Thank GOD for Gordon Brown. Praise the little baby Jesus for David Cameron . Get on your knees in abject grateful supplication to whichever celestial spooky imaginary friend takes your fancy for British politics generally; yes, British politics in all its sleazy, spinny, expense-fiddling, nanny-stating, milk-snatching, WMD-inventing glory. This is at least, I have no doubt whatsoever, what any UK resident would be saying were they exposed, even for a week or two, to Italy under the governance of Silvio Berlusconi.

As some of you may know, I’ve just returned from the land of my forefathers, and whenever I’m there, I can’t help but contemplate its less-than-glorious leader; how his sleazy South American-style junta is rapidly transforming Italy into a banana republic, and (if I might speak plainly), how much of a little dickbag he is.

“Little” is the first thing you notice about him; a classic example of the megalomania of stunted rulers, he’ll regularly stride around political summits in 4-inch heeled boots (which Italian newspapers are strictly forbidden to photograph), yet still only come up to Barack Obama’s chest. Then there’s the hair - not only was he prepared to suffer the indignity of a Waxl Rose-style bandana for a few weeks in 2004, he subsequently emerged with a bizarre greased-back hair weave which looks like it was designed by a 3-year-old using fuzzy-felt and pritt-stick.

As is well known, he’s a one-man gaffe machine; the creators of “Fawlty Towers” and “Curb Your Enthusiasm” regularly weep with envy at his natural talent for the faux-pas. He’s compared himself to Jesus, complimented Barack Obama on his “suntan”, compared a German MEP to a concentration camp guard, suggested to people made homeless and living in a temporary shelter after the L’Aquila earthquake that they “enjoy it like a camping trip” - and much, much more.

Then, of course, there’s the seemingly endless sex scandal, which is still being drip-fed to an incredulous audience worldwide. In any other country, he’d have been removed long ago; after all, he’s lied to his wife and the public, and used taxpayer’s money to fly hordes of girls fifty years younger than him out to his villa in Sardinia (some of whom go on to be ministers in his government) - but this is Italy, and the public love him for it. Women on the peninsula appear to have a “boys will be boys” attitude, whilst men are undoubtedly thinking “get in, my son!”. Even the upright, moral bastion* that is the Roman Catholic church, so set against the idea of non-procreative sex that they recently discouraged the use of condoms in AIDS-riven Africa, is strangely silent on Berlusconi’s conquests.

“So what?” - you might ask; all of these are ultimately venial sins. But let’s not forget that this is a man who openly admires Mussolini; a man who, when in any kind of political hole, will liberally and enthusiastically play the race card to an increasingly inflamed and dangerous country. A man who sees no conflict of interest in being Prime Minister and simultaneously owning most of the media*.  A man mired in decades of bribery and corruption who changed Italian law to render himself immune from prosecution.

In short, he’s not just a dickbag, he’s practically a dictator. 35-40% of Italians absolutely loathe him, but whilst there are so many idiots prepared to vote for him, they have no choice but to get out of the country if they can (as my family has done), or just wring their hands, watch their country becoming ever more the laughing stock of the world, and wait for him to die. Which I hope is VERY soon.

(* - hundreds of thousands of children in the care of Catholic priests down the years have unfortunately experienced their “upright bastions” very intimately.)

(** - Berlusconi’s Fininvest and Mediaset operations own several newspapers and TV stations; most other newspaper owners are friends of his, and the only other significant TV channels are state-run. Amusingly, Berlusconi recently gave up running AC Milan because he felt that it represented a “conflict of interests” with his premiership…)

All our recent chitty-chat about sporting excellence got me ruminating; table-tennis is my chosen field of sporting battle, but exactly how good am I? I mean, we all know I’m good; the eight-year-olds (who are probably actually fourteen) and the physically infirm who make up Division 4 of the Ashford League cower at the very mention of my “widowmaker” forehand. But there must be a way of calculating the precise extent of my great sporting gift.

And indeed there is. Here is the latest ranking list for the Folkestone and District T-T leagues; I rank 107 / 173 affiliated players. (Looking at the names, which obviously mean nothing to you, that’s probably about right; although it should rise a bit next year given the increased ranking points I’ll garner from playing in a higher division - even if I will be losing most of the time.) “Folkestone and District” covers the Shepway part of Kent, which has a population of 100,100 (2007 estimate). From there the calculations are easy:

107 (my ranking) / 100,100 (population of Shepway) = 0.0010689 x 60,943,912 (UK population) = 65143.

So, there it is. In the prime of my fitness and the peak of my form, I rank somewhere in the lower sixty-thousands* in the UK at my preferred sport. And the UK is rubbish at table-tennis. And that’s not even counting the people in Shepway who are good at table-tennis but not currently playing in the league. Or people who are just good at sport generally and would kick my arse even if they don’t play table-tennis regularly.

Quite dispiriting, really; here I was off the back of a good season contemplating a late bid for selection for London 2012 - whereas in fact, the statistics suggest that I’d most likely get beaten by Abu Hamza with his eyepatch on the wrong eye…

(* - Mind you, this ranking is probably a MASSIVE overestimate based on false extrapolation, given that demographically, unlike much of the rest of the UK, Shepway consists largely of people aged over 85.)

Some of you (although not very many, I’ll wager) will have seen Prince Charles delivering the annual Richard Dimbleby Lecture on the theme of the enviroment. “We have 96 months to save the planet”, Charles claimed; “the age of sustainability must replace the age of convenience”. And a good deal more organic, homeopathic porridge besides.

Now, the lazy, predictable response to what he said would be “well, why don’t you and your family stop jetting everywhere in private helicopters; that might be a start” - so that’s exactly the angle I’m going for. Charles happens to be an enormous hypocrite; he regularly flies transatlantic in his private jet powered by ultra-refined extra-leaded petrol - accompanied by 200 retainers all in their own private jets - either to collect environmental awards from gullible Americans, to hunt endangered species in the rainforest, or simply because he can.

Or something like that, anyway. Seriously, though, Charles - WE KNOW. Those of us who care are doing something about it, those of us who don’t are quoting made-up numbers from newspaper columns by Jeremy Clarkson (and probably moaning about immigration and paedophiles at the same time). Portentous pronouncements from well-meaning if muddle-headed rock stars and royalty belong to the stadium benefit gig era of 20 years ago. (Come to think of it, Bruce Springsteen is in town; perhaps he could have delivered the talk for all the difference it’s going to make - “Awraaaght, Richard Dimbleby Lecture!!! Are we gonna SAVE THE PLANET???!!! F*** YEAH!!!”)

If you really care, Charlie, use your family’s enormous wealth, prestige and assets to seriously - and very publicly - lobby world and industrial leaders for change. Actions need to speak louder than words - and converting your Aston Martin to run on your excess whine - sorry, wine - ain’t gonna cut it, I’m afraid…

One for the fellas, really; watching the majestic Roger Federer scrape past a very gallant Andy Roddick to win his 15th Grand Slam (an all-time record), I was struck by how many of the “best of all time” sportsmen* are competing currently, or have only recently ended their careers**. Most of these sports have been going, globally, for 100 years or more; why, I wonder, is there such a crop of over-achievers just at the moment?

Examples -

Tennis - Federer is now (pretty much) undoubtedly the best of all time. He’s won more grand slam titles than anyone else, and has won on all 4 surfaces.

Golf - Tiger Woods has only won 14 majors to Jack Nicklaus’s 18, but he’s done it in half the time and exerted an extraordinary dominance over a sport which is far more competitive now than it was in Nicklaus’s time. He’ll almost certainly break Nicklaus’s record before the end of his career.

Motor Sport - Michael Schumacher is statistically the best driver of all time by a long way, even if a) no-one knows what Ayrton Senna would have achieved, and b) the sport in the last 10-15 years is perceived to have been dominated by technology rather than driving skill. There’s also a strong case for Valentino Rossi as best motorbike racer of all time.

Cycling - Lance Armstrong overcame cancer to win 7 consecutive Tours de France; no-one had ever managed more than 5 previously.

Basketball - Michael Jordan. Not much doubt about this one.

Swimming - Michael Phelps at Beijing 2008 became the first ever Olympian to win 8 gold medals in a single games.

Cricket (bowling) - Shane Warne and Muttiah Muralitharan have both put previous test wicket-taking records to the sword. Muralitharan now has 770; before his duel with Warne, the record stood at a mere 519.

There are others, but you get the idea. Any thoughts as to why this is happening? Busier international schedules leading to more exposure? Better training methods / widespread use of performance-enhancing drugs? More money in sport these days? You’re talking bollocks? I really couldn’t give a monkeys?…

(* - apparently, women play sport too sometimes, but I must admit it’s not something that I come across regularly. Insert “apart from the centre spread of Sports Illustrated featuring Anna Kournikova” gag here.)

(** - Oh, and how many of them are called “Michael”.)

Aaahh, the first week of July - the sun is shining; birds are singing, flowers blooming, various other flora, fauna and weather patterns are doing whatever they do, and your editor is suddenly feeling very, very much older.

But none of that matters, because the country is in the collective grip of Wimbledon fever. Every year, millions of armchair slobs who don’t normally give a monkeys about tennis will go crazy apeshit bonkers for it; a schedules-monstering 12.6 million of them watched the first ever match under the new roof on Monday night. And this year,  the normal gallant British tryhard-doofus has been replaced by someone who actually has a chance; step forward Andy Murray.

Despite looking as if he’d be better suited to “World of Warcraft” than to actual physical activity, and despite suffering from an alternating nationality (British if he wins, Scottish if he loses) and a stroppy teenage personality, Murray is (whisper it soft) very good. But what we really want to know is - WILL HE WIN?

One for the poll…