Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi; the rogue of Europe

Plaudits for Berlusconi

Former British PM Sir Tony Blair gave Signore Berlusconi the epitaph “‘ “shrewd, capable and true to his word”, following the announcement of the Italian PM’s demise on 12 June 2023 at age 86.  He was the longest servicing Italian prime minister and a self-made millionaire. His charm and aplomb let Italy surf the rough waters between the US and Russia.  Alas, the rogue of Europe, has died.

He was surrounded by his family at Milan’s San Raffaele Hospital.  He was being treated for a lung infection caused by leukemia. Berlusconi was elected four times as the Italian prime minister, but the colorful bunga bunga scandal , named for the ritual where they strip their clothes, followed by a conviction for tax fraud led to his fall.

Giorgia Meloni, the newly minted Italian prime minister, whose coalition government includes Berlusconi’s Forza party, also praised her predecessor saying “He was a courageous fighter. He was a man unafraid of defending his ideas, and it was exactly that courage and determination that made him one of the most influential men in the history of Italy.”
 
But Matteo Salvini, Italy’s far-right deputy prime minister, had the most over the top eulogy for Berlusconi crying when he heard news and then proclaiming Berlusconi “one of the greatest ever, in all fields, from all points of view”.

Fierce determination

As his country’s longest-serving postwar prime minister, Berlusconi led Italy for around nine years in multiple stints, all while battling criminal investigations and scandals in his private life. The billionaire media mogul racked up some 35 criminal court cases and one definitive judgment against in over 30 years of legal battles. By his own account, he made over 2,500 court appearances over the period, with legal bills costing him up to €200 million (£172m).

Most sensationally, in April 2013, Berlusconi was found guilty of having paid for sex with 17-year-old nightclub dancer Ruby the Heartstealer. In 2012, he was convicted of tax fraud, serving a year-long sentence doing community service and banned from holding public office. The embargo was lifted in time for him to win a seat in the European Parliament in 2019. After he was kicked out of the Senate, and served a term of community service, he ran again and was elected to the European Parliament and then again in the September 2022 elections, regaining a seat in the Senate.

How the stars helped

Born in Milan n 29 September 1936 to a middle-class family, he embarked on a business career in property development before founding Italy’s largest commercial broadcaster, breaking the yoke of state-run television broadcasting and modernizing Italian media. I have pegged his ascendant at 08 Libra 16, making him a double Libra, which gets the symbol “Courage” and denotes his aggressive talent for leadership. This fits well with his locomotive planetary pattern, but no matter what the opposition threw at him it never seemed to perturb him, anymore than freeing up the media and making it a free capitalistic market against the iron fist of government bureaucracy

He has a stellium in the twelfth house of government, backstabber and self-undoing is opposite his Saturn, Moon and Part of Fortune in the sixth house, showing both his love of public service and hard work.  With his Grand Trine in Water, evinced when he publicly cried for a ship full of Albanian immigrants that sank on the way to the South of Italy, making Berlusconi a Locomotive Planetary Pattern.

Unsurprisingly, his most aspected planet is the Moon while his least is the Sun, which really is a good thing for someone who is a team-builder. Egos have no place in teams, and a good leader must realize what he can and cannot do and defer often to others. While most leaders have poor Sun aspects, they have powerful aspects to Jupiter, giving them lots of energy and the ability to land on their feet no matter the obstacle.

What the Jones lines say

Berlusconi has several interesting Jones lines, but his line of vitality absent, showing he could view things objectively without his ego getting involved. Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Joseph R. Biden also do not have this aspect, while presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump do.

His line of efficiency is sextile, suggesting a tendency to let things drift and wait until they become most urgent.  His line of motivation is square and thus becomes his “dynamic urge” where it is the foremost struggle in his personality to conquer and manage. Here with Saturn in Pisces in the sixth house and thus in its detriment and Jupiter in Sagittarius in its third and rulership, and in the third house of communications opposition the ninth of law and legal proceedings, seems to hint that he enjoyed the lawsuits too much and liked the fanfare writing them as “trivial.” That was a major mistake, for he did not realize the real toll it took on his health and more importantly his family and business.

With Moon was opposite Mars in Virgo with T-Square for an outlet, the constant back and forth fed his Venus in Scorpio’s love of publicity and pugilistic tendencies; he saw himself as a champion against the gladiators and indeed called his opponents “to the left of Pol Pot”, the Cambodian dictator and tyrant.
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Finally, his line of social significance is absent because Silvio didn’t care what people said about him.

Footnotes: This post was reviewed on 2 October 2026