Thursday,
10 January 2013. Silvio Berlusconi enters the lions den, where
Michele Santoro and Marco Travaglio were looking forward to devouring
the former prime minister.
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| Santoro and Berlusconi |
Allegedly
Silvio Berlusconi kicked Michele Santoro out of Italian public TV
RAI, back in 2002, that's why the clash between the former prime
minister and the left-wing anchorman was described as the duel of the
century by many.
Silvio
Berlusconi was supposed to walk out in anger, after Michele Santoro
and his associate Marco Travaglio would have grilled him properly.
Almost
9 million Italians were glued to the video (one third of the
audience, up to 50 per cent in the heat of the discussion), as the
Santoro-team attacked on waves.
Nothing
doing, the former prime minister fended off Santoro's lunges, ignored
Luisella Costamagna remarks, and even returned fire to Marco
Travaglio, by enlisting – written on a letter he abruptly pulled
out of his pocket - ten lawsuits for defamation the journalist had
lost.
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| Berlusconi cleansing the chair where Travaglio sat |
Attacks
regarding sex-scandals, Rubygate, and the paying of the 42
bunga-bunga army girls, the request of saying to the Italians he was
sorry... all in vane. Silvio Berlusconi answers blending wit remarks,
with shreds of statistics, smiles and provocations. And, once again,
he gets away with it, and keeps on «gaining
back who already voted for me, and perhaps convincing new voters»,
as he put it.
How
to convince the Italians that the People of Liberty party is the
right choice? Silvio Berlusconi's pièce
de résistance is the
abolition of a tax on proprieties, which yield would be – according
to the former Italian prime minister – replaced by new taxes on
tobaccos, spirits and gambling (the tax was introduced by Berlusconi
himselft, but it's the Monti's government that made it applicable to
owners of first homes).
Running
out of options, Santoro also showed a video taken almost four years
before (in April 2009), when Silvio Berlusconi had been keeping
waiting German chancellor Angela Merkel while he was talking on the
telephone (the video is available on our YouTube channel, click here> to watch it). Well, of course Silvio had an answer for that (he could have work
out quite a range of replies, in four years...), but before replying
to it – revealing he had been talking to Turkish prime minister
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan about a crucial topic of the summit - he said
«Santoro, you're digging your own
grave.».
“I'm
having fun” would later declare smiling the former prime minister.
Santoro – quite evidently – was not having fun, was visibly annoyed and refuse to shake hands with Silvio, at a certain stage. At least until
Silvio left and he went on giggling with his cartoonist friend,
Vauro Senesi, who showed the sketches he had been drawing during the programme, in what Santoro
called «my communist moments.».
While
enjoying his communists moments, Santoro might be an unaware
supporter for Silvio, whose deficit had been reducing constantly,
since the Italian politician started to show off on TV, without
finding any credible opposition. So far.
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Video from our YouTube Channel: Berluschannel
