Silvio Berlusconi and Francesca Pascale: The Odd Couple That Wants to Lead Italy

Sequels to horror movies often begin “just when you thought you were safe.”

Cue the eerie music because Silvio Berlusconi, the former Italian prime minister, is back. He would like to be prime minister again and he is bringing a friend.

Berlusconi is 76 and (for what was a dreadful period) he has already served as Italy’s PM. In recent months, Mario Monti has been trying to mop up the mess Berlusconi left behind, but Monti is losing his mandate as Italians decide too much austerity is no fun.

The friend is 27-year-old Francesca Pascale of Naples, a councilor (on what?) in Berlusconi's Freedom of the People Party and a founding groupie of an organization called “Silvio, we miss you.” Her experience includes a stint as a shop assistant and what appears to be a masterful collagen treatment.

Tastefully, Berlusconi describes his beloved as “a beautiful girl, beautiful from the outside, but even more beautiful inside” leaving little doubt among Italians as to his meaning.

The former prime minister and bunga bunga aficionado has introduced his fiancée to his daughter, Marina — born August 10, 1966, making her 46 years old and a prime candidate for the role of “bestie” to a step mother 19 years her junior. That should definitely go well.

In a continuing effort to find the good in everything, Pascale is older than some in Berlusconi's life. There was, for example, Ruby the Heart Stealer, the Moroccan dancer with whom he is alleged to have paid for sex somewhat before she reached the minimum age required to be an Italian hooker. Charges are pending but, in many cases, prime ministers are immune from prosecution, which goes a long way toward explaining his return to public life.

Should any semblance of austerity continue in Italy, public health officials might do well to consider a reduction in the government-financed Viagra program.

This article originally appeared on Liberty Pell.