Rest in Peace, Silvio Berlusconi

Former media magnate and professional sports team owner, conservative party founder and leader, and multi-time Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi died today in Brianza at age 86. Berlusconi founded the center-right Forza Italia (Go, Italy) Party after the 1991 collapse of the Christian Democratic Party that had dominated Italian politics since the foundation of the Republic in 1947. “The Knight” served as Premier in 1994 to 1995, 2001-2006 and 2008-2011, leading four governments over that span, dominating Italian politics until recently as the conservative political leader. Berlusconi reduced spending, made fiscal reforms, cut taxes and bureaucracy and cracked down on organized crime, while maintaining Italy’s pro-Western and pro-American foreign policy. He was, however, often involved in scandals, both financial and sexual, and his friendship with authoritarians, such as Russian tyrant Vladimir Putin, which detracted from his principles of morality, free market capitalism, liberty, representative government, and support for the transatlantic alliance and sometimes made his party, which he continued to lead until his death, seem as primarily a vehicle for his self-preservation. Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said the party, which is currently a key member of the coalition right wing national government, will continue without its founder and leader. Tajani would be the obvious successor to the presidency of Forza Italia. There is a need for a center-right anchor that keeps the nationalist and populist right wing from abandoning conservative principles and its super-national ties to Western Europe and its alliance with the United States. Italy, a member of the Group of Seven industrial powers and one of the world’s leaders in international peacekeeping, is a major ally of the U.S. as a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and in the War on Terrorism.