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Italy woke up on Sunday to discover that politics was once again a world of bitter, personal attacks, sleight of hand, stunning egotism and shocking obsequiousness, meaning just one thing: Silvio Berlusconi was back. Overnight, the calm, grey world of Italy's technocrat prime minister, Mario Monti, vanished after the former EU commissioner said on Saturday he was resigning because Berlusconi, the 76-year-old media mogul and three-time prime minister, had withdrawn his parliamentary support. Hours earlier, Berlusconi had stood outside the gates of AC Milan, the football club he owns, declaring that after much soul-searching he would stand in elections, now likely in February. He boasted that after searching far and wide, he had failed to find a successor as brilliant as himself. Monti's austerity polices, tax hikes and spending cuts had dragged Italy to "the edge of an abyss", Berlusconi said last week, before his MPs were ordered via text to walk out of key votes and his party secretary, Angelino Alfano, told parliament: "We consider the experience of this government closed." Alfano then accused the centre-left Democratic party – currently riding high in the polls – of communist tendencies, jolting Italians back to Berlusconi's heyday of claiming commies boiled babies alive. Gian Antonio Stella, a leading commentator with Corriere della Sera, lamented: "I thought we had got beyond all that; it is so unpleasant to return to the 'You are either for me or against me' version of politics.

"Italians are sick of the Guelph and Ghibelline mentality, which cuts off the oxygen from political debate."

But for Berlusconi that vitriol is his lifeblood and he now has two months to turn up the heat on his TV channels and persuade Italians to take his side once again, following his resignation in November 2011 in the midst of sex scandals and an economic crisis that threatened to send Italy into meltdown.

Monti's plan to resign at the end of the year after he passes the 2013 budget, bringing elections forward a month from March, deftly denies Berlusconi the pleasure of shooting down the government's remaining bills as they struggle to get through parliament.

"The big question now is whether Monti himself wants to run as the head of a centrist group in the election," said Roberto D'Alimonte, a professor of politics at LUISS university in Rome.
Italy faces a return to political chaos - IN FACT , ITALY WANTS OUT FROM UNDER THE GERMAN BOOT - after Prime Minister Mario Monti announced at the weekend that he will resign, prompting his notorious predecessor Silvio Berlusconi to say he would attempt a comeback. The renewed uncertainty sent European shares into a slump as trading for the week began on Monday morning. Investors aren't the only ones worried, either. German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle told SPIEGEL ONLINE on Monday that the situation in Italy threatened to spark renewed financial problems in the euro zone. "Italy can't stall at two-thirds of the reform process," he said. "That wouldn't cause turbulence for just Italy, but also for Europe." Westerwelle's concerns were echoed by Klaus Regling, the head of the permanent euro-zone bailout fund, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), who told German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung on Monday that he feared the heavily indebted country could abandon necessary reforms. "In the last year Italy has pushed through important reforms," he told the paper. "So far, the markets have honored that, although they have reacted with concern to the developments of recent weeks." The reform process must continue for the sake of both Italy and the entire currency union, Regling said. BERLUSCONI SHOUL GET iTALY OUT OF THE FOURTH REICH !!!!