Word: berlusconistan
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...begin a formal news conference. But this is Italy in the age of Silvio Berlusconi, the land of a flamboyant billionaire Prime Minister whose ambiguous relationship with an 18-year-old aspiring showgirl has dominated public debate for most of the month of May. Welcome to springtime in Berlusconistan...
...control of the airwaves (he owns the three main private TV channels) and, perhaps most intriguingly, with his ability to transform his personal whims into a disturbingly entertaining public discourse in a democracy of 58 million people. But his critics - and they do manage to get airtime in Berlusconistan - believe that the 72-year-old master manipulator may have triggered a news cycle that could actually lead to his political demise. (See Berlusconi's worst gaffes...
Some journalists say this could be the Berlusconi equivalent of Bill Clinton's "I did not have sexual relations with that woman" moment - a fact-checking challenge to investigators throughout Berlusconistan and a spur to even more debate and speculation about the Prime Minister's private life. But at the same time, the potential for scandal just might help Berlusconi keep his popularity high by giving him center stage in a public arena that ever more resembles The Jerry Springer Show (or a Fellini film...
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