Word: communistically
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What do Silvio Berlusconi and a communist transvestite have in common? That may sound like the set-up to a bad joke, but the search for a serious answer could just bring some focus to the bizarre spectacle of Italian public life...
...millions of Italians tuned into the ever-popular local version of Celebrity Survivor, or Isola dei Famosi ("Island of the Famous"). The show was wrapping up its sixth season with the coronation of the latest champion, Vladimir Luxuria, a former cabaret performer and Refounded Communist party member. In 2006, the unlikely politician became the first transvestite to be elected to Italy's parliament...
Luxuria's participation had already ensured record high ratings for the 10-week-long show. Interest centered not only on how a communist politician would interact with two-bit stars and showgirls, but curiosity about what Luxuria would look like without her makeup. (See pictures of Milan's 2008 fashion week...
...chief of the Refounded Communist party, which lost all its parliamentary seats in the April poll that saw Berlusconi sweep to power, quickly offered Luxuria a slot to run for the European Parliament. "Vladimir has an elevated degree of solidarity and brotherhood and at the same time is very sensitive and aware of others and their dynamics," said the ever-somber Communist leader Paolo Ferrero. "She is a very positive anthropological model, in my view." A columnist in the Communist party newspaper likened Luxuria's victory to Barack Obama...
...Opinion polls show public opinion in Poland divided on how Jaruzelski should be judged. A December 2007 survey showed that 44% of Poles believe that the communist authorities had no choice but to impose martial law, while 45% condemn the decision. Some former Solidarity leaders, such as current Speaker of the Senate Bogdan Borusewicz, are not as forgiving of Jaruzelski as others have been. "The trial is an act of justice," Borusewicz said. "The martial law was a classic Latin-style military putsch. Jaruzelski defended the communist system, not Poland. He defended the communist dictatorship, not the state...