Former Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi May Have to Perform Community Service

Silvio Berlusconi in his younger days,
when he was a cruise ship entertainer.

Classists such as Elizabeth Gilbert often project the idea that Italy is brimming with enlightened citizens who understand how to live well. This naive notion runs aground against Italian reality. Not so long ago, the boorish zillionaire Silvio Berlusconi was elected -- and re-elected -- to the Italian senate and became Italia's prime minister. Echoing the proclivities of Roman emperors, Berlusconi held "bunga bunga" parties that included hookers for his sexual satisfaction as well as for the pleasure of his political cronies.

According to a BBC report, the former PM is being investigated for witness tampering in a prostitution trial. Berlusconi, who was convicted last year of having paid sex with an underage woman, is not sweating the details. He's surviving in style on a northern Italian health farm with his young fiancee and presumably younger dog. Meanwhile, Berlusconi faces a four-year sentence for his illegal act. Given his age (77), he's unlikely to do time. However, the BBC story notes Italy's former numero uno may have to perform community service.

For someone equipped with Berlusconi's arrogance, the sentence seems to fit the crime.

Berlusconi to Release Album of Love Songs

A Young Silvio Berlusconi Singing on a Cruise Ship

Believe it or not, former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi intends to release a collection of Neapolitan love songs. The story, appearing in today's LA Times, notes this is Berlusconi's fourth "album," all of them done in collaboration with another singer.

Called Il Vero Amore, the 75-year-old zillionaire and Italian media mogul is the "album's" chief crooner. Given Berlusconi's documented and rumored sexual exploits, it's possible the interpretations and color for each song may offer plenty of feeling. We're just not sure which of his heads Berlusconi uses for song. We do know which one he uses to think, especially around females.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and the late Indiro Montanelli

The Financial Times reported today that Standard and Poor's downgraded Italy's sovereign debt rating. The downgrade will likely continue the political erosion of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's regime. Many people feel it's time for Berlusconi, whose unbridled immorality and rapacious lust for power echo the unleashed id of some of the more depraved Caesars, to leave public service.

Indro Montanelli

I began thinking about this today as a result of my curiosity about a post-war Italian movie called Il Generale della Rovere. The film, directed by Roberto Rossellini, relates the story of a mole placed by the German occupation authorities into a Milan political prison. The Nazis' goal was for the spy, who pretended to be an Italian general, to learn the name of key Resistance figures. (The protagonist was played by Vittorio DeSica.) The story is allegedly based on the true life story of iconic Italian journalist Indro Montanelli, whose controversial life and work touches many Italian political, social, and cultural preoccupations between the rise of Fascism and the years following the kidnapping and murder of Prime Minister Aldo Moro. (The late Sicilian author Leonardo Sciascia discusses the Moro incident his interesting, but densely written book The Moro Affair.) In 1973, Montanelli broke with Italy's leading newspaper, Corriere della Sera, and founded Il Giornale, a right-wing newspaper that was eventually owned by none other than Silvio Berlusconi. According to Montanelli's Wikipedia biography, the journalist couldn't stand the man who would be king. "He lies as he breathes," Montanelli is reported to have said. Most observers today would agree with that terse, bitter assessment.

I don't have enough sense of contemporary Italy to grasp how the electorate could repeatedly make such a bleak choice for its prime minister. What's missing to explain it, I suspect, is someone with the intellectual weight of an Indro Montanelli.

For Italian language links regarding Montanelli, try these two for starters:

Fondazione Montanelli

A review from the Roman newspaper Il Messagero of Sandro Gerbi's and Raffaele Liucci's book on Montanelli, titled Montanelli l'anarchico borghese. (Sorry for the tortured syntax.)

Berlusconi, Bellochio, and Censorship

The BBC has steadily reported Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's alleged and verified sexual exploits. Today's edition noted a more disturbing aspect of Berlusconi's rule.

The article included an assertion by noted Italian film director Marco Bellochio that he has been subject to "creeping censorship." The silencing of Bellochio takes form through the unwillingness of producers and others to finance projects, due to their fear of the powerful prime minister and media magnate. In this case, according to the BBC report, Bellochio wanted to make a film in which a girl is "caught up in a headline-grabbing circus of racy parties and luxury villas."

Berlusconi's grip on the Italian media, combined with his political power, has permitted him to act above the law. Berlusconi's duality has added turbulence to Italian politics without any useful benefit to anyone except the prime minister and his court. The lesson Americans can take from this embarrassing episode is to firmly separate media and political power.

New York City learned this lesson the hard way during Mike Bloomberg's maneuvering for a third term as mayor. No one wanted to say "boo," because of Bloomberg's control of a media outlet and his money. It's much too dangerous for a representative democracy to permit those who own opinion shaping enterprises to simultaneously hold political office.

The photograph shows Marco Bellochio at the 2010 Venice Film Festival.