Cashing in on a brand name. Not.

Ever heard of one Benito Mussolini? If by any chance you have not, you can read a little about this interesting gentleman here. Well, he has a grand daughter who goes by the name of Alessandra and, guess what, has retained the surname of her rather infamous ancestor. Not only this, but she decided to cash in on her gramps ‘good’ name and become a politician.

Now, I find this a wee bit odd. How many politicians in Germany have the surname ‘Hitler’? Not many, I bet. Well, Italy is a little different and seems to be able to let bygones be bygones, almost. You see Alessandra may have been up to some dodgy tricks in the name of keeping her name in the political spotlight. You can read about this in English over on a New Zealand web site, of all places, which goes by the name of ‘Stuff‘.

I don’t know exactly who discovered Alessandra’s possible naughtiness, but I would like to think that it was someone who does not really appreciate her sticking up for and using the name of her grand daddy. Maybe, I dearly hope, it is a sign that Italian’s are getting a little tired of having so many recycled politicians. I mean using someone with a good name to launch your career is just about acceptable, almost. But trying to exploit the name of one of history’s more notorious leaders does not strike me as being a great thing to do. Does not give the country a great name, now does it?

My, Italy is an interesting place to live in.