conservative newspapers of post-revolution Lisbon. He first became nationally known at 15 years of age when he wrote a letter-to-the-editor of the daily evening newspaper Jornal Novo that prominently published it under the heading "Three Betrayals" ("Três Traições") directly accusing then president Ramalho Eanes, prime minister Mário Soares and foreign minister Diogo Freitas do Amaral of "selling out" Portugal's African colonies in 1974–75. The article earned him a libel lawsuit from President Eanes and valuable public exposure to get his own weekly opinion column in O Tempo and, some years later, in the new weekly Semanário. In 1987, he co-founded, with Miguel Esteves Cardoso, the weekly newspaper O Independente, which started publication in May 1988 and became known for its innovative editorial concepts as well as for denouncing political scandals, often on the basis of little more than hearsay. In reporting such scandals, Portas personally targeted the then prime-minister Aníbal Cavaco Silva and most of his ministers (1985–1995) thus making several enemies in the PSD. Although it reached very respectable circulation levels in the 1990s, O Independente never quite reached Portas's stated objective of outselling the leading Portuguese weekly Expresso and eventually folded in 2006. In the 1990s Portas became a TV personality appearing regularly on several Portuguese TV channels as a political commentator. He was a sporadic panel member in a popular weekly night TV talk show (Raios e Coriscos) and in the Portuguese edition of Crossfire. In 2006, after his first stint as a government minister, he returned to TV with his own biweekly show (O Estado da Arte) where he commented on current issues. Political career The formative years, 1974–85 Paulo Portas showed a precocious interest in politics and as a child engaged in lively political discussions with his elders. In 1975 he joined the youth wing of the Democratic Popular Party (PPD), which in 1976 became PSD Social Democratic Party. He would later profess to have been a staunch follower of PPD's founder Francisco Sá Carneiro, who is said to have relished the views of the 14-year-old Paulo Portas and personally sponsored his full PSD membership in 1978. Sá Carneiro died in 1980 and, following a bitter loss in an internal election of the party's youth-wing JSD, Portas quietly left PSD in 1982. He remained involved with politics through his popular opinion-columns in the conservative weekly newspapers O Tempo and Semanário. Early political career, 1986–97 Paulo