On Thursday, it was Italy's turn for a day of anger. Rival Marxist factions in Rome began by fighting each other rather than the common enemy, as anyone familiar with leftwing protest could have predicted. Tiring of internecine warfare, the demonstrators then threw eggs at the Italian Senate and denounced Goldman Sachs, which, as well as being the world's most dangerous investment bank, was also once the employer ofMario Monti, who now happens to be Italy's unelected prime minister.
In Palermo, Milan and Turin, the police had to protect financial institutions, while demonstrators chanted: "Save schools, not banks." For all the familiarity of their concerns, the protesters missed a glaring point. Not as glaring as the point the Occupy London movement missed when it set out to close the City and force the vultures of Goldman Sachs to resign and then decided to close St Paul's and force its clergy to resign. But a target that outsiders still find so large it overshadows all others.
