Word: rome
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Silvio Berlusconi lobbied long and hard for this hour of glory. It was in Rome in 1957, after all, that six European leaders signed the founding treaty of the European Economic Community - the forerunner of today's European Union - so the Italian Prime Minister wanted the leaders of the 25 member states to return to the Eternal City to sign the European Constitution. On Friday they came, and Berlusconi made the most of it. With famed filmmaker Franco Zeffirelli directing the live television coverage, Berlusconi led his European colleagues through a carefully choreographed ceremony at Rome's historic Campidoglio city...
...Perhaps one day this event will rank in importance alongside the 1957 ceremony. But last week, Rome seemed like a strange place to sign a treaty clarifying relations among E.U. institutions (it has yet to be ratified by any member state and faces long odds in some), because those relations have been upended thanks to Berlusconi's nomination of conservative Catholic Rocco Buttiglione as Italy's member of the European Commission, the E.U.'s executive body. Commission President?designate José Manuel Dur?o Barroso had tapped Buttiglione for the Justice, Freedom and Security post, which includes responsibility for antidiscrimination...
...relevant committee; and Latvian Taxation Commissioner-designate Ingrida Udre, who Schulz said "doesn't belong in the Commission" because of an ongoing corruption probe into her party, the Union of Greens and Farmers. (Her candidacy was made even shakier on Thursday by the resignation of Latvia's government.) In Rome, E.U. heads of state began talking about how to put together a new, improved Commission - which means doing some serious horsetrading if they really intend to wrap it up at their summit this week in Brussels. But the situation is fluid. Some of the Parliament's remaining objections could...
...Barroso arrived in Rome with a clear message: the European Parliament is not to be trifled with. "We'll get what we wanted, which is an improved Commission," says Andrew Duff, a British Liberal Democrat M.E.P. That result would silence talk about last week's showdown having been just another example of pointless institutional muscle-flexing. By demanding higher standards for the Commission than the leaders of the member states themselves - and by proving its members had the gumption to stick together and stand firm - the European Parliament has made the most of its powers of approval. Now both institutions...
...says. Although American expats care about the same issues - Iraq, terrorism, the economy - as their fellow voters back home, many are naturally also concerned about the rising tide of anti-Americanism that's swept Europe. "Bush has messed up foreign alliances," says Yolanda Bernardini, chairman of Democrats Abroad in Rome. But others credit Bush for his response to terrorism. "Considering the situation in the world, I think Bush is the better candidate," says Stuart Schnee, a Jerusalem-based marketing executive from New York who has never before voted Republican. "He's proved over the last four years that...