Let's post some pics of Silvio's gals

MÉNAGE À TROIS

Be a good boy or else

ITALIAN Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has become the biggest victim yet of Europe's economic crisis after surviving a career-killing run of gaffes and raunchy sex scandals.

The 75-year-old billionaire, who has led Italy for half of the past 17 years, is the longest serving Italian leader since Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini.

He has been dogged by allegations of bribery and corruption and currently faces three criminal trials - including paying for sex with an underage prostitute and nightclub belly dancer known as Ruby the Heart-Stealer.

He promoted several long-legged beauties to high political positions and has been accused by critics of tainting Italy's image abroad. He recently admitted he was "no saint". Without him, there would be no "Bunga bunga".

Here are the top Berlsuconi gaffes:

1. In 2003, Berlusconi asks US investors to relocate to Italy because Italian secretaries are better looking than US ones. "Another reason to invest in Italy is that we have beautiful secretaries... superb girls."

2. The same year he refers to German MEP Martin Schulz as a concentration camp guard.
"I know that in Italy there is a man producing a film on Nazi concentration camps - I shall put you forward for the role of Kapo (a guard chosen from among the prisoners) - you would be perfect."

3. Italy suffered its biggest earthquake in 30 years in 2009, leaving 17,000 people homeless. On a tour of the tent sites around the quake site, Berlusconi said the victims should see it as a camping trip: "Of course their current lodgings are a bit temporary but they should see it like a weekend of camping."

4. Berlusconi misses a Nato ceremony for fallen soldiers the same year because he was too busy talking on his mobile.

5. At the G20 photo shoot in London in 2009 he yells at US President Barack Obama, earning a rebuke from the Queen: "What is it? Why does he have to shout so loud?"

6. Still with Obama at the G20. Berlusconi tells the world his response to the global economic crisis differs from the president's because "I'm paler". "I’m paler because it's been so long since I went sunbathing. He's more handsome, younger and taller." The year before he calss Obama "handsome, young and also suntanned".

7. In 2006 he manages to offend China: "Read the black book of Communism and you will discover that in the China of Mao, they did not eat children, but had them boiled to fertilise the fields."

8. The year before it was the turn of the Fins. Berlusconi said he had to “dust off my playboy charms” to convince Finland’s female PM to set up the EU Food Safety Authority in Parma.

9. Just last week Berlusconi defied the world'as opinion of Italy’s economy . "Life in Italy is life in a prosperous country. We see that on every occasion, consumption has not gone down, the restaurants are full, you have trouble booking seats on aeroplanes, holiday areas are totally booked out on long weekends. I don’t think that if you went to live in Italy that Italy is feeling anything that could resemble a serious crisis."

10. A wiretap catches Berlusconi bragging about his male prowess. He says he was "doing only eight girls, because I couldn’t do more".

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/world/bunga-bunga-the-top-10-silvio-berlusconi-gaffes/story-e6frfkyi-1226189833703#ixzz1dG8ESdNI

What's the matter with Italy?

By Laurence Knight Business reporter, BBC News

Silvio Berlusconi Italy is coming under a lot of pressure from other European governments to tackle its debts


Italy is moving to centre stage in the eurozone debt crisis.

While Greece has generated a lot of noise, it is increasingly seen as a sideshow.

Greece's debt problems are already widely known and the immediate consequences of a Greek default largely anticipated.

Moreover, the size of the Greek economy is small enough that the direct damage if Greece stopped paying its debts should be quite manageable for the eurozone.

Instead, the big fear is "contagion" - that a Greek default could trigger a financial catastrophe for other, much bigger economies.

That is why European leaders announced in October a significant expansion of its bailout fund, the European Financial and Stability Facility (EFSF).

And it seems it is Italy that is now seen as the lead candidate for that contagion among Europe's big economies and the main possible beneficiary of the enhanced bailout fund.

Why is that?

Prudent Italy?

According to Germany's Chancellor, Angela Merkel, "Italy has great economic strength, but Italy does also have a very high level of debt and that has to be reduced in a credible way in the years ahead."

As with Greece, she and other eurozone leaders believe the solution is more government austerity - spending cuts and tax rises - by Rome.

However, some economists might disagree with her assessment.

The Italian government's debt, at 118% of GDP (annual economic output) is certainly high, even by European standards.

Crisis jargon buster

Use the dropdown for easy-to-understand explanations of key financial terms:
GDP

Gross domestic product. A measure of economic activity in a country, namely of all the services and goods produced in a year. There are three main ways of calculating GDP - through output, through income and through expenditure.

Glossary in full

But dig a little deeper, and the picture changes.

Unlike their counterparts in Spain or the Irish Republic, ordinary Italians have not run up huge mortgages, and generally have very little debt.

That means that according to the Bank of International Settlements Italy as a country - not just a government - is not actually terribly indebted compared with other big economies such as France, Canada or the UK.

Moreover, the large debts of the Italian government are nothing new. It has got by just fine with a debt ratio over 100% of its GDP ever since 1991.

The main reason is because - unlike Greece - Italy is actually quite financially prudent.

The government spends less on providing public services and benefits to its people than it earns in taxes, and has been doing so every year since 1992, except for the recession year of 2009.

Indeed, the only reason Italy continues to borrow at all is to meet the principal and interest payments on its existing debts.

Grim outlook

So why is Italy in trouble now?

The reason is because its economy is so weak.

Italy is plagued by poor regulation, vested business interests, an ageing population, and weak investment, all of which have conspired to limit the country's ability to increase production.

The country has averaged an abysmal 0.75% annual economic growth rate over the past 15 years.

That is much lower than the rate of interest it pays on its debts.

And this creates a risk that the government's debt load could grow more quickly than the Italian economy's capacity to support it.

In the past, this risk has not materialised, thanks to Italy's relatively high inflation rate, which has steadily pushed up the government's tax revenues.

But now the outlook is much more grim.

Self-fulfilling prophecy

Like other southern European economies, Italian wage levels rose too quickly during the good years, and left Italy uncompetitive versus Germany and other northern economies within the eurozone.

How does the eurozone bailout plan, the European Financial Stability Facility, actually work?

That lack of competitiveness is likely to mean many years of even weaker growth and low inflation, as Italian workers find their pay is frozen, or even cut, until they regain a price advantage over German workers.

But lower growth and inflation suddenly make the Italian government's debt load look much less sustainable.

Further government spending cuts are likely to hurt the economy even more, and - as Greece is discovering - may not even do much to improve the government's borrowing needs if they lead to a sharp rise in unemployment.

That scary outlook has freaked out markets, and lenders are demanding a much higher interest rate from Italy in order to lend it the new money it needs to repay its old debts as they come due.

To borrow money for just one year, Italy now has to pay an interest rate of 6.05%. Germany, by contrast, must pay only 0.25%.

But of course this higher cost of borrowing makes Italy's debts look even less sustainable.

That means the market's loss of confidence in Italy could well end up becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy.

If nobody will lend to Italy, then Italy cannot repay its debts. And if Italy cannot repay its debts, then nobody will lend to it.

And if markets do panic and switch their money out of Italian debt into "safe" German debt, Italy would need an enormous bailout that would dwarf the original 440bn-euro EFSF, agreed in July.

Much of this fund had already been earmarked to support Greek government spending.
Insurance

The new deal is designed to prevent this scenario.

European leaders have agreed to expand the EFSF to, in effect, insure lending to countries such as Italy up to a value of about 1tn euros - three or four times what was available before.

The hope is that this will also reduce the cost of Italy's borrowing and so make it easier for the country to pay back its debts without drawing on the facility's insurance.

But the deal comes with caveats - Italy is expected to implement a new round of austerity measures to ensure its debts stay under control.

It is not clear that the coalition government - led by Silvio Berlusconi - is able to implement further cuts.

Furthermore, if the economy then fails to grow - as happened in Greece - and Italy looks even less able to pay back its debts, investors may ask who will ultimately pay for insuring them.

October's deal did not go into details on how the expansion of the lending facility would ultimately be funded.

Knowing the report (Silvio Berlusconi resigning as Prime Minister of Italy) isn't actually a surprise anymore for most individuals. In fact, some are thankful for the step made by the Prime Minister considering the fact that his 3rd term as Prime Minister of Italy has been tangled up with scandal that's why he has been one of the most controversial figures in world politics for some time. He has faced accusations of corruption, narrowly survived votes of no confidence and earlier this year, according to the Guardian, was put on trial for criminal charges. He was alleged to have had sexual encounters with an underage prostitute named “Ruby the Heart Stealer,” among many other allegations concerning his personal life. Those are just some of the reasons why Berlusconi has now lost support in the government and finally decided to resign.