{"id":4243,"date":"2010-12-04T07:31:49","date_gmt":"2010-12-04T14:31:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/josemarquez.com\/xsml\/archives\/4243"},"modified":"2010-12-04T07:31:49","modified_gmt":"2010-12-04T14:31:49","slug":"if-you-know-any-italians-please-forward-this-anecdote-to-them","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/2010\/12\/04\/if-you-know-any-italians-please-forward-this-anecdote-to-them\/","title":{"rendered":"If you know any Italians, please forward this anecdote to them."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>An <a href=http:\/\/www.thedailybeast.com\/blogs-and-stories\/2010-12-02\/wikileaks-cable-reveal-special-relationship-between-italian-prime-minister-silvio-berlusconi-and-russian-prime-miniester-vladimir-putin\/>anecdote<\/a> that must be shared:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Their favorite activity, however, seems to be holding joint press conferences. At one of their most memorable appearances together, in Moscow, in 2008, a Russian journalist named Natalia Melikova asked Putin about his apparent marital trouble and rumored romance with the young and indecently plastic gymnast-cum-parliamentarian Alina Kabaeva. When asked about the liaison, Putin\u2019s face hardened. \u201cThere is not a word of truth in this story,\u201d he said. Berlusconi, giggling, regarded the exchange. When Putin had finished answering, Berlusconi cocked his hands, and, imitating a gun, fired with a silent \u201cPow! Pow!\u201d at Melikova. It had only been a year and a half since Anna Politkovskaya, an investigative journalist, had been shot in her Moscow elevator, and Melikova was reduced to tears. On the dais, Berlusconi laughed, and Putin nodded.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An anecdote that must be shared: Their favorite activity, however, seems to be holding joint press conferences. At one of their most memorable appearances together, in Moscow, in 2008, a Russian journalist named Natalia Melikova asked Putin about his apparent marital trouble and rumored romance with the young and indecently plastic gymnast-cum-parliamentarian Alina Kabaeva. When&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6,13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4243"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4243"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4243\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}