A political earthquake in Italy is rattling across Europe.  The populist blogger and comedian Beppe Grillo’s strong showing in Italy’s election is signaling what some think is a growing wave of resistance to the European Union’s incredibly unpopular austerity measures.

Many of the newly elected members of Grillo’s “Five Star” (M5S) political movement are total novices, barely older than the age limit of 25 for getting into parliament.  One of them, Roberta Lombardi told the newspaper La Stampa, “I certainly feel a huge weight of responsibility. We're not the saviors of the country. But we are prepared to revitalize the political scene.”

Beppe is promising that his party will be as anti-establishment as ever.  But the "Italy: Common Good" center-left coalition also did pretty well in the elections which ended on Monday.  And its leader Pier Luigi Bersani is offering an olive branch and advice to M5S.  He’s trying to get Grillo's group to join in a coalition government, saying in effect that electoral success brings with it the responsibility to govern.  Bersani rejected a coalition offer from former prime minister and convicted tax cheat Sylvio Berlusconi, who is awaiting trial for sexual misconduct with an underage prostitute.

The Movimento 5 Stelle won roughly a sixth of the seats in both houses of Italy’s parliament on platform of environmentalism and degrowth, anti-corruption, and anti-austerity as imposed by the European Union.