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Faith in the Pope. Cavalier talk it was, too, for the parlor of an absent Foreign Minister. As Il Borghese played it, La Pira had gaily dismissed Communism as "a peril that no longer exists." President Johnson, he told the editor with a mystic's assurance, "will have to cede and make peace [in Viet Nam] because American financiers want it." Dean Rusk? "He doesn't know anything." Italian Premier Aldo Moro? "There's something about him I don't like." Pope Paul? "I have faith in him," allowed the Saint, "even if he sometimes stops, seesaws and bogs down." La Pira denied everything, insisted he had been merely joking and speaking in "paradox."
All Italy got the joke, all right, but the returning Amintore was not amused. First he blew his 5-ft. 1-in. top at his wife, and when she tried to escape by closing a door in his face, Fanfani reportedly kicked it in. Only when things were settled at home did he manfully face up to the chortling outside world. "Unjust and unfounded considerations and judgments of a friend and the improvident initiative of a member of my family," he wrote Premier Moro with as much dignity as he could muster, "rightfully or wrongfully have cast doubts on the conduct of the Foreign Minister." With that he resigned.
To Fanfani's agony, Moro spun out the farce yet another day, refusing to accept the resignation. But how much laughter must a politician suffer? A mortified Fanfani wrote again, and this time, realizing that enough was enough, Moro let him go.