The interview is just plain reality check with a couple of well-placed "insults." Travaglio said simply that news in Italy is run by politicians. If there's a noteworthy news item, forty politicians will release declarations so that the day after the political reaction to the news will be frontpaged.

Naturally, Travaglio proved his point today. His interview prompted the "forty political statements" and occupies up to three pages (Repubblica 1-3; la Stampa 1, 4-5; Corriere 1, 5-6).

The Crime? After denigrating Renato Schifani, president of the Senate, Travaglio returned on the well-known facts for those of us who actually read books and trial transcripts, that Renato Schifani and his associate, Senator Enrico La Loggia, were partners in a broker firm with the mafia boss Nino Mandela and had sought to condition the urban regulatory plans of Villabate to advantage the mafia.

So long as it's written in books (or mentioned in blogs as I've done) it doesn't matter. But when it's said on primetime, all hell breaks loose. But what is of note is that no one contests the facts. It's all a symphony of indignation and personal attacks- criminal usage of the media, as B would put it.

The trial transcripts are a great read, especially Mandella's contemptous remarks on what a bawl-baby Enrico La Loggia is.

But, hell, does this sort of shit go down elswhere? If a prominent Senator in the States was linked in no uncertain detail to a mafia boss and an attempted crime that was thwarted by authorities, would he be then elected to a key position in the government without a single word not appearing in the press or on TV? Is it just Italy?