More on the future of Italy

A reader commented as follows to my previous post :

"70% of italians want Berlusconi to go home"

I wonder how did you calculate this percentage. According to the last suervey published in "la Repubblica" the center-right coalition is @ 47% and Berlusconi's party is @ 22% (the first party in Italy). Do you mean that among this 47% there's a 17% who "wants Berlusconi's home"? If they want this result and they vote for the center right colaition, whose leader IS Berlusconi, I agree your concerning about the future of a country which has a 20% of schizophrenic electors

Taking his data as a starting point, I am going to reiterate my point.
22% of the italians vote for Berlusconi's party. This means that they are clearly behind Berlusconi, and that's fair enough.

The question now is to know wheteher those italians that vote for the centre-right coalition but not for Forza Italia (Berlusconi's party), are still happy with Berlusconi as a Prime Minister.

My interpretation is that both Casini (head of the Christian Democrats) and Fini (head of Alleanza Nazionale) would prefer a different centre right coalition, without Berlusconi as a prime minister. Have a look at the most recent interview given by Fini, just after the Prodi-Berlusconi clash. In this interview Fini says that he hopes to be prime minister

This means that, at least covertly, the best option for part of the centre-right is to replace Berlusconi. Of course, the second best is to win the elections with Berlusconi. But this is a separate issue.

If you therefore add the centre-left voters to the non-forza italia centre right, at least those who understand Fini and Casini's message, you come up with a figure which is roughly around 70%! In other words, 30% of the italians still want Berlusconi as a prime minister, but the rest does not want this, at least under ideal conditions.