And Uma, please this is for blogging, not for newspaper writing. You write such long diatribe that one just cannot take it all in when there are other people with short, smart blog writing to read. Please stop!!

You said:
That is funny. The American political correctness has gotten out of control. 30 years ago the US had a sense of humor, everyone teased everyone else, it made for a sense of lightheartedness.

Were you IN the USA in 1978? I was. Thirty years ago, the US still had race-riots. Thirty years ago, African-American kids were still in the most substandard schools in the country - and they still are. Thirty years ago, all housing was Officially 'desegregated', but if an African-American family moved into a White neighbourhood, they could count on harassment and hostility, at best, and crosses burning on their lawns, at worst.

Many would agree, that the 'political-correctness' of speech, which did start in the USA, has got out-of-hand.

Those people who agree with you have never been on the RECEIVING end of HATE-CRIME, which is what the limitations on speech are aimed at combating.

If people have to THINK, before they talk, about whether their words
might cause HARM, in theory, it helps them learn that all people deserve RESPECT. Obviously, it doesn't work on people like you, who obviously do not respect all human beings equally.

Oh yeah, it was such 'teasing and good fun'. You either have no clue what you are talking about, or do not care how offensive your views are.

Now we overanalyze everything.

Ahh, the ole anti-intellectual spirit! What a Good Ole Boy.

Everything that does not make us feel superior is considered “hate speech” and I find that silly.

You obviously don't understand the meaning of 'Hate-Speech'. It is speech used to express a feeling of superiority - like when Italians moved to the USA, the Irish, who had been the bottom of the social scale before them, used ugly words 'w–', etc, to put the Italian immigrants down. It wasn't ONLY Irish-Americans, but it was a way for them to feel superior to somebody, because everybody ELSE dumped on the Irish, until a new wave of Immigrants arrived.

Hate-SPEECH is the theory. Hate-CRIME is the practice.

Be funny tease others and keep things light and fun.

Oh yes, godsforbid anyone should be SERIOUS about the issues. Are you old enough to remember the hyper-inflation of the Italian Lira? It wasn't funny. It was misery, and poverty, and dark times in Italian history.

What are you so desperate to hide from? Why are you so insistent that nobody should THINK?

We have forgotten that. Seems like the only sane Americans (those with enough self-confidence to take a joke) is white southern males…they love the sterotypes and find them funny.

WHOA! White, Southern Males BELIEVE the stereotypes. (Not MOST White, Southern men, thank the gods, but the ones YOU mean) They don't find themselves funny. They DO find burning down African-American churches funny. They DO find spray-painting swastikas on synagogues funny. They DEFINITELY find chasing young, African-American girls into the woods, and tying them to trees, and gang-raping them HILARIOUS. The serious neo-fascists don't find anything 'funny' unless it involves violence and humiliation of people they call 'mud-people'.

You are one sick, twisted individual. Your 'joking' completely fails to hide a strong and disgusting Neo-Fascist streak. I know Neo-Fascism is rising all over Europe. You are an example... and I am profoundly disgusted... You, and those like you, and those who are WORSE, would be strung from trees, as 'dirty w–s; by those White, Southern men, whom you so admire.

I am struggling to find a good reason why that would be a Bad Thing... Oh, right, because LYNCHING is WRONG, even if the person who is being lynched is social POISON.

I have many friends, all over Italy, who routinely express disgust, disdain, disappointment, and despair about this toothache of a Berlusconi.

Italy, Siclily, and Sardinia have my sympathies, and understanding. I lived in the USA for forty years. I met many people online who judged me, just because the USA has an embarrassing President (and that's just George Bush - I travelled extensively, during the Nixon and Ford Administrations... that was great fun. Fortunately, I carried a British passport!)

Berlusconi must have been the lesser of two evils, to win the election.

I hate to think what his opponent was like.

As a person of colour, who lives in the UK - which grows daily MORE racist - who lived in the USA through schools-desegregation - and who would have had to carry a pass, in Old South Africa, I know racism when I see it.

I don't see it in Sylvio Berlusconi. A 'racist' is a person of deep convictions. I am not convinced that Berlusconi is CAPABLE of 'deep convictions'! He seems shallow, belligerent, and rather proud of being 'controversial'.

Tony Blair's Deputy Prime-Minister, John Prescott, was a womanising, rude, crude, vulgar, stupid, uninformed, lazy, hostile, drunken, angry buffoon, who made his first impression by punching a reporter, and continued in that vein, until Blair finally was forced to sack the old fool. John Prescott was morbidly POPULAR here, in the sense that people were always entertained by, and speculating upon, what moronic thing he was likely to do next!

He said unfortunate things, every time he opened his mouth. Is he racist? No. He's too DIM, and far too shallow, to be racist. He's a typical British xenophobe, but that's no crime in Britain. Whether or not it should be, is open for discussion.

The racism here is the British National Party. They are neo-fascists, are SERIOUS, and are gaining support.

Doubtless Italy has some sort of equivalent lunatic-fringe Party. Those people are worrying. Berlusconi is just embarrassing!