For Center much ado about nothing? The idea of building the Margherita 2.0 around the former Director of the Revenue Agency Enrico Maria Ruffini it is controversial but it has the flavour of an illusion. However, the interventions of the father of the Olive Tree Romano Prodi, who always smells the wind in advance and who is no coincidence in the prime minister's sights Giorgia Meloni, are not at all banal and have the flavour of a turning point with as yet undefined outcomes. What new thing did the Professor say in the face of the rough sea of the democratic Catholics of whom he is still the spiritual father? He naturally denied, as was obvious given his high standing, that he wanted to personally reorganise the Catholic area of the centre-left. And he denied having ever thought of a Catholic party, considered "impossible and unrealistic". But for the first time he said something very important: that the Elly Schlein's Pd it is too unbalanced to the left and cannot think of also representing the moderate wing of the centre-left with a majoritarian vocation that today no longer holds up and that mortifies the Catholics but more generally the moderates of the progressive coalition.
The Democratic Party is "too unbalanced to the left" to assume a majoritarian vocation: a central leg is needed
Prodi's words are heavy and seem to prelude a turning point from which the center leg of the center-left can be born. Call it, if you like, Margherita 2.0 but the goal is to march divided to strike together at the center-right government and build the alternative. But will it be an exclusively Catholic center like the original Margherita wasn't or will it be a center that knows how to open up and unite even the secular forces from Renzi a calenda to other bushes? The blood test, with a slightly confessional flavour, that Prodi gives to Matteo Renzi in his new book-interview with Massimo Giannini “The duty of hope leaves some doubts and it would be a shame if the center leg of the progressive coalition closed itself in a Catholic redoubt without opening up to the secular. Prodi sets three mandatory conditions for Renzi to return to the broad field: “The first is that the sinner admits to having sinned, the second is that he is truly repentant and the third, the most difficult, is that he commits to never sinning again”. The only thing missing is the obligation to wear a hair shirt, but frankly restoring the logic of the confessional in the secularity of politics does not seem like the best way to broaden the center-left field. Renzi may have made his mistakes and no longer represents 2.5-3% of the electorate, but condemning him to eternal atonement does not seem like proof of foresight on the part of those who would like to broaden the field without forgetting that the 51% threshold is only a mirage for now. If it weren't for the fact that Prodi's words always hide an undercurrent of subtle irony, one wouldn't even understand the logic of double standards: why does Renzi have to atone for his alleged sins (but what are they? Having determined the election of Mattarella to the Quirinale and having ousted Conte from Palazzo Chigi, opening the doors to Draghi, are these merits or are they faults?)) and instead the Bersani, the Bonelli, the Fratoianni and especially Joseph Count no? From the Five Star Movement and the Greens, pro-Russian suggestions about the war in Ukraine often emerge: should we close our eyes and pretend nothing is happening?
Without a proportional electoral law there is no room for the third pole: either on this side or on that side
But, be that as it may, one thing is certain and that is what the sinner Renzi, unlike the wavering Calenda, understood first: if the current electoral law that favors bipolarism remains in force, there is no room for a third independent pole and you have to choose which side to be on. Either on this side or the other. Renzi has chosen the center-left but the spiteful, sectarian and above all self-destructive ostracism, which the left wing of the Democratic Party, the Greens and the Five Star Movement are fueling towards him, has already caused defeats in Liguria and Basilicata and can always score resounding own goals. After all, working for the King of Prussia has always been a fatal attraction for the maximalist wing of the left and Giorgia Meloni can only be happy about it.