I stated last Monday on Ken McClenton’s The Exceptional Conservative Show that if Italy rebuked Leftist government proposals it would be on its way to its own “Italexit,” and, should that occur then France would be next. I also stated that if France slapped Leftist values and went forward with its own “Frexit” then the EU was well and truly done, no matter what Germany or Brussels did.

Guess what?

Italy slapped the shite out of its own Leftist government on Sunday. Renzi is not long for his position. From YahooNews.com:

Renzi facing exit as polls point to Italy referendum defeat

by Angus MacKinnon

Rome (AFP) – Matteo Renzi’s time as Italy’s prime minister appeared to be over Sunday as exit polls indicated voters had overwhelmingly rejected constitutional reform proposals on which he had staked his future.

The reformist premier had vowed to quit if he lost the vote on proposals to streamline parliament and the first exit polls indicated he had been left with little other option.

Polls for national broadcaster Rai and the La7 television channel both called the vote decisively for the No camp. Their surveys put the winning margin at an average of 56.7 percent to 43.3.

But what were these so-called “proposals” on which Italy was voting?

The main opposition parties went into the vote insisting that there should be early elections if the proposals — curtailing the size and powers of Italy’s Senate and transferring powers from regions to the national government — were defeated.

Opposition parties denounced the proposed amendments to the 68-year-old constitution as dangerous for democracy because they would have removed important checks and balances on executive power.

The chamber would also have been stripped of most of its powers to block and revise legislation, and to unseat governments.

Read that correctly. Translated: the proposals were a naked power grab by the Italian government to remove whatever independence and authority local regions may have yet remaining because — as we all realize — any massive, centralized government knows much better than any individual how that person must live his or her life.

The bottom line concerns by voters were these:

Spearheaded by the populist Five Star Movement, the biggest rival to Renzi’s Democratic party, the “No” campaign also capitalised on Renzi’s declining popularity, a sluggish economy and the problems caused by tens of thousands of migrants arriving in Italy from Africa.

Say, might we have heard similar concerns expressed somewhere else quite recently?

Let’s talk specifics and reality.

The Italian government can’t pay its debt. Their budget deficit is growing. “The EU Fiscal Compact requires Italy to run budget surpluses large enough to cut its debt ratio by 3.6% of GDP every year for 20 years.” Really? You’d then best get ready, Brussels, to kick most everyone out of your blessed European Union and watch it crumble with those My Little Pony, purple-skied wishes.

The Italian banks are damned near bankrupt. Can they write down any of their bad debt? Negative, Will Robinson, because their capital ratios are already abysmally low.

Italy has an official unemployment rate of 11.4% meaning, of course, the actual unemployment rate is much higher due to persons who have stopped looking for jobs altogether. Just like the US. Just like any other country. Those figures are never collected or reported. But wait until you see these figures: “the youth unemployment rate is 65% in Calabria, 56% in Siciliy and 53% in Campania.”

Furthermore: “Industrial output has dropped by 35% since 2008, and investment by 59%.”

Stand by for the nominal Leftist bleats: it was nothing but ill-informed populism run rampant with Islamophobia, driven by irrational xenophobia, because all the commoners, proles, groundlings and serfs well and truly do not know what is best for them. And the Leftist Elites most certainly do. Blah blah blah. Rentoon rentoon rentoon.

These are indeed “interesting times” according to the Chinese saying. “Populism” is on the rise, no doubt — though I dislike that term. What I prefer to say is this: taxpayers are finally beginning to awaken to their being fleeced by big governments globally, run by Leftist Elites who wish to ultimately answer to no one or nothing. Populism cannot be tolerated because it portends a diminishment of their centralized mastery, challenges their authority, and blinkers their chances to make even larger and farther-reaching power grabs for complete and utter dominance.

That cannot stand. The unwashed masses must be put down, and quickly.

Yes, as Frank Underwood says, the money is fine and dandy.

But ultimately, it’s about the power.

BZ

P.S.

From this photograph, who is still standing?

Correct. Angela Merkel. Cameron, Obama, Hollande and Renzi gone or going. Anticipate that there will be massive pressure on Merkel from Leftists to continue living the definition of insanity, and that she will push back in ways heretofore yet unseen.