The Brilliance of Silvio Berlusconi

One thing that supporters and detractors of the outgoing Italian Prime Minister seem to rarely mention is the sheer brilliance of the man. Love him or hate him, its difficult to suggest that he's anything but brilliant and often one step ahead of the rest of the politicians. During the campaign he was behind in every poll, committed some serious gaffes including comparing himself to Jesus, calling opponents "dickheads" and told poor Italians to "make more money." He said that his opponents were communists (Prodi does in fact have the communists in his coalition) and that the communists supported boiling babies because they didn't object when the practice of killing unwanted children used to happen in China. No published poll that was not sponsored by Berlusconi showed him in the lead or anywhere close to it. In November of last year, he was down by 10 points and seemed finished.

And yet, with all that, he still came very nearly close to pulling off the upset of a lifetime. This doesn't happen without skill, and it doesn't happen without a strategy out of which victory (or in this case defeat by a narrow margin) can evolve. First of all, there was a method to the apparent absurdity of the Prime Minister's gaffes. He managed to focus attention exclusively on him and away from Prodi and the center-left. They fell for his trap and made the campaign almost entirely about him, thus ensuring that he will represent the center-right that lost the election even after Prodi officially takes over as Prime Minister probably late next month.

In addition, who, when faced with prosecution, ever even CONSIDERS getting elected and changing laws for their benefit. And yet, Berlusconi did just that when he was in office, and much of him time appeared to be spend trying to keep him and his friends out of trouble.

The center-left coalition has encountered internal divisions even before it has formally taken office and there is an outside chance that Berlusconi would be able to block the formation of a government and force new elections. This is not the most likely scenario, and it is likely that the Union will survive the current disputes intact, but they aren't going to be able to continue like this for five years. Eventually their differences and internal contradictions are going to bring them down. Ironically, if Berlusconi is behind in the polls it might allow their differences to become more apparent and could pave the way for yet another term in government for this most brilliant of politicians.