Corriere della Sera is now reporting that the Italian Senate is breaking 158-156 to the Left, with the lower house going 340-277. The controversial six seats for Italians abroad, introduced by neo-well actually quite-fascist minister (a former member of the Salo Republic’s army) Mirko Tremaglia, seem to have backfired badly on their inventor, with 4 [...]

UPDATE below the fold.
With respect to the Italian elections, there’s still only one thing certain - it’s going to be a long night, and, possibly, not the last one. There have apparently been, if my rudimentary understanding of Italian news broadcaster Rai News 24 is correct, unjustified delays in data processing. Thus, given the closeness [...]

Well, by 1630 CET today, the Milan stock market had made a very clear judgment on the outcome of the Italian elections - the MIBTEL index being up just under 1 per cent intraday, despite a pasting for Berlusconi’s own Mediaset..down 1.98 per cent at €9.68 a share. Berlusconi’s departure seems welcome indeed.
More exit poll [...]

The CDU in Baden-Wuerttemberg is conducting negotiations with the Greens in that state to decide if the two parties should form a coalition government. If they do, it will be the first “black-green” coalition at the state level, and another sign of fluidity in Germany’s post-reunification party politics.
Update: Maybe next time. The CDU and FDP [...]

Now this is news (even if it not entirely unexpected).
The Basque separatist group ETA on Tuesday announced a permanent cease-fire, apparently bringing a dramatic end to nearly four decades of violence that claimed more than 800 lives, Basque television reported following a communique from the group.
The authenticity of the announcement could not immediately be [...]

Everyone’s been terribly worried about France. First of all, last autumn’s carburning outbreak saw a lot of people who really ought to know better gathering to hail the end of days and the Islamofascist conquest of Eurabia, or something. Now, the students are out on the streets to protest the government’s new labour laws, and [...]

Well we’re having a fairly lively discussion on the original post about the future of Italian democracy, so I thought it might be useful, as a sort of side plate, to link to this analysis from Morgan Stanley’s Vincenzo Guzzo. He highlights the recent changes in Italian election law, and the impact they may [...]

Well Romano Prodi and Silvio Berlusconi finally got to meet up in front of the TV cameras last night, even if they didn’t exactly enter into face to face combat. The poll consensus seems to be that Prodi won it on points.
The debate seems to have centred around economic themes, and Euractiv has [...]

Battle may be about to be joined. EU competition commissioner Neelie Kroes is back in the news. She made a speech yesterday, and in that speech she suggested that the golden days of the EUs unreformed energy giants may be numbered, as the European Commission is considering launching an onslaught on monopolistic [...]

Well the election campaign in Italy trundles on, and issues are starting to emerge. One of the more curious details to have come out in recent days refers to the size and shape of the voting card. It is to be some 65 centimetres long with canditates arranged horizontally rather than vertically across the strip [...]