Letter to Italy: Bring Back Silvio!!!!
At 8:15 a.m. eastern time, the featured headline on The New York Times' website: "Berlusconi Flirts. His Wife’s Fed Up. Read All About It."
Many in the media (at least those he does not own), as well as this site have taken a cheap shot or two (and many well-deserved shots) at Mr. Berlusconi. After all, his time as Italy's Prime Minister is almost equally as absurd as Rupert Murdoch becoming President of the US. (Reason #100000 we should not repeal the 12th Amendment: Mr. Murdoch is Australian.)
But for all his shittiness, you have to laugh at a guy with a pacemaker and hair implants who goes out in public and says things like, (to Italian MP Mara Carfagna) "If I weren’t already married, I would marry you right now."
It's for these types of absurdities that I may unfortunately miss our own President in a few years. I just can't imagine anyone else living up to Mr. Bush's comic standards or to President Clinton's hilarious horndog ways. While Mr. Berlusconi's comic style is more like Jack Nicholson (read: lecherous), Bush plays the President in the way I imagine David Brent would (read: incompetent). In both cases I get the feeling that somewhere aliens are watching a TV show about our world and "havin' a laugh."
Read on for more... including a new entry in the long-running contest to find the hottest politician ever.
As an additional note, much respect to Mr. Berlusconi's wife, Veronica Lario, for her statement. If you wanted a singular example of cultural differences between Italians and Americans, contrast her with Hillary Clinton (to whom I would still offer cautious support for the '08 election). Hillary's husband obviously cheated on her, repeatedly, and she kept relatively quiet and supportive. Ms. Lario's husband flirted with young women in public (at the very least), and she writes a letter to a newspaper saying, "To my husband and to the public man, I therefore ask for a public apology, not having received one privately."
Silvio's response:
"Your dignity should not be an issue: I will guard it like a precious material in my heart even when thoughtless jokes come out of my mouth. But marriage proposals, no, believe me, I have never made one to anyone.
"Forgive me, however, I beg of you, and take this public testimony of private pride that submits to your anger as an act of love. One among many. A huge kiss. Silvio."
As the Times story goes on, they note that Mr. Berlusconi (i) left his first wife for Ms. Lario, a "B-movie" actress, (ii) claimed that he lost his hair because "he had too many girlfriends," (iii) has since had hair implants, and (iv) once opened a political conference by praising the legs of a woman in the front row. It's no wonder the man once received a two minute standing ovation in the US Congress.
On the other hand, I doubt he has ever ended a press conference by saying, "Listen, I've got to go eat a burger."
[Editor's note: In Silvio's defense, take another look at Italian MP Mara Carfagna (seen above), the woman about whom Silvio made the now-famous comments. For God's sake, could we not get ONE US politican that looks like that? We love Yulia dearly, but Ms. Carfagna is very likely the hottest. politician. ever.]