"In a word, everything is for sale, anything can be bought in our country. And in this flow, he who holds the slightest cover of public authority uses it illegally to acquire money, goods, prestige or to avoid obligations. The right to be recognized by a public servant, to have one's children enrolled in school, to obtain medical care, etc. ...are all subject to this tax which, though invisible, is known and expected by all."

"Zaire is the country that has been the most heavily exploited in the world. That is why farms, ranches, plantations, concessions, commerce, and real estate agencies will be turned over to sons of the country."

"We are seeking our own authenticity, and we will find it because we wish, in the innermost fibers of our being to discover it."

"Gomez: But in the meantime we know how these things go: he will end up being acquitted."

"Licio Gelli: In this country there is only one charismatic figure who can truly lead it: Silvio Berlusconi."

"One of the wildest elections in Italian history is finally over. And as expected, it came down to one guy, the guy who inspired a group of topless female protesters to storm his polling station. That looks so inappropriate. Shouting, "Enough, Berlusconi, enough!" That's right. Bunga, bunga is back. Yesterday and today, all of the headlines had been about Silvio Berlusconi's amazing return to power. There's just one problem. He lost. When all the votes were counted, Silvio finished with 31 percent, a strong showing but only good enough for second place behind a guy called Pier Luigi Bersani. But still every headline is about sweet Silvio, because sometimes you don't have to be first to be famous. Even people who hate him, and there are a lot of them, want to read and hear about him. … Silvio, Danica and Tiger, what a threesome. They're not famous for nothing. They are hugely successful at a level that most of us can only dream of. But what really matters is that they have that something, that ineffable and intangible something simply known as star power. People care about them. That's even when they lose, they're the ones we want to hear about. And maybe that's a great gift or maybe it leads to an intense stressful life since every loss and every failures in the headlines you can't have any secrets. Only perfection is enough."

"(Italian language) [...] io, a parlare con Zelensky, se fossi stato il Presidente del Consiglio non ci sarei mai andato. Perché, come sapete, stiamo assistendo alla devastazione del suo paese e alla strage di suoi soldati e di suoi civili. Bastava che lui cessasse di attaccare le due repubbliche autonome del Donbass e questo non sarebbe avvenuto; quindi io giudico molto molto, molto negativamente il comportamento di questo signore."

"I added extra stimulation ... if you win against one of these great teams, I’ll send a bus full of whores to the locker room."

"Massacres of civilians in Bucha and other localities are real war crimes."

"The aggression against Ukraine is unjustifiable and unacceptable, [Forza Italia's] position is clear. We will always be with the EU and Nato."

"The troops were supposed to enter, reach Kyiv in a week, replace the Zelensky government with decent people and a week later come back."

"[On the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine] Putin was pushed by the Russian population, by his party and by his ministers to invent this special operation."

"Obviously the government of [Mussolini's] time, out of fear that German power might lead to complete victory, preferred to ally itself with Hitler's Germany rather than opposing it … The racial laws were the worst fault of Mussolini as a leader, who in so many other ways did well."

"[To the] edge of the abyss."

"Only the prosecutors' witnesses were admitted, those of the defence were chucked out … Can there be worse justice than this? I am treated like a criminal."

"The life in Italy is the life of a wealthy country, consumptions haven't diminished, it's hard to find seats on planes, our restaurants are full of people."

"I'm getting out to mind my own fucking business, from somewhere else, and so I'm leaving this shitty country, of which I'm sickened."

"Freedom means having the right to freely educate your children, and freely means no obligation to send them in a public school, where teachers want to inculcate principles different from the principles that their parents want to inculcate them in a familiar context."

"We are worried about everything happening there, in all the area. I haven't yet heard from Gaddafi. The situation is evolving and so I don't feel I should disturb anyone."

"I hope that in Egypt there can be a transition toward a more democratic system without a break from President Mubarak, who in the West, above all in the United States, is considered the wisest of men and a precise reference point."

"They called me, inviting me to watch L'Infedele. I'm watching a disgusting program, run in a despicable, vile and repulsive way. I've heard false and distorted views, far away from the truth. I've seen a representation of reality which is to the contrary of truth."

"We don't want to see just one forward up front. To win you have to score. To have chances you've got to have forwards close to the goal, I appreciated Leonardo a lot but I disagreed with him in how he fielded the team. Ronaldinho must play on the shoulder of the strikers even if he has a tendency to drift left. Ronaldinho has been linked in the media with a move away but Berlusconi was adamant the playmaker was staying. He is the No1 attraction at Milan," he said, "Ronaldinho does not want to leave. I'm sure he is happy to stay. I would be happy for Gattuso to stay but we are not against people saying they want to leave, We can't exclude [the sale of Huntelaar] even if we are convinced of his qualities as a main striker."

"When I received my membership card it said I was an apprentice bricklayer and I, who was a great home builder at the time, couldn't help but have a good laugh."

"P2 gathered the best men in the country, and signing up was not a mistake but an accident through no fault of our own."

"Being a piduist is not a title of demerit."

"I wish luck to you and your nation that loves you as the election results we can see testify."

"The real Italian anomaly is not Silvio Berlusconi but communist prosecutors and communist judges in Milan who have attacked him again and again since he entered politics."

"In absolute terms, I am the most legally persecuted man of all times, in the whole history of mankind, worldwide."

"We could not field a big enough force to avoid this risk [of rape]. We would need so many soldiers because our women are so beautiful."

"Barack Obama being young, handsome and sun-tanned is going to get along with you swimmingly."

"They keep calling me a dwarf, but I'm taller than Sarkozy and Putin."

"It's the fate of the lion in winter: all his billions, all his television channels cannot rescue him from the mockery that rains down on the aged lecher, his powers visibly waning."

"Ladies, I have a mission for you on election day: cook! Sweet and exquisite things, please. Bring them to the polling station to be examined. The boldest can try making a tart, the most skilful, profiteroles"

"People will vote for Daniela Santanchè because she is a beautiful babe."

"The women of the Right are certainly the most beautiful … the Left has no taste, not even when it comes to women"

"They're not gaffes. I've made no gaffes."

"Ghe pensi mi."

"Marcello Dell'Utri is right: Mangano was a hero, because he never invented anything about me."

"The public prosecutor … should be subject to regular examinations to attest to sanity."

"The journalist Enzo Biagi left the RAI out of free will … he did it for the money."

"The April 9th/10th vote is like that one of 1948, when democratic forces rejected the communist offensive and firmly moved the Country to the West, towards democracy and its values."

"I have Italian citizens in too good consideration to think that there are so many voting assholes (literally: "coglioni", rude word for testicles) around which could vote against their own interests. I apologize for the rude but effective language."

"Go and read the black book on communism and you'll find that under Mao's China they didn't eat babies but they boiled them to fertilise the fields."

"Do it my way and earn more money."

"Churchill liberated us from the Nazis, Silvio Berlusconi is liberating us from communists."

"Only Napoleon did more than I have done. But I am definitely taller."

"Thank you dear Father Massimiliano, I'll try not to let you down and I promise you two and a half months of complete sexual abstinence until April 9 [election]."

"By definition, as a Prime Minister I cannot be a liar."

"I am the Jesus Christ of politics. I am a patient victim, I sacrifice myself for everyone."