THE VOID - A nation under a spell

Italy. Why has Unification never really unified the country? Giuseppe Verdi's sad omen ("Unification will be our ruin. We will all die of starvation.") predicted some 14 million Italians would leave the country (1861-1914). Not even Prime Minister Giovanni Giolitti (in 1892) had faith in the country's future ("Governing Italians isn't impossible, it's useless.").
One hundred years of unification passed, filled with events that read like a litany of horrific curses: Italian colonialism, the Italian diaspora, the birth of MAFIA, two World Wars, the birth of Fascism, a civil war, fifteen "Years of Lead" (years of terrorism and social upheaval), widespread political corruption.
Was it due to Pope Pius IX's curse? Or the rage of the nicest man in the world, Don Bosco, hurled at the rulers?
The Roman Question, the Southern Question, the Moral Question, questions that, having originated with the dawning of the country, are still unresolved today.
All hopes for redemption for the Italian population ended with the abduction and the execution-style assassination of pacifist political leader Aldo Moro on March 16, 1978.