Here's why I'm drinking Italian and Australian Wine these Days

[dude1394]

Contrast this with the back-stabbing french. Viva Italy

BUSH IN ROME: BERLUSCONI'S DECLARATION
(AGI) - Rome, Italy, June 3 - Here is the entire text of the prime minister's speech: "A people which forgets its past cannot build a bright future. That's why it is right for us Italians to recall the 4th June 1944, when, sixty years ago, the allies freed Rome, our capital, from the Nazis, two days before the US troops landed in Normandy, to liberate Europe. Those were the last days of our winter. The US president is now on visit in Europe to commemorate those painful but glorious days. He will come to Rome, then to Paris and Normandy. Well, a part of our political sphere are using this visit as an excuse to express their hostility towards the United States. That's why I decided to intervene, because Italy must prove to the world it is a good host, that it knows its history. I am not worried by freedom of expression and thought: that's the essence of democracy. What worries me is the possible, absurd violence which we have already witnessed. I am worried by the conviction of some youngsters that burning a flag or breaking a shop window can make one stronger. But that is totally wrong. Yet what I really fear is that an extremist demonstration may lead the Italians to forget the real, profound, historical meaning of the event we're celebrating. Some of us have lived those days, while the majority of us have read about it. They must know that their fathers, their grandfathers, who took up arms against the Nazis, considered the allies as saviours. They must know the price the Americans paid to free our continent. Half a million killed in world war II. More than 7000 killed on D-Day alone, in Normandy; 25,000 killed to liberate Italy. Some of them rest in peace in our country, buried in Anzio. I suggest you visit that cemetery, and see the names of people unkown to you: John, Charlie, Robert, Ted, Howard... Men aged 20, 22, who gave up their life for our freedom. An ancient bond links us to the USA. Millions of Italians found their well-being in that hospitable country. Our brotherhood with the USA dates back to those days, and cannot be deleted. Besides, after the war, the reconstruction of our cities and our economy was made possible by that generous Marshall Plan, which allowed Italy to head for its economic miracle. It is even thanks to America that many Italians, thieves of bicycles, could then buy a Vespa and a Fiat Seicento. We must not forget. When two terrible planes violated New York's sky and demolished the Twin Towers, killing more than 3000 people, we said that we all felt American. We didn't say that just because we were touched, but because that attack was also an attack against the western world, and the entire world. We realised we were facing another threat to our freedom. We thought that after the fall of Communism, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the era of peace would finally come. But terrorism declared war on us, a war which we never thought we would have to fight. The most vile of wars. Not always has the international community been wise enough to tackle this threat. Once Afghanistan was freed from the Taliban regime, democracies diverged on the Iraqi affair. I don't want to comment them again. I just want to say that Italy didn't take part in the war. We only sent troops after Saddam Hussein's fall, and following a parliamentary debate and the UN resolution 1511. Peace keeping troops, the same as we did in Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Afghanistan, to guarantee security and the operating of hospitals, schools, social services. In order to restore democracy. We must be proud of our soldiers. Hence, our mission in Iraq is a peace-keeping one, but someone still denies it. We cannot mistake the prey with the predator! A peace-keeping mission doesn't cease to be so just because of the attacks of terrorist militia. On the other hand, that's when our presence becomes even more important. Soldiers are sent to carry out these missions because they are high-risk ones. Withdrawing our troops from Iraq today would be .

[MavKikiNYC]

If not Italian......

[Drbio]

Originally posted by: MavKikiNYC
If not Italian......

Messinahof rules.

[mavsman]

They must know that their fathers, their grandfathers, who took up arms against the Nazis, considered the allies as saviours.

Wow, just when you think Berlusconi couldn't possibly reach any new lows, he completely denies Italy's history with this revisionist drivel.

[MavKikiNYC]

Originally posted by: Drbio

Messinahof rules.

Fall Creek Vineyards out by Llano has had some surprisingly good (quite good in fact) wines in past years.

Tricky to find them in Manhattan though.

[dude1394]

Originally posted by: mavsman

Wow, just when you think Berlusconi couldn't possibly reach any new lows, he completely denies Italy's history with this revisionist drivel.

Interesting, what's revisionist about it? Either:
- The allies were NOT saviours?
- The italians wanted to be under fascism?

[mavsman]

Dude, I think you know exactly what's revisionist about it. If not, go to google and type in "Italy Greece Egypt 1940" and see where it takes you. On the other hand, why am I startled about something Berlusconi might say after he uttered "Mussolini didn't let anybody kill, he just sent people on a vacation"? Even his most hardcore friends were banging their collective heads against the table back then, as he once again tried to weasle out of something he said the day before by saying "sorry, just a joke, too much prosecco", when numerous journalists swear that only tea had been served at the time (not that it would matter).

[dude1394]

Well actually I don't, (you give me too much credit for history knowledge), but I will check it out.

[mavsman]

Even easier, google "The axis" to see how wrong B. is, when he is talking about his "grandfathers, who took up arms against the Nazis", when they were in fact marching right with them.
I once almost ran out of gas in France on my way to Spain, stopped at a gas station, one of the old fashioned ones, where you have to wait for the guy to come out and serve you. Guy comes out, he's a real old dude, tells me in French to piss off, as he doesn't serve Germans. Another time in Italy, I bought some wine, the salesman, once again an old dude, gave me my wine and asked me if I wanted to have something of that. There's the difference between Italy and France for you.

[Fidel]

Berlusconi is one of the worst dictators in todays world. Since the new agenda of the US governement is to bring "freedom, democracy and peace" to Iraq, they might as well invade Italy next to free the italian people from Berlusconi. He owns allmost all of the italian media now. To be able to become such a powerfull media mogul he had to change a couple laws. Thats his usual routine, whenever he´s in trouble (like in the corruption scandal and a couple other scandals too) he simply changes the law after which he could be convicted. There were at least four criminal procedures against him that he ended this way.

Berlusconi is a lying, currupt and criminal bastard, the anti democrat. To quote anything he said or to point to anything he did, to support ones argument is just weak to say the least. Going by the high moral standards that so many here claim to have and going by the logic that you should punish a whole country for what it´s governement does (the whole boycot thing) italian wine defenitly should be the last choice right now among european wines (I disagree with the whole concept anyways, just going by the logic of some around here). But I guess these days any ally is better then no ally for Bush and those who support him. Even if he´s just a criminal mafia tycoon.

And one more thing. What the "prime minister" had to say clearly was revisionistic drivel, like mavsman pointed out.

[FullBurst41]

I agree. Bush could not choose a more... unlucky alliance, if I may use that term. And is this really rue? Did some people on this forum not know that Italy was part of the Axis... hey guys, did you know Rumania was as well? [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-tongue.gif[/img]

Mavsman, I'm not sure hwere you're trying to get at with your comparison between the French guy at the gas station and the Italian selling wine. I just think that's part of the "old guard," if you will. You may remember that it was the French that made sure in the '50s that Europe would have no common defense policy, I believe he said something along the lines of this:

"No son of mine will serve alongside a man who's father treated me like a dog."

You have old Belgians that feel bitter towards the Germans, you have old French, old Brits, old Americans who feel bitter. I can't really blame them for it, even though it is not right, but it's just how it is. You cannot really shove it under their noses, we did not live through what they did, for the most part.

one last thing... I do wonder when Bush will make a visit to Azerbeidjan to show how grateful he is for not opposing the war in Iraq. That owuld really make my day.

[mavsman]

Exactly FullBurst. I just wanted to point out (even though my example just shows single persons and cannot be generalized), that other than what Berlusconi had said, outside Germany Italians sure were the last "who took up arms against the Nazis". And the "old guard" (in my example the old man who sells Hitler-wine) proves him wrong.

[dude1394]

Living in the past dudes. Japan/Germany was also part of the axis. Russia was complicit until uncle hilty decided to get uncle stalins stuff. That's 60 years ago, good grief. Sides were taken during WWII...

Sides were taken after 9/11. Italy is on the right side, in my opinion france is not. This is this generations war, of course we will take aid from someone who has erred in the past but sees the light.

As for the french, they can kiss my red, white and blue ass.

We Americans are such interminable optimists. The French know better, and they are biding their time, sharpening their knives and keeping their rifles oiled. President, en garde.

[FullBurst41]

Now that is what bothers me. Some on this board have a tendency to say something about their allies' past mistakes like "Oh, but gee guys, history is history." Nos uch luck for the guys on the "wrong side." You don't seem to get the point. We don't hate the Italians, or do not think the US should not ally with Italy because of its past. We think the US should not cuddle up so much to a regime led by a corrupt, dictatorial ass who would even wipe away his own country's history. That's about as nice as some former SS freak (from wherever he is) saying the holocaust was an unfortunate accident.

[dude1394]

I can't really comment on internal italian politics. As an american I see external italian politics. Italy has supported the US in the war on terrorism with blood and treasure and even after the spanish cowardly appeased bin laden, they stand firm. France has aggressively obstructed my countries self defence, lobbying against our interests. They are probably share more blame that we actually had to invade Iraq than any country except for Iraq and Sadaam itself.

They are not allies, and quite honestly haven't been for a while.

And I'll be sampling a fine italian wine tonight. Sort of a shame about spain however, I liked their stuff. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

[Fidel]

Believe me dude, Berlusconi is one of the worst politicians that europe has seen in a long time. I´m not going so far as to compare him to hitler, but his methods are totalitarian and he´s pretty close to being a dictator. He has totally undermined the italian system of law and democracy (which has allwas been corrupt that´s why Berlusconi didn´t have much trouble to completely take over). His ownage and or control of allmost all the italian media and himself being the prime minister would have been impossible if he didn´t change or erease all the laws that stood in his way. Same goes for a number of scandals he was involved in. Actually he would have done prison time twice if he didn´t quickly change the respective laws by which he would have been convicted (the evidence was overwhelming). He´s in the process of firing all lawyers and other state representatives who don´t support him. That completely destroys the balance of power that every democratic country should have to a degree. Italy is not a democratic country right now just as Russia and I wouldn´t want it as my ally.

[dude1394]

So how many folks has he had killed? Why don't the people vote him out? So do you compare italy to say china or saudia arabia?

[Fidel]

Well he´s certainly more subtle in his methods then say the chinese regime. I don´t know if he would go as far as to manipulate elections. He does have the power however to manipulate elections over the media which is a huge problem too. Normally there is a balance of power in most countrys media. Like liberal and conservative in the US. In Italy nearly all huge TV stations and alot of Newspapers are either owned or controlled by Berlusconi. The power this gives him should´t be underestimated. There´s a reson why most democratic countrys do have laws which prevent a person from being a media mogul and let´s say prime minister at the same time. Most countrys do have laws to prevent someone from getting into such a monopolistic postion in the media alone. So did Italy, before Berlusconi changed the laws.

After everything I said in this thread I still wouldn´t compare Italy to China. The disdain of human rights, old law and democratic priciples certainly isn´t as drastic. But I´d say Italy is borderline, just like Russia. No real totalitarian regime, no real democracy.

[FullBurst41]

Dude, so you do not look at internal politic, that is interesting. Perhaps the US government agrees with you. Pehraps that is why they like the Uzbeks as well, eh?

[dude1394]

Well the us is a big place with a lot of responsibilities. In general I don't want us to indulge in getting involved in other countries internal politicis unless it coincides with our interests. Also people(and countries) have to make choices because they cannot always just sit back and let someone else do something that needs doing. So priorities and strategy must be considered as well.

Just as stalin was our ally in NYII (but obviously contrary to almost everything we stand for) he bacame an ally.

Have you ever played the game RISK? If so in that game many times, players who are adversaries MUST join together to bring down the other, stronger player, even though at some point in time they will also attack each other. Hard to put world politics into the context of a board game, but that's sort of how I view it.

[dude1394]

Well,well,well. Obviously a few more like folks have decided that their wine dollars should maybe go somewhere else. But boy are there some good bargains out there. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

french whine

Agence France-Press reports that French wine sales in the US are significantly down.

French wine producers need to radically rethink the way they package and market wines to US consumers if they hope to stem the decline in their share of the multi-billion dollar US wine market, a panel of industry experts said here.

Sales of French wine has been held back by confusion over the type of wine being sold, perceptions that the wine is over-priced, and an inability to distinguish between the hundreds of different brands on the market, said panelists during a seminar at Vinexpo Americas 2004, a wine trade fair being held in Chicago.

The article then proceeds to identify the reasons for the decline: the rise in the Euro relative to the dollar, and confusing labeling and branding.

The article doesn't contain any acknowledgement that some of the decline might be due to political backlash by ordinary Americans. It is apparently inconceivable that some American wine-drinkers might be consciously boycotting French wine because of France's foreign policy.

[MavKikiNYC]

Originally posted by: dude1394
Well,well,well. Obviously a few more like folks have decided that their wine dollars should maybe go somewhere else. But boy are there some good bargains out there. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

french whine

Denial.

Americans are voting in French elections--with their wine glasses.