Silvio Berlusconi dead at 86

Quite a momentous last 10 days for certain types

 

John Ganz with some context

My first reaction to the death of Silvio Berlusconi was to make a joke. There was never quite any way to take him seriously: Something about his vulgarity, his clownishness, and the cheerful shamelessness of his corruption made one inclined to laugh. In his later years, with the apparent assistance of plastic surgery and botox, the sleazy smile became fixed into a permanent rictus, the entire massive head looked like one of those rubber parody masks of politicians. During a recent election, when he showed up to a polling place, a man was caught on camera asking a friend sotto voce, “Is that really him or is it a mask?” It was a good question.

Berlusconi invited you to laugh—with him or at him—it didn’t matter as long as you were having fun—to enjoy the spectacle in all its obscenity. It was central to his success and his apparently supernatural ability to dodge convictions and survive politically. He could appear harmless, charming, not worth getting so worked up about. His whole thing said, “Relax!” and then maybe put his hand where you didn’t particularly want it. And once you stop to reflect it all appears a little less funny.

When you add up all the shambolic cabinets, Berlusconi was unified Italy’s longest ruling leader after Mussolini and Giovanni Giolitti. There’s an argument to be made that, as fellow creator of modern Italy, he also comes in third just behind them. It feels perverse to use the world “statesman,” but he was the ultimate pervert statesman: instead of building the foundation of national unity and strength, he ably and consistently undermined it. The entire trajectory of post-Cold War Italy is defined by his politics.


Classic Berlusconi. He just admits it! He let the Fascists in. No wonder the Meloni government declared a national day of mourning for Silvio: they have every reason to be very grateful. The points of comparison between Trump and Berlusconi are obvious and have been remarked upon at length elsewhere. But it’s worth thinking about the importance of the far right to both their coalitions. Both of them, with gleeful irresponsibility, opportunism, and nihilism, opened the door to a type of politics that had been taboo since the war. After they are dead and gone, we may have a lot less occasion to laugh.



Ciao, Silvio