Mario Draghi’s maiden speech to the Italian Senate today shows that EIR warnings were not exaggerated. Draghi outlined a radical supranational and climate agenda, while indicating that mass vaccination and defeating the pandemic are short-term goals.
“To support this government means to share the irreversibility of the euro choice and the perspective of an ever more integrated Europe, aiming at a common public budget, able to sustain countries in recession periods. Nation-states are still the reference point of our citizens, but in areas defined by their weakness, they surrender national sovereignty to acquire shared sovereignty. In fact, by belonging with conviction to the destiny of Europe, we are even more Italian,” Draghi began his speech.
“When we get out of the pandemic, what kind of world will we find? … Global warming has direct effects on our lives and our health, from pollution to hydrogeological fragility, the increase of sea levels that could make large areas of some littoral cities no longer habitable. Room subtracted from nature by some megalopolises could be one among the causes of virus transmission from animals to man. As Pope Francis said, ‘natural tragedies are the Earth’s response to our mishandling.’ And I think: if I asked the Lord what he thinks, I don’t believe he would say that it is a good thing: we were the ones to ruin the work of the Lord.”
Draghi continued: “Getting out of the pandemic won’t be like switching on the light again.... Government shall protect workers, all workers, but it would be a mistake to indifferently protect all economic activities; some [of them] shall change, even radically change, and the choice of which ones protect and which ones accompany the change is the difficult task facing economic policy in the months ahead.”
He said, “We want to leave a good planet, not just a good currency.”
Draghi then said that he won’t change the priorities of the recovery plan drafted by his predecessor, but will “strengthen their strategic dimension, in particular concerning targets such as energy production from renewable sources, pollution of air and water, high-speed railway network, fuel distribution networks for electric vehicles, production and distribution of hydrogen, digitalization, broadband and 5G.”
Italy as rotating president of the G20 and co-president (with Britain) of the COP26 conference will focus “on sustainability and green transition ... with particular attention to actively involve youth generations through the ‘Youth4Climate’ event.”
In foreign policy, we will favor “mechanisms of dialogue with Russia but we are following with concern what is happening in this and other countries where citizens’ rights are often violated. We are following with concern rising tensions in Asia around China.”
