roen/roen_dev.en

that 's enough !  
by Cornel Nistorescu  
Monday , 04 February 2002  
i don't think Laura Andrisan is worth being paid much attention .  
she 's a young woman , expelled from the high school in Gherla commune at the time she was an eleventh grader , who has smeared lots of people .  
but such a thing could happen for lots of reasons .  
she gave the impression that , provided they had some nerve , hundreds of girls of the same condition could get in the situation of being able to tarnish even innocent people .  
not to mention the atmosphere of vulgar scandal promoted in the society .  
what 's the story about ?  
before having gotten her high school graduation degree , Laura Andrisan worked for two or three publications in Cluj city .  
after getting her degree , she managed to make her way to three publications in Bucharest .  
in November she was part of the group of journalists who accompanied Adrian Nastase on his official visit to the White House .  
lucky for her , at the White House and the State Department she didn't show her real colours , but she did that in London where she was grabbed by bodyguards , thrown out on the street and banned from ever entering the building again .  
many Romanian politicians must have been hobnobbing with this demoiselle if she could generate such a low - down scandal on OTV station .  
this is no honour to newspapers either .  
there are lots of geese and loafers hiding behind a journalist ID .  
( much to my regret , there was a time when such a thing happened at " Evenimentul zilei " too ) .  
but it wasn't only Laura Andrisan 's fault ( she 's the way she is ) , or the newspapers ' fault ( where selection criteria when hiring someone are often poor ) , it was also OTV 's fault .  
this TV station for which " Ziua " daily 's manager Sorin Rosca Stanescu fought tooth and nail is like a garbage tin daily dumping filth and amateurism over the ether .  
Dan Diaconescu is carrying on here tenfold what he did on Tele 7 abc station .  
on the chair next to him ( sort of a chair for felons ) , you can see all sorts of politicians .  
both top politicians and small politicians , slow - witted and cramming like calves driven to the slaughter house just to be seen by TV viewers , or bring accusations against some people or for who knows what other reasons .  
the lack of any criteria , the appetite for vulgarity and gossip , adventurers and rumour spreaders have turned the above - mentioned TV station into an over - the - ether sewer .  
the National Audio / Visual Board , defeated in its initial attempt to shut down OTV ( by whom else if not by politicians and mobsters who have free access to speak on the TV station ) , is now helpless .  
the appalling scandal launched by a demoiselle who has made her way among newspapers , state institutions and top politicians is a sign that should set us thinking .  
not quite anything can be allowed .  
and we Romanians have crossed the line .  
we made journalists some bed - hoppers and some half - illiterate young women who first accompany official delegations , then traffic intelligence files , fish secrets out of and hobnob with politicians and civil servants , flip on TV and give the impression the whole country is like them .  
you can smear the entire state pyramid even if you are of Bucharest belt way descent .  
and if you get angry you can set up your own newspaper or TV station .  
that 's way too much .  
that 's the sign that the garbage dump , instead of being turned environment - friendly , is advancing on the heart of the society , political parties and parliament , ministries and mass - media .  
maybe what happened on OTV on Friday night will make most people exclaim in exasperation : that 's enough !  
Treptow 's lame arrest  
by Cornel Nistorescu  
Monday , 21 Octomber 2002  
the American historian and his female accomplice have finally been arrested .  
after a month - long noise made by the Romanian press , the pedophile - historian was busted .  
meanwhile , other pedophiles were arrested as well and immediately presented to the press as potential authors of similar crimes .  
the high number of such unfortunate events triggered a firm reaction from prime minister Adrian Nastase .  
he said pedophiles deserve to be sentenced to death .  
but as this is not possible , they " must understand they will spend the rest of their life in Romanian prisons " .  
obviously , the message was addressed especially to foreigners fond of sexual tourism with underage individuals in Romania , but also to those who tried to beat about the bush in the case of historian from Iasi town .  
but nobody asked for the death penalty as far as Kurt Treptow was concerned .  
the newspapers and the parents of sexually abused children didn't speak for one second about the capital punishment .  
the public would have been satisfied with much less than that .  
to see that the law was enforced on every pedophile , whether a historian or an American citizen .  
not a paragraph more or less .  
but Kurt Treptow was extended special treatment .  
his home was searched overnight in a judiciary raid seconded by a general .  
and since then the character has vanished .  
he wasn't shown to the press , no communiqu é was issued .  
the Prosecutor 's Office beat about the bush , so did the police , always hinting that the historian was a special person who had rendered I don't know what services to Romania .  
further more , when the press started to dig into the case and expose all sorts of details , presidential adviser Ioan Talpes held the umbrella to protect his friend ( or co - worker or God knows what Treptow had been to him ) .  
he recommended that the journalists protect the American because it was about a matter of confidentiality .  
a Romanian top official , instead of asking in his turn that the country 's laws be observed , tried to accuse the mass media .  
he said that Treptow 's doings were " overshadowed " by other " things published in the press " .  
suspicious was also the fact that the presidential adviser made public a dangerous judgement .  
at the height of the pedophilia scandal , he claimed that " there are things of a certain delicate nature " .  
what would those things be ?  
that historian Treptow is an American , for example .  
which planted into the ordinary people 's minds the idea that enforcing the law on an American citizen is a very delicate matter .  
and things are even worse .  
Ioan Talpes ' stupid statement was like a drop of water to the root of Vadim - style nationalist feelings .  
some Romanians winced as if lashed : they 're beating about the bush because he is an American .  
American ambassador to Romania Michael Guest had to intervene to dispel some of the rumours .  
he announced that " US Embassy asks no protection for Treptow " .  
despite Michael Guest 's stand , the Treptow case hasn't gained in transparency .  
the state 's institutions continued to keep silent , as if they were investigating a Martian caught by the Romanian military .  
meanwhile , the parents and the relatives of children sexually abused by Kurt Treptow were " delicately " warned they ' d better keep their mouths shut .  
could it be that the police and the prosecutors adopted that attitude as they grew fond of Treptow ?  
i very much doubt that .  
it was police and Prosecutor 's Office sources outraged by what was going on that leaked details about the case to the press , which is a sign they too were annoyed because their bosses ordered them to be discrete .  
now , when Kurt Treptow 's deviant acts can't be covered up anymore , he was arrested like all the other pedophiles turned in to the police and presented to the press .  
and it is also now , that just like by magic , adviser Talpes is taking a step back trying to wash away the shame .  
he tells us " I have never suspected him " .  
logically speaking , we have to ask him a common sensical question .  
if you didn't suspect him why did you get involved in this ?  
couldn't you stay quiet in your presidential adviser seat without bringing ridicule upon yourself ?  
we were not interested in the services rendered by Treptow .  
nobody spoke about the institution of death penalty .  
all we wanted was a simple , ordinary and almost impossible thing .  
that the law be also enforced in the case of a person close to Mr Talpes and to who knows who else .  
the top of sums that add up  
Wednesday , 06 November 2002  
a lot of ink will still flow to write about the richest 100 people in Romania .  
most of the citizens will get angry .  
the Romanian , cheated with privatization vouchers , still in the same staten he was when he parted with socialism , will not accept easily a top of those who made the most of transition .  
among those 100 there are probably some who , in the following years , will carry on their shoulders , the burden of the myth of wealth .  
a democratic society with a market economy needs such economic models .  
but among the 100 there are also the big schemers of transition , some sham businessmen , even more contemptible than the cardboard billionaires .  
among the 100 there are also " the protected ones " .  
at a closer look and after a search through the archives , we will surely discover a few who are but an extension of the former and present Romanian secret services .  
on the same list there are also friends of the political parties .  
if necessary , it is easy to see who in who 's time made a fortune .  
fortune is one thing , money is another .  
there is much gossip , many stories , and even a certain amount of amateurishness in the assessment of one 's fortune .  
with all due respect for the authors of this top , it contains enough naiveties , typical of beginners .  
you cannot assess someone 's fortune at fifty million dollars when he has debts of sixty million dollars .  
if the state began to recoup the money , the next day some of the 100 would certainly be removed from the top .  
then there are many millionaires with fortunes estimated at 10 - 20 million dollars or even more , 20 - 30 million dollars .  
no matter how crazy Romania may be , ten million dollars is quite something .  
Approximation as a method is rather good for a joke than for a top .  
after all , what is the value of a fortune ?  
the authors of the top say that they used all sorts of sources , including interviews .  
the stock exchange does not play any part in the making of these figures .  
nor does the tax authority or the balance sheets .  
the value of a fortune is given by the market .  
you cannot attach a sum of money to the name of someone , who bought , I won't say for how much , a factory from the state and assessed it in his ( or the journalists ' ) own way and then he said his fortune amounted to a certain figure .  
if necessary , these millionaires in dollars , most often in need of liquidities , would be extremely happy to get rid of everything they have in exchange for 3 - 5 - 8 million dollars .  
unfortunately , their strategy to buy for little money from the state and to sell it for higher price to the foreigners does not really work .  
the wealth amassed by many of the 100 is not such a big deal .  
they are good only to show them off and to carry them on the way to a real economy , when the purchased goods could be sold for at least half of the value shown in the top .  
at the moment , many of the factories assessed for huge sums are not to be bought even for 1 million dollars in cash .  
one more thing .  
if we remove some of the names and several fortunes and make a total we will get what we might call " the Romanian capital " .  
but , if we start counting the sums of money that vanished from the banks which went bankrupt , we will notice with surprise that they are the same or are quite similar .  
this shows that a large part of the Romanian fortunes are equal to the " holes " in the banks .  
in order to balance the sums we should add the money deposited in banks abroad , the donations made to the parties , the houses , the luxuries , and the lovers .  
and so sums add up , that is a typical Romanian counting worthy of a cheap show .  
real money is not such an easy thing to find !  
i know a filthy rich guy very proud of his fortune who asks his friends to lend him 5,000 dollars .  
and once he grabs the money he avoids them for months !  
what reactions does the millionaire top trigger ?  
Thursday , 07 November 2002  
" top 100 wealthiest Romanians " has become a subject of discussion , dispute or kibitzing .  
there is big talk about money and especially about its link to politics .  
all readers who called " Evenimentul zilei " showed concerned about one single thing .  
to what extent have these fortunes been legally made ?  
why didn't the legislation work at all in the case of many persons ?  
average people have nothing against wealth .  
but they show signs that they refuse to accept a fortune made by illegal ways .  
making such classifications is a common thing in other countries .  
as it is a first for Romania , the top of millionaires caused a state of shock in people , but , leaving aside the high quality graphic , it hides a completely amateur approach .  
it is triggered by the lack of tradition , the lack of coherent selection criteria and of official information .  
that 's why many characters on the list have unjustifiable figures written next to them .  
we could say they are rather the result of some calculations made by the mind of a cardboard billionaire .  
to some people , their presence in the top is just an opportunity to show off , which could make us believe they strove hard to inflate the figures so that they can be included in the top .  
the problem with this top lies somewhere else .  
it 's about the politicians ' wealth still not made public .  
it is only in a few years from now on , when they are no longer in the game ( or maybe dominate it categorically ) that we will see the freight trains full of money coming out from the shadow of the backstage .  
but this top is useful to them from another point of view .  
it draws the general public 's attention to other people who set up serious businesses and to those who created empires with spineless foundations .  
most of the latter are already known for the scams they managed to perform .  
placed next to those who managed to build real economic mechanisms , they could get a drop of credibility and drag the former through mud , though they do not deserve that .  
but the most interesting effect could be that on poor people .  
poor people , who , as a rule , are hostile to the newly rich , will give up other topics regarding corruption and focus on the people included in the list .  
if resounding names managed to make a hair breadth escape and not serve time in jail ( as they were helped to get away with their wrong doings ) and landed in this top with 300 or 500 million dollars associated with their names , needy people will say this is a corruption case .  
they too are guilty .  
they stole the factories .