Berlusconi holding Italy Hostage

A brilliant article on Berlusconi and the sorrow state of Italy by Tim Sparks can be read HERE

A brief summary below:

Vote me out of jail, or I will bring the country down with me. This, essentially, is the message Silvio Berlusconi—four-time prime minister, owner of the country’s three main commercial TV channels, criminal defendant many times over—has just sent to the Italian government, one that clarifies at last the exact nature of what is at stake in Italy at the present moment: is this a modern state where the rule of law prevails or is it the fiefdom of an institutionalized outlaw?

After a dozen trials, many of which have gone through all three levels of Italian justice (primary trial, appeal, counter appeal), after making ad personam laws to have his crimes de-penalized, or using delaying tactics to have trials thrown out because the crimes alleged in them are time-barred, or facing guilty verdicts at one level and acquittals at another, Berlusconi has finally received a definitive and unappealable criminal sentence at the highest level, for tax fraud in the region of €7 million ($9 million) and for the creation of a slush fund of some €280 million ($375 million). Sentenced to four years in prison, he has benefited from a pardon aimed at emptying the country’s jails, which has reduced the sentence to one year—this despite the fact that, being over seventy, he will be allowed to serve his sentence at one of his various luxury homes. However, as an elected member of the senate, he enjoys immunity from arrest and cannot be forced into confinement until the senate approves his expulsion, a vote that could take place in September. He has now made it clear that if that vote goes against him he will bring the whole house down.

Italy's Illegal economy: Mafia Inc.

Soldi Rubati (Stolen Money) an interesting book on the disastrous situation of the Italian economy and society has been recently published (available in Italian only at this moment).
It describes in full details the extent of corruption and illegal economy now pervasive in the Italian society.
I'm quoting below some incredible figures worth noting now that Italy has entered into the maelstrom of debt collapse.
The illegal economy in Italy is the first of the world and it amounts approximately to 500-600 billions per year. An amount much bigger than the one allocated to bailout Greece, Ireland and Portugal together and a huge amount compared to the 80 billion austerity package enforced by the Italian government last week to save the country from a default.
An approximate breakdown is the following:

Tax Evasion: 120 billion euro per year
Corruption: 60 billion euro per year
Illegal economy: 350 billion per year
Financial Fraud: 55 billion per year

Nunzia Penelope, a journalist and author of the book brings up statistical data from the Italian Statistics Instute, Central Bank of Italy and the Italian Chamber of Industry which are clearly outlining how Italy is becoming the biggest Mafia State in the world. What many research institutes are saying is that the legal economy is being slowly strangled by the illegal one, Mafias are gradually becoming the most efficient and productive enterprise in Italy while swallowing or wackin' any other legal business.
If the crisis should bring to a bailout of the EU/IMF to Italy there is no doubt that a huge percentage of that money would end up in the pockets of the Mafia, worth considering should push come to shovel.