Rome Letter/Paddy Agnew: Warning to the reader: this column is written by a journalist whose opinions and views are probably "conditioned by the newspapers of the Italian left".
Furthermore, the Foreign Press Bureau in Rome, visited on a weekly basis by your correspondent in search of his post, is nothing less than a "cove of communists".
The above warnings, one recent and the other long-standing, come from Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, the man who yesterday assumed the rotating Presidency of the European Union. Never shy of expressing an unpopular view, Mr Berlusconi launched his most recent broadside at foreign media organisations on Monday during an interview with French radio station, Europe 1.
The Italian Prime Minister had good reason to be feeling just a little sore. After all, some unpleasant things had been written about him by foreign papers. Take the following three examples: "This is our new President, a man whose hand we would not willingly shake", in the German daily Die Berliner Zeitung; "Silvio Berlusconi, The Godfather, Now Showing All Over Europe", in the German weekly Der Spiegel; "Europe fears the imminent presidency of Berlusconi", in the Spanish daily El País.
Mind you, we journalists got off lightly. In that same interview, Mr Berlusconi suggested that magistrates are "even worse", arguing that Italy was afflicted by a "cancer", namely the politicisation of the magistrature. This last remark probably has something to do with the fact that over the last decade he has been charged with bribery, corruption, money laundering, tax evasion and even Mafia association, all crimes allegedly committed during his rise and rise to becoming Italy's wealthiest man, head of a business and media empire worth up to €14 billion.
Like it or not, the EU Presidency, just like contemporary Italian politics, has already begun to be dominated by the larger than life figure of 67-year-old Mr Berlusconi. Just when Europe and Europeans would be best employed discussing issues such as the new EU constitution, illegal immigration, pensions reform, the Middle East, EU defence policy, etc., the media spotlight has shifted onto the much more "sexy" terrain of Mr Berlusconi and his colourful past. Ably defended by a team of skilful lawyers (many of whom are now Deputies in his Forza Italia party and all of whom are well practised in the art of judicial filibustering and the strategic use of the statute of limitations), Mr Berlusconi has thus far been acquitted in all his major trials.
Anxious to avoid further judicial distractions during his term of EU Presidency (he still faces bribery charges in a trial in Milan), and convinced that he is the victim of a political witch-hunt by leftist magistrates, Mr Berlusconi recently promoted the "Lodo Schifani" law which de facto grants him immunity from prosecution whilst in office.
At first glance, all of this may mean little or nothing to the Irish reader. After all, Italian politics always were byzantine and a touch corrupt. So why be surprised when Italian politics throws up a figure like Mr Berlusconi, a man who seems willing to rewrite statute book in order to suit his own needs?
In an interview with the BBC last week, Jan Zielonka, analyst at the European University Institute in Florence, answered just that question when saying: "It [the immunity legislation] raises questions about justice and democracy when a European politician can act as if he is above the law. How can you say to the accession countries: you must converge, you must reform your judicial systems, you must defend press freedom, when a country like Italy is doing as it wishes?"
Graham Watson, leader of the Liberal Democrats in the European parliament, was even more outspoken last week, when saying that if Italy were an applicant country wanting to join the EU next year, "it would not be accepted because we demand standards higher than these".
Like it or not, Europe and Europeans will be watching Mr Berlusconi very closely over the next six months. There are those who feel that his penchant for the theatrical gesture and the maximum photo-op occasion will prove relatively harmless, merely form over content.
Yet, European partners got just a little uneasy recently when he spoke of enlarging the EU to include Turkey, Russia and Israel.
Those same partners became even more uncomfortable when his pro-USA sympathies prompted him to visit the Middle East last month without including Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat on his programme, apparently favouring US policy at the expense of EU policy.
Knowing Mr Berlusconi, our hunch is that we can sit back and ready ourselves for other similar little "sorties" over the next six months. He may find it hard to contain himself in his role of "President of Europe". Interesting times may be ahead and not everyone is convinced that Mr Berlsuconi is the right man in the right job at the right time: "At this moment in its history, Europe might have hoped to be piloted by a man of undisputed moral and political leadership. That will not be the case", wrote the authoritative French daily Le Monde last week. Need we repeat, of course, that Le Monde was probably "conditioned" by the Italian left.