In common with most other peoples, we British love a good scandal. In many cases, it’s the ordinariness of then that brings a smile - but, sometimes, astonishment - to our eyes.
The 50-year-old Leader of the House of Lords, married for twenty years with three children, is alleged to have been having a fling with a 48-year-old London socialite for the last seven years. ‘I just feel angry and used,’ she warbled to a reporter. Yeah, over seven years?
Then we have the tale of the 45-year-old police protection officer who is alleged to have seduced the 47-year-old wife of the much-respected Shadow Chancellor who felt obliged in honour to resign his post on Thursday. The officer has been suspended pending a police investigation.
These reports are hardly fit for a Mills and Boon novel, but they obviously represent emotional relationships that have failed and which have started up again in different forms. The human condition is full of heartbreaks and upsets and these are two of such. The public ought not to be that interested in them I feel.
On the other hand, the divorced 74-year-old Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, has refused to resign his high office of state following widespread allegations that he frequently attended wild sex parties with prostitutes, including one that was said to have been just 17-years-of-age at the time he had sex with her and who it is alleged received a ‘gift’ of €7,000 from him. ‘I am not running away and I am not resigning,’ said Sr Berlusconi, after newspapers ran telephone transcripts from more than twenty women who said they attended sex parties at Sr Berlusconi’s residences.
It is the Italian story that raises an eyebrow. An old man making out with a 17-year girl and other women? He must have stamina as well as other attributes one supposes if the stories are true and, perhaps, it is no surprise that the Pope reminded the world on Friday that public officials ought to offer a strong moral example.
On the other hand, as one commentator said on television yesterday, we Brits expect our politicians to behave themselves while Italians may well prefer a leader who does not always keep his trousers firmly buckled up!
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The 50-year-old Leader of the House of Lords, married for twenty years with three children, is alleged to have been having a fling with a 48-year-old London socialite for the last seven years. ‘I just feel angry and used,’ she warbled to a reporter. Yeah, over seven years?
Then we have the tale of the 45-year-old police protection officer who is alleged to have seduced the 47-year-old wife of the much-respected Shadow Chancellor who felt obliged in honour to resign his post on Thursday. The officer has been suspended pending a police investigation.
These reports are hardly fit for a Mills and Boon novel, but they obviously represent emotional relationships that have failed and which have started up again in different forms. The human condition is full of heartbreaks and upsets and these are two of such. The public ought not to be that interested in them I feel.
On the other hand, the divorced 74-year-old Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, has refused to resign his high office of state following widespread allegations that he frequently attended wild sex parties with prostitutes, including one that was said to have been just 17-years-of-age at the time he had sex with her and who it is alleged received a ‘gift’ of €7,000 from him. ‘I am not running away and I am not resigning,’ said Sr Berlusconi, after newspapers ran telephone transcripts from more than twenty women who said they attended sex parties at Sr Berlusconi’s residences.
It is the Italian story that raises an eyebrow. An old man making out with a 17-year girl and other women? He must have stamina as well as other attributes one supposes if the stories are true and, perhaps, it is no surprise that the Pope reminded the world on Friday that public officials ought to offer a strong moral example.
On the other hand, as one commentator said on television yesterday, we Brits expect our politicians to behave themselves while Italians may well prefer a leader who does not always keep his trousers firmly buckled up!
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