Meanwhile in Italy

[Strike For The South]

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20110209/D9L97SLO1.html

The premier spoke to reporters in Rome on Wednesday shortly after prosecutors in Milan filed a request for his indictment on charges he paid for sex with a 17-year-old girl and then used his influence to try to cover it up

I thought you Euros were ok with this stuff, that's why Polanski is over there

[TinCow]

Italian government is a punchline. The nation is pretty much in the same situation as Greece, but at least the Greeks have a prospect of recovery. Italy would do far better if it was split back up into city-states.

[Strike For The South]

Italian government is a punchline. The nation is pretty much in the same situation as Greece, but at least the Greeks have a prospect of recovery. Italy would do far better if it was split back up into city-states.

Excitable little fellas, always yelling and talking with their hands

[Louis VI the Fat]

I fully expect this to develop into a North Tunesian Revolution.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Just what does it take to become a capable modern country?

[al Roumi]

I fully expect this to develop into a North Tunesian Revolution.

God, ANYTHING for the alarmingly high number of Italian voters who still support Berlusca to see the light, somehow!

It really is insane how much he can get away with. It would be appaling that he faces such little opposition within Itialian politics were it not for how good his people are at undermining any whif of contrariness.

"popolo della liberta" my friggin arse.

[rory_20_uk]

His comanising IMO is not a big deal in an of itself. Kennedy was a massive wommaniser, after all. I'm sure they're not alone.

That one was 17 is a gray area. But I feel this is where arbitrary ages are not that useful - from what I've seen / read, the young girls he's been with have not been nuns taken from the nunnery, they are working girls very aware of what they're doing.

That he uses his position to evade charges of corruption - and the only way to get him out is via this smacks of doing Al Capone on failure to pay taxes.

[Ronin]

with all the stuff the bastard has gotten away with over the years it's kinda pathetic that it takes a sexual scandal to get people in arms over the situation....with a girl that was borderline illegal at most.
phony moral outrage is always the lowest common denominator.

[Louis VI the Fat]

It really is insane how much he can get away with. It would be appaling that he faces such little opposition within Itialian politics were it not for how good his people are at undermining any whif of contrariness.

Have you ever watched Italian television? Just about any programme features scantilly clad girls. Taller than the host, but just screen filler. Standing there showing their cleavage. So many of them are blond, that I suspect just about the whole of Italian Tirol must work in showbizz.

Berlusconi owns most of Italy's television channels. He has shaped them in his own image. You get fed an enormous amount of gratuitous babeness on an evening of television. It is mind numbing. The many viewers of Berlusconi's tv channels don't mind his escapades anymore. They have become completely numb to the sight of a fifty, sixty year old tv presenter with two tall semi-naked women behind him. To the modern viewer, the sight of Silvio with several underage girls is plain normal, if not a sign of his virility.

[Greyblades]

So basically, the closest analogy is that italy is Europe's north korea? As far as the government goes at least.

[al Roumi]

Have you ever watched Italian television? Just about any programme features scantilly clad girls. Taller than the host, but just screen filler. Standing there showing their cleavage. So many of them are blond, that I suspect just about the whole of Italian Tirol must work in showbizz.

Berlusconi owns most of Italy's television channels. He has shaped them in his own image. You get fed an enormous amount of gratuitous babeness on an evening of television. It is mind numbing. The many viewers of Berlusconi's tv channels don't mind his escapades anymore. They have become completely numb to the sight of a fifty, sixty year old tv presenter with two tall semi-naked women behind him. To the modern viewer, the sight of Silvio with several underage girls is plain normal, if not a sign of his virility.

I know, I lived in the Veneto and Emilio Romagna for a year (2005).*

The way he survives every scandal, abuse of power, political incident is to construe all criticism of him as a left wing conspiracy. Italy is still reeling from the politics of the cold war (if not the 1930s).

2011 will have started a wonderfull year if Berlusconi, Mubarrak and Ben Ali are ousted.

I really can't get over the fact that his response to these latest proceedings, as prime minister, is to SUE THE STATE. In a sense, he as a private individual will be suing his own professional self. It's such a typical picture of how he has bent the whole country around his own personal interests.

But then, as Frag would say, i'm just a leftist conspirator...

Edit:*so i'm clearly an expert on the subject matter....

[al Roumi]

So basically, the closest analogy is that italy is Europe's north korea? As far as the government goes at least.

Not really, Berlusconi runs Italy (to the extent that you could accuse him of charting a course for the country anyway) in the interests of his own private business empire. I remember reading something about how the great majority of laws that his governments had actually passed (passing a law in Italy has been quite intractable for the last decade, if not more) have been to exempt the prime minister (berlusconi) from various legal investigations and shore up his business empire. Berlusconi runs Italy with the same approach to public service as a feudal tax-farming baron.

I'd say Italy is closer to being Europe's Egypt or Nigeria, but plus a massive dollop of vested interests from a public gorged on special rights and priveleges which have been granted to "buy" their votes.

Italy is a developed country despite its political governance.