Italy: Forlani Gives Up

The scandal proves too much

For 17 days, Arnaldo Forlani had tried to resolve Italy's latest political crisis as if the scandal that caused it could be ignored. Last week he gave up the effort to find enough support among five political parties to succeed himself as the leader of Italy's 41st government in 35 years. Italians thus settled in for a prolonged period of political paralysis brought on by allegations that a 953-member secret Masonic group, the P2 Lodge, included some of the nation's political, military and business elite—and three of Forlani's...