[OPE] Tutti-frutti politics: Mr Berlusconi and the renewal of the political class in Italy

The prime minister [Silvio Berlusconi] said: "We want to rejuvenate our
political class with cultivated, educated people who are committed to being
present for every vote, who don't smell bad and are not poorly dressed,
unlike certain people from other parties." (From: Gina Dogget/AFP/Expatica,
"Berlusconi's wife goes public, again, over his eye for ladies", 1 May 2009,
expatica.com
http://www.expatica.com/fr/news/european_news/Berlusconi_s-wife-goes-public_-again_-over-his-eye-for-ladies-_52145.html )
.

Berlusconi's wife Veronica Lario now wants a divorce, Italian media reported
this Sunday, just days after she publicly criticized his party's selection
of pretty young women to run in European elections. Berlusconi, who is a
72-year-old media tycoon and Italy's second-richest man with a fortune of
$6.5 billion, according to Forbes magazine, has said he was sorry his wife
had apparently believed "what she read in the papers," blaming a campaign
against him "hyped by the leftist press." Berlusconi's People of Freedom
party has been considering a number of starlets and television showgirls as
possible candidates in the June European elections, media reports say. As
party leader, Berlusconi has a powerful voice in who makes the list.
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE5421GD20090503

According to L'Unita, Veronica said: "Basta. Non posso stare con un uomo che
frequenta le minorenni" [I've had enough - I can't stay with a man who
frequents minors, i.e. girls under 18].
http://www.unita.it/news/84427/veronica_verso_il_divorzio_berlusconi_malato

Il Manifesto writes: "Dagli anni 80 in poi, prima con le tv poi con la
videopolitica, prima da tycoon poi da premier, Silvio Berlusconi ha
accumulato buona parte della sua popolarità lucrando sulla crescita di
protagonismo femminile, cambiandone il segno, e riabilitando un immaginario
sessuale maschile destabilizzato dal femminismo e dal cambiamento del
rapporto fra i sessi." ( From the 1980s onwards, first with tv and then with
videopolitics, as tycoon and then premier, Silvio Berlusconi has accumulated
much of his lucky popularity on cultivating female protagonism, changing the
styles, and rehabilitating an imaginary heterosexual male destabilized by
feminism and the changing relationship between the sexes).
http://www.ilmanifesto.it/

J.

tutto quello che abbiamo
già sentito non ci basta più
e sono sempre i soliti discorsi
parlan tutti ma nessuno
fa quello che dice...

- Eros Ramazotti, Cuori Agitati ("Excited hearts") [everything we've heard
sofar/ does not suffice for us anymore / the discussions are always the same
/ everybody is talking / but nobody takes action... ]

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Received on Sun May 3 19:20:04 2009