contribute to gobal warming.