Silvio Berlusconi is Prime Minister again in Italy... He was elected on Sunday May 13th. Let's see if he lasts longer than the 7 monthis he lasted for in 1994.
This guy is a rat IMHO.
for a great recent article on him check out the latest edition of the Economist at:
http://www.economist.com/opinion/displayStory.cfm?Story_ID=593654
and
http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=587107
Born September 29, 1936, Silvio was raised in the middle-class surroundings of Milan, Italy. Berlusconi, as a youth, charged entrance fees for puppet shows and, in high school, ghost wrote homework for other students, who then paid on a sliding fee scale; highly graded papers commanded full price, while those less successful were free. While studying law at the University of Milan, Berlusconi paid his tuition by selling vacuum cleaners, photographing social events, and booking his successful band on summer cruise ships. At the university, Berlusconi befriended Bettino Craxi], the future prime minister of Italy. Completing his studies at age twenty-five, Berlusconi was offered a position at the bank his father worked at, and in refusing, managed to talk the bank into a loan to finance a construction firm he named Edilnord. Founded in 1962, Edilnord became a successful real estate development company, and, in 1969, Berlusconi built an entire suburb north of Milan, naming it Milano 2, which eventually housed ten thousand people. In 1974, expanded his growing empire by founding Telemilano, a cable television station that serviced Milano 2. Realizing the potential involved, Berlusconi, in 1978, invested 2.5 million dollars to challenge Italy's state-run television monopoly, Radiotelevisione Italiana (RAI).
Skirting the law that only allowed RAI to broadcast nationally, Berlusconi set up a system of local stations that simultaneously broadcasted the same programming.
In 1980, he established Canale 5 (channel 5), an erstwhile nationally broadcasting television station that offered Italian game shows and first-run American sitcoms such as Dallas.
In the 1980's Berlusconi both diversified his holdings and consolidated his grip on the media. Finivest, a private holding company formed in 1975 with Berlusconi as its president, bought the other two major private television stations - Rete 4 and Italia Uno. Hoping to encourage alternative broadcasting, the Italian government, in 1976, loosened its monopoly on the medium, and, instead, helped create what has been described as a "duopoly" of RAI and a conglomeration of local television stations, owned by Berlusconi, acting as a national broadcasting system
Berlusconi diversified his empire with acquisitions in the print media (Panorama being his news weekly flagship) , publishing (Mandadori), retailing, and the soccer team A.C. Milan (Shuggar, p.15-16). He had so permeated Italian life that a new term, Berlusconism, "entered the Italian vocabulary, meaning a way of life where people live in houses built by Berlusoni, watch TV controlled by Berlusconi, shop at supermarkets owned by Berlusconi, relax on tennis courts and in restaurants built by Berlusconi, and adore a soccer team bought by Berlusconi"
By 1989, Berlusconi's prime time television shows had cornered 45 percent of the audience and 60 percent of the advertising revenue; his personal wealth was estimated at 6.25 billion dollars. Berlusconi was simply the richest man in Italy.
Berlusconi's plunge into the Italian political scene was precipitated by the Tagentopoli ("kick back city") scandal.
Berlusconi's formation of the political party Forza Italia, in April 1993, was as much a reaction to his own personal situation as it was to the general malaise of Italian politics.
Forza Italia was as much a populist movement as it was a political party. Berlusconi, using his powerful ad agency Publitalia, set up Forza Italia clubs throughout Italy, ostensibly searching for political candidates who embraced the principles of "Good Government", the Forza Italia manifesto which exulted market forces and the "politics of efficiency" as saviors of Italian culture. (
Trading on the popularity of A.C. Milan (Forza Italia - a soccer chant of "let's go Italy"), Berlusconi also presented himself as an independent, self-made man, who would cut Italian bureaucracy that was strangling the creation of wealth.
A television blitzkrieg then followed, as Berlusconi announced his candidacy two months before the March 28, 1994 elections. Forza Italia emerged, victorious, as Italy's largest party, by appealing to a politically devastated country which traditionally embraced popular figures.
In May, 1994, Berlusconi unveiled his coalition government of Forza Italia, the Lega Nord (a pro-northern party with Umbertto Bossi as its head), and the neo-fascist party of the Alleanza Nazionale.
Berlusconi, from the beginning, also faced criticisms of conflict of interest. Berlusconi continued to use his media empire as a political propaganda tool, continuously turning to the people to strengthen his populist stance.
During Berlusconi's short term, the stock market lost 25 percent of its value, the lira continued to devaluate, and national debt increased, while unemployment, a key theme of Berlusconi's campaign promises, hovered at 12 percent.
As the fall of 1994 progressed, Berlusconi's position became ever more tenuous. The magistrates deepened their investigations into Finivest corruption, calling Berlusconi up to testify and eventually arresting two employees of Finivest.
This along with the budget fiascos surrounding his government, forced Berlusconi, on December 21, 1994, to resign his post as prime minister.
Berlusconi did not go gently into the night. Forging a coalition with the AN and Forza Italia (Freedom Alliance),
The beleaguered Berlusconi continues to hold his own, participating in politics while battling to keep his empire intact. Berlusconi, who has two children from his first marriage, and three from his marriage to actress Veronica Bartolini, resides in his seventy room villa north of Milan, Italy.
info refrenced from:
Graham, Judith. Current biography yearbook 1994. H.W. Wilson,1994.
Gundle, Stephen and Parker, Simon. The new Italian republic. Routledge, 1996.
McCarthy, Patrick. The crisis of the Italian state: from the origins of the cold war to the fall of Berlusconi. St. Martin's press, 1995.
Sassoon, Donald. Contemporary Italy. Addison Wesley Longman,1997.
Shugaar, Antony. Columbia journalism reveiw. July/August 1994. P. 15-16.
Vulliamy, Ed. Manchester guardian weekly. April 3,1994. P.4. 26 April 1998