If there is one undeniable merit of Pietrangelo Buttafuoco, it is having elevated culture to the dominant theme of the agenda in a political context, the conservative one, where it has always been considered marginalized. However, this is like recognizing the outbreak on the Princess ship for making people talk about biology, virology, and science, inducing fear (already denied by the WHO) that the Hantavirus could trigger a new pandemic.
Buttafuoco, equally undoubtedly, is a capable and lively person, intellectually and humanly; he might have been a good minister. This must also be known by his friend and ally Alessandro Giuli, who is a minister, who seems a bit less capable and a bit too lively, so much so that one suspects Giorgia Meloni regrets having appointed him. Thus, Alessandro uses two tones towards Pietrangelo: he complains about the inappropriate citation of Mattarella, saying it is not nice to pull the head of state’s jacket in a family quarrel, but he reiterates their unbreakable friendship. “This hand can be iron and can be feather,” one might say using a famous quote inspired by the cinephile world.
At the end of the day, the Biennale affair resolves into a perhaps overly emphasized good figure of Buttafuoco, who stands out as a champion of intellectual freedom against the dictates of politics (in this case, moreover, certainly contradictory). And in yet another mess erupted at the Mic, which really did not need it. There was already, just to stay in the lagoon area, the one involving La Fenice and director Venezi (not to mention the Tgr protesting the sale of the Palazzo Labia headquarters). However, it must be acknowledged that Giuli can always get confused in the crowd of gaffe-prone colleagues: every day has its ministerial sorrow, yesterday Giuseppe Valditara with Piersanti Mattarella killed by the red terrorists took the pole position and we can only imagine the premier’s mood.
Buttafuoco is adored by many dissatisfied conservatives and reactionaries, largely because they hoped the Meloni revolution would bring more fascism and sovereigntism to power and to enjoy at least a little personally, with some appointment and related perks. And he is admired by many opponents who see in him the useful representative of the faction that allows them to say: “See, those on the right are rough, uncultured, ignorant, a bit dumb and a bit fascist, they even say it themselves.” Buttafuoco like the much-interviewed Franco Cardini and Flavia Perina, in this sense.
In the middle is someone like Giordano Bruno Guerri, who has received the seat and who delivers some jabs to the governing majority but softly, without exaggerating, with caution due to innate indifference rather than calculation. “Friendship is common to all politicians, but those on the right have fewer friends” is the relentless and spot-on diagnosis with which he resolved this conservative cultural symptomatology, to which he added an assessment of the right’s indiscipline as both a strength and a weakness at the same time.
It may be so, but the impression is that there are two levels: a “high” one, where conservative and reactionary culture is overwhelmingly victorious, the true great masters have mostly been on the right; a “low” one, where it is simply rowdy. And we are still here, from Berlusconi’s times to Meloni’s, little seems to have changed.
