But as he turns 75 on Thursday, he and most Italians are in no mood for celebrations that might evoke the day when Marilyn Monroe famously sang the song for John F. Kennedy in 1962.
The prime minister — whose title, to Italians, is president of the council of ministers — did attend a birthday party on Wednesday evening. But Italian media said his speech to friends was marked by familiar, defensive jibes at his many critics.
In a front-page editorial on Thursday that seemed to encapsulate the mood of many in the country, the Rome newspaper Il Messaggero lamented a “systemic crisis” that had left most Italians disoriented.
Berlusconi, now heading his fourth government since taking up politics in 1994 after making billions in business, has shown himself to have a knack for surviving scandals and diplomatic gaffes that would have ended the career of many another leader.
Piera Di Giacomo echoed the thoughts of many Italians when asked in Rome what she thought of Berlusconi as he turned 75, and why he had survived so long: “What should I say? As far as I’m concerned he is a likeable scoundrel,” she said. “Happy birthday.”
Magistrates accuse him of corruption in three separate trials and in a fourth trial, he is accused of paying for sex with a minor.
In recent weeks he has faced damning criticism and more or less open calls to resign from pillars of the establishment including the Catholic Church, employers group Confindustria, the head of auto giant Fiat.
And now Berlusconi, whose eye for young women is legendary, has been caught up in a new investigation by magistrates. It is centered around bribes and blackmail linked to parties he is said to have hosted for young women, some perhaps prostitutes.
According to wire-tapped conversations published by Italian newspapers, he has boasted of “doing eight girls” a night and joking that with all his sexual activity, he was only prime minister “in my spare time.”
Berlusconi was feted at a party on Wednesday night hosted by Alessandra Mussolini, grand-daughter of the Fascist dictator. According to Italian media, he told his friends that all accusations against him are “mud” hurled by politically biased magistrates and that he would prove his innocence.
A bitter “antipasto,” or appetizer, for Berlusconi came four days before his birthday when Italy’s top Catholic bishop issued a blistering attack on the ruling class, saying the country need to “purify the air” contaminated by licentious behavior, scandal and corruption.
The unusual unveiled attack by Angelo Bagnasco, who stopped just short of asking Berlusconi to resign and painted a damning picture of an elite more concerned with its own survival than the good of the people, left Berlusconi and his government, according to political sources, feeling “stunned.”
