Emperor Berlusconi cast to the lions....but not yet

Former Prime minister Silvio (“the Stallion”) Berlusconi has been given a 4 year jail sentence for tax fraud by an Italian court. In what passes for the circus (maximus) otherwise known as Italian politics, this is quite a development. However the chances of the great Emperor Silvio ever ending up behind bars and in chains (prison ones that is) must be very slim given the number of appeals and the span of time over which it can all be dragged out. Almost certainly he is unlikely to be intimidated by this ruling. No, the King of Bunga-Bunga will come out fighting, after all this is the man who apparently held “hard-core ballet” parties (Olympic accreditation pending?) and indulged in all sorts of similarly soft-gladiatorial activities more likely to be associated with the lecherous and debauched decline of the Roman empire than contemporary Mediterranean politics. But there again…..

 

So we can sit back inexpectation of further entertaining twists and turns as Italian politics masquerades as farce and pantomime. By turn, we will see  Enraged Silvio, like a bull elephant, trumpeting his hot indignation to his media channels, the populist Silvio of the People, dismissing his accusers with smooth panache and disarming charm and perhaps warming up for another comeback? From time to time perhaps the Serious Silvio will put in an appearance, bald head (sans pirate bandana) a-shining under the glare of camera spotlights, invoking the rhetoric of the champion, bloodied but unbowed, fighting on bravely against unjust and corrupt judges (left wing toadies in Silvio’s view), and so on.

 Is Silvio though not getting a bit old for all of this now? Well into his 70s, his ageless, well botoxed and perma-orange features belie his vintage. Undimmed though, he remains a connoisseur of cultured pass times, most notably those lively expressions of the performing arts (belly dancing) and fine cuisine and entertaining (orgies). It’s unlikely Silvio will in fact be able to make any return to front line politics. Instead though, he will entertain us all, acting out the role of a modern day Roman emperor facing the treacherous tribunes trying to drag him down. Italian justice masquerading as ancient comedy – it could be worse…

NOBEL PEACE PRIZE FOR FARCE

This week the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the European Union (27 nations and counting) the Nobel prize for peace. Why we may well ask? Perhaps it’s because there is no prize for overwhelming bureaucracy and economic mismanagement? In any event, it is as ridiculous as it is meaningless and continues the trend of undermining the entire credibility of the award.

If you thought awarding the prize in 2009 to newly elected US President Barak Obama – who in fairness seemed as bemused as everyone else - was both a bizarre and sycophantic decision of the Committee (and rather misjudged in retrospect), then this goes a good stride further down the path of politically loaded decisions. (Interestingly, if you are a past US Democratic President or VP, you are statistically more likely to win the prize than anyone else).

After having birthed World Wars 1 and 2, this is apparently a reward for the EU countries for not yet having started number 3 and, for most of the time at least, being able to live in relative, democratic peace with each other. In that sense it’s deeply insulting to Germany (especially as it will be up to them to bail out their spend-thrift and rioting southern fellow EU citizens). Angela Merkel obediently made the correct noises about how wonderful it all was, although it’s doubtful if the “German street” shares her view as this week they watched her crudely and distastefully being caricatured as a Nazi by furious mobs when on a visit to Athens.

 As expected, Europe’s other politicians were also mostly very excited by this even if no one else was.  EU cheerleader in chief and president of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy, was positively ebullient. Van Rompuy is a caricature of a European politician. Unelected, unknown and mostly incomprehensible, he is blessed with the personality of an empty paper packet; his speeches are the verbal equivalent of a vast slow- rolling wave of thick grey carpet under-felt. “We are all very proud that the efforts of the EU for keeping the peace in Europe are rewarded” he intoned, with the implicit and unfounded assumption that, had the EU not been there, there would have been war. That it was bound up in a NATO military alliance for 40 of the past 65 years with America in a cold war against a common foe (the USSR) seems to have completely slipped his mind. Without that enormous US support, the chances of Europe having been invaded by Russian tanks would have been very high. So much for the EU keeping the peace then…

Von Rompuy’s chum and President of the European Commission (another unelected and numbingly ineffectual, overpaid bureaucrat) Jose Manuel Barroso was just as excited and also described it as a great honour. In his utterances ripe with cant, Barroso claimed “I believe it is justified for the European Union to see its work for peace recognised, not only in the unification of the continent, but also outside our Europe".  Well, I’m not sure how the tens of thousands who were victims of genocide in the former Yugoslavian wars of the 1990s might feel about all these fine words when it was the EU that stood bravely during those terrible years, resisting the temptation to try to stop the ethnic cleansing most sides indulged in.

More recently, the EU’s fractured, disjointed stance on Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya was on international display. In Libya’s case it was France (with the UK) which had to “do the deed” whilst once more the rest hovered anxiously on the side-lines insipidly wringing their hands and looking on. These behaviours are typical but hardly prize-worthy, for in truth the EU is normally afraid to “keep the peace” where it requires a little courage to first seek it out. As for Syria….

Barroso also claimed it was, “a great honour for all 500 million citizens”; a fair proportion of which are currently rebelling in the streets against the EU’s centrally imposed austerity. What intellectual, not to mention mathematical, nonsense. The concept of all 500 million people being Nobel peace laureates is of course absolutely meaningless as the vast majority of these individuals cannot play any part in this process nor on their own influence the course of national or continental events. It’s the pointless, out-of-touch, “sounds good but means nothing” language so beloved of self-important politicians like Barroso, Van Rompuy and others whose contact with the real world has long since withered and died.

If the Peace Committee cannot come up with a sensible nomination, it should rather holds its decision over for that year, instead of devaluing the credibility of the award with the silly, meaningless nomination of 27 nations and 500 million people.