Berlusconi To Italians: Vacation In Venice!
Italian Prime Minister and billionaire Silvio Berlusconi has always been a pretty good salesman. Now he’s trying to sell Italy – to Italians.
Berlusconi has voiced over a 30-second commercial that will be running in the coming days. Over lovely scenes of Porto Fino and Florence, the Prime Minister encourages his countrymen to vacation at home.
“”What you see is your Italy, a unique country of sky, sun, and sea, but also history, culture and art,” he says in the commercial. “Use your vacations to get to know Italy better, your magic Italy.”

As you can see from the ad, Italy is often magic and enchanting. But it was ironic the Ministry of Tourism presented the commercial on the same day some 5,000 protesters from the city of L’Aquila were in Rome. The last several months have not been exactly magic for them following a devastating earthquake in L’Aquila.

Protesters clashed with police as they tried to get close to Berlusconi’s Rome residence. They’re complaining about the slow pace of reconstruction in the city after the quake, and asking for further tax breaks and loans.

The commercial is not just about national pride, and a country feeling good about itself. In a time of crisis, the government is trying to encourage Italians to hit the beach in Calabria rather than in Kenya to keep those vacation dollars at home.

The Bank of Italy estimates that in 2009 Italians spent more than 17 billion dollars traveling abroad; Berlusconi’s government would just like to keep a bit of that money at home.

Greg Burke by liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com