Berlusconi is the longest serving PM in Italian history. Except for him the tenure of a PM is usually less than a year before they're exposed for corruption or pure idiocy. He's been there for what, how many years now?
When Bill Clinton had his troubles with a horny intern the Italians went to bat for him, as it's normal in Italy for successful men to play around with available ass wherever it may be conveniently found.
However Berlusconi has sort of crossed a line here in that he's doing this at parties, and otherwise reviving the bad habits of the Imperial Romans when it comes to this kind of immorality.
The church and traditional values have been a staple of the new right in Italy, so I think his flagrant hypocracy in this regard is now his doom.
Too bad too because for all it's neo-facist faults the new right there is all that has saved the place from a socialist nightmare. Italy is one of the few countries where you still see posters of the old hammer and sycle [sp] from the Soviet-era communists. The communist influence there has been a problem for a long time [since about 1919]. Over the decades the CIA spent a fortune in our tax dollars to keep it out of communist hands [in the 1950s the CIA budget for covert political action there was over $20 million a year].
The CIA's Chief of counter-intelligence for Italy from 1953-1957 used to live here in Austin, until he died here in 2004.
I love Italy!
It's affordable to go there in the off season - from Sept through May excluding Christmas.
Ciao!
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