Peter Popham: Will Silvio's legal tour come full circle?

If Silvio Berlusconi's latest term in power feels a lot different from the last one, it's mainly because he's a free man now. After his election in 2001, so heavy were the cases of corruption, bribery, etc lodged against him that he was like Harry Houdini, lashed with rope, bound in chains, stuffed into a barrel and perched above the Niagara Falls – and then told to govern. He spent vast amounts of time passing laws specifically designed (his opponents claimed) to set him free.

In the end they worked, he went into the spring 2008 elections without a stain on his character (though don't ask about his friends) and once back in Palazzo Chigi immediately enacted a new law granting himself (and the three other highest office holders) immunity from prosecution. With the law off his back he could get on with sorting out the country.

But now those pesky "red togas" (as he defines the judges) are back on his case, asking the Constitutional Court to examine the constitutionality of the immunity law. And on Saturday a court in Milan decided, to the fury of Berlusconi's lawyers, that the case in which he is accused of giving David Mills, estranged husband of Tessa Jowell, a bribe of $600,000 to testify in his favour must go ahead, even if Berlusconi is removed from the list of imputees thanks to the immunity law.

This is unwelcome news for the prime minister because if Mills is found guilty of taking the bribe, Berlusconi can hardly be not guilty of giving it. The men with ropes and chains are crowding back into the picture. The usual Berlusconi arguments against the prosecutors are 1) they are out to get me for political reasons, and 2) they should not be allowed to because the Italian people have elected me to govern. The prosecutors' point is the principle emblazoned on every court in the land: the law is equal for all.

If you've got it, flaunt it

Mr Berlusconi celebrated his 72nd birthday last week at a private party in his new home, Villa Campari on Lake Maggiore. He sauntered down the immense drive of this palace to address the TV cameras, and it occurred that the politics of envy operates very differently here. No British politician with his mind on the opinion polls would dream of flashing his wealth around like this. These days they don't dare even to go somewhere sunny for their holidays.

Too right, Benedict

Forty years after Pope Paul VI banned the use of contraceptives, Pope Benedict has admitted that "the world, as well as many of the faithful, has a lot of difficulty understanding the message of the Church" on this issue. This is clearly true: otherwise the desperately low birth rate in overwhelmingly Catholic Italy could only mean the Death of Sex. And not even the most extravagant doom-sayers are claiming that.