MILAN — “Good morning!” says one of the guards on duty outside the Excelsior Hotel Gallia here, where the United States consulate general is hosting a postelection breakfast. “Hardly a good morning,” I reply.

Inside, the phantasm of Donald J. Trump, with its egg-custard bangs, weaves its way through the palpable embarrassment emanating from the assorted guests. I accepted the invitation after a sleepless night because I wanted to show my friendship to the United States and its citizens. They’re looking forward to at least four years of being governed by a president who looks to be unsuitable, possibly embarrassing, and certainly, to say the least, unpredictable.

At times like this, you really need your friends, right?

While I consider myself a friend of America, there are more than a few friends of Mr. Trump in Italy, many of them newfound. No other country in the European Union, according to the Pew Research Center, is so passionate about Mr. Trump, and the last week has seen an outpouring of affection for the incoming American leader.

Is that really surprising? The plaudits in the news media, and on social media, betray a disagreeable longing for authoritarianism, a Mussolini-style nostalgia for a macho leader who’s always right, and a yearning for the (verbal) stick to be taken to anyone who dares criticize the boss. In other words, Berlusconism is alive and well in Italy, even when it means looking abroad for a strongman.