Italy is land of the living bribes

The prosecutor's office in the city of Florence has filed a corruption suit against Guido Bertolaso, head of Italy's Office for Civil Protection and close acquaintance of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. Gad Lerner looks in his blog at the role of sex presents in the affair: "They cost relatively little and do much to create bonds of solidarity. More than any other form of bribery they can ensure the secrecy of one's accomplices. Sex presents grease the wheels of business right up to the seat of parliament. And in the process even civil protection becomes uncivil. Such presents work exactly because they corrupt. ... Now we know that the harmony between B & B [Berlusconi and Bertolaso] has been cemented by the conventions of complicitous elderly men. ... The spirit of inventiveness of these whoremongers has cooked up a new business idea: giving women as presents, living bribes so to speak, to get into circles that really count."

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