Silvio Watch: Berlusconi is Scalding

Talk about hot water! Poor Silvio Berlusconi is in serious trouble over his pecker: Prosecutors in Milan handed over to the Italian Parliament a 389 page dossier, seeking to gain permission to prosecute Berlusconi on prostitution charges.

Does this man look worried?
Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi

To insist: No matter how fun it might be, Berlusconi’s scandal wouldn’t ordinarily be something The Hourly G would be interested in.

However . . . as everyone knows, the Italian fiscal situation is as terrible as Spain’s.

And after surviving a no-confidence vote in December, it is clear that there isn’t an Italian politician or coalition that could replace Big Silvio. If his government were to fall, Italy might find itself rapidly going through coalitions, without any of them having the political muscle to straighten out Italy’s fiscal situation. Or (just as bad) Italy could slide into a Belgian Limbo, where there is no government in power for an extended period of time, the country floating along on nothing but air while all the political parties squabble.

The Telegraph’s reporting covers the sordid details of Big Silvio’s pecker problems—but as we here at The Hourly G Command Central have already said: The next big sovereign debt crisis in the eurozone could be the last crisis in the eurozone.

We’d been betting it was going to be Spain that triggered the fall—but it could wind up being Big Silvio’s Bimbo Eruption instead.