Foreign Trends

European cynics claim they understand perfectly well why the U.S. knows so little about the fast deteriorating situation in Italy: the U.S. Ambassador to Rome happens to be the wife of America’s ablest news-gatherer. Now, knowing that he is firmly rooted in Italy, no other U.S. publisher would even think of competing against such an unbeatable handicap; but Mr. Luce (and this is the European cynic’s punch line) doesn’t tell. Ergo, the U.S. now knows far less about Italy than it used to know before America’s most enterprising publisher made his home in the Roman Embassy.

The European cynics are usually wrong, and the U.S.’s ignorance of things Italian might have entirely different reasons. Yet whatever they are, that ignorance is almost as appalling as the studied silence with which the U.S. press responds to the Italian situation.

European cynics claim they understand perfectly well why the U.S. knows so little about the fast deteriorating situation in Italy: the U.S. Ambassador to Rome happens to be the wife of America’s ablest news-gatherer. Now, knowing that he is firmly rooted in Italy, no other U.S. publisher would even think of competing against such an unbeatable handicap; but Mr. Luce (and this is the European cynic’s punch line) doesn’t tell. Ergo, the U.S. now knows far less about Italy than it used to know before America’s most enterprising publisher made his home in the Roman Embassy.

The European cynics are usually wrong, and the U.S.’s ignorance of things Italian might have entirely different reasons. Yet whatever they are, that ignorance is almost as appalling as the studied silence with which the U.S. press responds to the Italian situation.