Because Academics Running The Government Worked So Well Here...

...that they're going to give it a go in Italy. Forced out by unelected EU commissars when he refused to dance to their economic tune, Silvio Berlusconi's replacements are indistinguishable from the crew that took power with Barack Obama, the "best and the brightest", the object of the media's massive affection, the ones who would finally fix things and put the country on the right path, for sure.

Look around.  See how well that worked out?  Now pray for Italy:

The new government sworn in on November 16th has the chairman of NATO’s military committee, Admiral Giampaolo Di Paola, as defence minister; the boss of Italy’s biggest retail bank, Corrado Passera, as minister for economic development and infrastructure; and no fewer than seven professors, including the prime minister, out of a cabinet of 17. Mr Monti himself takes the finance portfolio.

Only one of three women in the Berlusconi government had a heavyweight job. All three of those in Mr Monti’s will have onerous responsibilities. Anna Maria Cancellieri, a former prefect, becomes interior minister. Paola Severino, a law teacher and courtroom advocate, is the justice minister. Elsa Fornero, a pension expert, takes employment and welfare. The new government’s only defect may be that it contains no young people.

It is rare for the intellectual firepower of so many technocrats to be trained on a country’s problems. But it is also rare for the problems to be as grave as those left by Mr Berlusconi’s tragicomic administration...

Introducing "blaming Berlusconi", the European version of "blaming Bush". Again, that rocked until about fifteen minutes after the inauguration. But you can rest assured you will hear it over and over again, as Italy's team of technocrats - most of whom seem to have no "real-world" life experience whatsoever - desperately attempt to deflect responsibility when their ivory-tower schemes go awry.

It's going to be hard to watch. You want to scream at the screen, "Don't go in there!!", but you know those clueless kids are going to walk through that door anyway, and be subject to the cruel, horrific fate that awaits them...

Mara Carfagna, 33, former model, Miss Italy contestant and calendar girl, and one-time Equal Opportunities Minister in Berlusconi's cabinet.  Trust me, the Italians will miss her once they realize what "equal opportunity" means to college professors:  the castration of men, the casting out of women with "different" ideas, and the elevation of anyone with darker-than-olive skin to the front of the line - for everything...