Lately I’ve witnessed the same scene play out over and over: A man and woman meeting for the first time at bar or restaurant. It’s usually in the early evening, and one of them will be sitting there gazing at their phone, trying to keep from looking too eager. The other walks in, and approaches tentatively.
Bucharest was once known as the Paris of the East. In the 1930s, it was a vibrant city of cafes, artists, and poets. The playwright Eugene Ionescu, the historian of religion Mircea Eliade, and the essayist Emil Cioran all became friends at this time at the University of Bucharest. Romania was also enjoying a brief economic boom, and many of Bucharest’s most beautiful houses were built during this period leading up to World War II.
Some of those houses are still standing, including the family home of economist Dragos Negrescu. That’s where I met him in 1990 when we talked about the future prospects of Romania.
Negrescu chose to study economics because, back in the 1980s, it offered a better shot of getting a job in a city. Otherwise, as a historian for instance, he would have forced to take a position in the countryside. During the waning years of centralized planning, he worked for a short time at a steelworks in Targoviste and then in a ministry in Bucharest. Since 1989, he has had a series of jobs in and out of government. Currently he works for the European Union in Brussels, and that’s where I caught up with him in August 2013.
Negrescu argues that Romania missed an opportunity in 1990 to embark on the same kind of “shock therapy” economic reforms that Poland began. “Prior to October 1990,” he told me, “there was no movement toward economic reform. And the government built up a debt to the miners. I don’t remember the exact figures, but there were about 100,000 workers in a sector that required no more than 20,000, and they not only kept the miners in place for a decade but increased their salaries. Another brilliant idea was dropping the retirement age for scores of workers because of difficult working conditions. And allowing people to retire wholesale. So basically for the first year the government radically increased all sources of macroeconomic imbalances.”
In 1993, Negrescu worked for the government of Nicolae Vacaroiu for eight months, but it was not a satisfying experience. “I worked for the Council for Coordination, Strategy, and Economic Reform, which was headed up by Misu Negritoiu,” he told me. “We were writing the strategy of reform, because Vacaroiu had promised a full-fledged program when he got his investiture vote. But our strategy was never implemented. I used to describe the council this way: we were all typing in front of an unplugged keyboard. We were talking to people in the ministries who didn’t give a shit what we said. They had their own ways of doing things.”
Could Romania have caught up with the rest of the region if it hadn’t delayed implementing economic reforms? “It definitely would have lost fewer years than otherwise,” Negrescu responded. “When things began to work economically in Romania, when the economy was booming, in 2003-4, then the world crisis happened a few years afterwards. This is very similar to what happened to Romania in the inter-war period, with exactly a 70-year difference in time. Between 1934 and 1938, Romania’s economic boom came to a stop because of the world war.”
The accession process to the European Union provided Romania with the necessary impetus to push through economic reform. I asked Negrescu if Brussels, too, missed an opportunity to use the leverage of accession to demand further reforms.
“There wasn’t much left to reform,” he replied. “It is just regular decisions of economic policy. If you look at the fundamentals, Romania compares advantageously to many countries. Look at the fiscal consolidation. You now have a budget deficit after seven months this year that’s less than one percent of GDP. Even with the slippage that takes place every December, it will be at most around three percent. Romania’s public debt has been increasing at a fast pace in recent years, but it’s still only 40 percent of GDP. Compare that to Belgium or France, where it’s hovering around 100 percent.”
In other words, Romania has become, basically, a normal country. “One can talk a lot about the infrastructure, which is still missing a few parts,” Negrescu concluded. “It still takes decades to build a highway. You can pay billions and still get nothing. But we see lots of new buildings. The airport is now looking like a regular airport. Of course the railway network is in shambles, but it’s in shambles because there’s no demand. Romania is a normal country, that’s the point. From the standpoint of economic policy, there might be mistakes, but they’re not radically bigger than in other countries.”
The Interview
What do you think were the economic options were for Romania at that time? Could the government, any government, have done a better job with the economic reform?
Definitely. Especially at the very beginning, Romania had some assets, which the government threw out the window in a single month. I’m not talking about no longer having foreign debt, because that was stupid to begin with. As a parenthesis, every now and then, here in Brussels, I come across locals who try to explain to me how clever Ceausescu was in paying off all of Romania’s debt, and I try to make them understand with a simple example. You borrow money to build a house, you build it, and then you start paying back the loans without maintaining the house any longer, and you let it decay — that’s exactly what Ceausescu did. Recently I was talking to my Greek son-in-law who said, “At least Romania had no foreign debt.” Yes, but who made this debt in the first place? Ceausescu! Prior to the late 1960s, no socialist country could have borrowed from abroad. Ceausescu built up a small debt by the Eastern European standards of the time, which he used to build factories. Then he started paying back by restricting imports so that those factories either didn’t have raw materials or spare parts or could not modernize their product. The Dacia [Romanian-built car] was the same in 1989 as it was in 1970! How idiotic could you be? And Ceausescu is given as an example of a great economist? Okay, closed parenthesis.
But there was a foreign reserve of about $2 billion, which would be the equivalent of about $5 billion now. What did the government do? They started importing oranges!
They wanted to satisfy consumer demands.
Then they didn’t liberalize prices for 10 months, while at the same time immediately going to a five-day week. Petre Roman said that there were such pent-up expectations that he couldn’t have opposed it. Yes, he couldn’t have opposed it — because he wanted to be in power. And actually what he did was bribery, not giving in to legitimate demands.
What other major mistakes were made?
It all boils down to the fact that prior to October 1990, there was no movement toward economic reform. And the government built up a debt to the miners. I don’t remember the exact figures, but there were about 100,000 workers in a sector that required no more than 20,000, and they not only kept the miners in place for a decade but increased their salaries. Another brilliant idea was dropping the retirement age for scores of workers because of difficult working conditions. And allowing people to retire wholesale. So basically for the first year the government radically increased all sources of macroeconomic imbalances.
Who was making these decisions? Were there economists providing recommendations?
There might have been economists as well. There used to be two categories of economists: real economists and the “geniuses” that Ceausescu was using, for whom the only the thing that mattered was production, with a capital “P.”
So they didn’t have any real economists giving them advice.
Right. On the other hand, I don’t think they would have used their advice anyway. There were political demands, then political debts. Also because of doing all that crap in the first months like coming down hard on the opposition and creating a shitty reputation, Romania had no access to external funding any longer. The government could have done it in an intelligent way. They could have used foreign funding as a way of rounding the angles of liberalization.
Later on, of course, it was more difficult and more costly to make the simple — simple in the sense that they weren’t rocket science — reforms that Balcerowicz did in Poland on the spot. Even now 23 years later, I still favor “shock therapy,” in spite of what happened from 2008 onwards. Those reforms just put the economy on the path to the market, and afterwards we can talk about how much market and how much intervention and so on. But 23 years ago, we did not have a sophisticated financial system that could “give birth to monsters,” as people say.
If somehow a Balcerowicz-style plan had been instituted in Romania 23 years ago, do you think Romania would have been at the level of Slovakia or the Czech Republic today?
Possibly. It definitely would have lost fewer years than otherwise. When things began to work economically in Romania, when the economy was booming, in 2003-4, then the world crisis happened a few years afterwards. This is very similar to what happened to Romania in the inter-war period, with exactly a 70-year difference in time. Between 1934 and 1938, Romania’s economic boom came to a stop because of the world war.
That wasn’t a particularly good time in the world economy.
The crisis was mostly over. But the starting point for Romania was lower than for other countries. In the richer quarters in Bucharest today — Kiseleff, Aviatorilor, Cotroceni, in Dacia where the World Bank is located — all those beautiful villas were built during those four years. My house was built in 1936.
When Bucharest was called the Paris of the East. In October 1990 economic reform started in some fashion. Why did it happen then?
To read the rest of the interview, click here.
Jesus arrives as a gay man of today in a modern city with “The Passion of Christ: A Gay Vision,” a controversial series of paintings that are newly available as a book.
The paintings and the new book that I wrote about them have been attacked as blasphemy by conservative Christians. But we refuse to concede Jesus to those who act like they own the copyright on Christ, then use him as a weapon to dominate others.
The contemporary queer Christ figure is persecuted, killed and rises again in the 24 paintings by New York artist Doug Blanchard. A surprisingly diverse group of friends join the gay Jesus on a journey from suffering to freedom.
Right-wing Christians denounced us as “blasphemers” and condemned our book as an “abomination,” “disgusting” and “an outrage to mock Christ in this manner.” Facebook canceled ads for the book because it was too “shocking.” When the LGBT community protested, the social media company reversed its decision and “resurrected” the ad.
LGBT Christian visions are important now because conservatives are using religion to justify discrimination against queer people. Whenever anyone commits violence against another, Christ is crucified again — including when LGBT people are attacked or killed because of who they are.
Every group envisions Christ in their own image from their own context, and now there is a gay vision of Jesus, shaped by the political, economic and cultural forces of our time. LGBT people often identify with the hurt and humiliation that Jesus experienced on the cross.
As Easter approaches, Christians around the world remember Christ’s Passion — his suffering in his final days as he was betrayed, arrested and brutally killed. Many LGBT Christians and their allies turn to “The Passion of Christ: A Gay Vision” for inspiration.
Blanchard’s gay Way of the Cross shows a contemporary Christ figure who stands up to priests, bankers, politicians, soldiers, and police — all of whom look eerily similar to the people holding those jobs today. He is jeered by fundamentalists, tortured by Marine lookalikes, killed as news cameras broadcast his pain, and rises again to enjoy homoerotic union with God.
The queer Christ is intended to broaden, not limit, how Christ is perceived. Every image of Jesus is insufficient. It is valuable to have images of the “queer Christ” along with all the others to show that Christ is with all human beings in our full diversity.
Crucifixion is the most common theme in LGBT Christian art. Artists consider it the best way to express the horrors inflicted on queer people, to advocate justice and perhaps to offer the hope of new life.
The queer Christ is encountered in members of the LGBT community who have been martyred through anti-LGBT hate crimes, driven to suicide, killed by AIDS or executed in countries where homosexuality is a still capital crime.
The growing number of queer theologians say that the queer Christ is here to free and empower people who were wounded in Christ’s name. Those who were rejected by the church for homosexuality may find that the gay Jesus welcomes and understands them. When believers open to the possibility of a queer Christ, it becomes easier to see the God within the LGBT community.
I have blogged about a wide variety of LGBT Christian images by dozens of artists. Many are included in my book Art That Dares: Gay Jesus, Woman Christ, and More. But none has had as much impact as Blanchard’s gay Passion of Christ paintings. Accessible but profound, they are so popular online that my blog series about them was published recently as an illustrated book. Like the paintings, the book is titled The Passion of Christ: A Gay Vision..
Nobody knows for sure what the historical Jesus looked like or whether he was attracted to other men. Some progressive Bible scholars do argue that Jesus had a same-sex lover, but that is not the point of his life.
What the gospels emphasize about Jesus is the wildly inclusive way that he loved. He lived in solidarity with outcasts, including prostitutes, lepers, immigrants, widows and the poor. Christians believe that in him God became flesh — a total, shocking identification with all people, including the sexually marginalized.
“Christ is one of us in my pictures,” Blanchard says in the introduction to the book. “In His sufferings, I want to show Him as someone who experiences and understands fully what it is like to be an unwelcome outsider.”
Blanchard, an art professor and self-proclaimed “very agnostic believer,” used the series to grapple with his own faith struggles as a gay New Yorker who witnessed the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
In the book each image is accompanied by my essay on its meaning, artistic and historical context, Biblical basis and LGBT significance, plus a short meditation with a scripture and one-line prayer. The images come alive in a video made for the book launch. Excerpts from the book will be posted daily during Holy Week at the Jesus in Love Blog.
Blanchard’s Passion provides a 21st-century version of the traditional Stations of the Cross, a set of artistic images used for meditation on Christ’s suffering and death. The Stations of the Cross remains one of the most popular devotions among Catholics and some Protestants, especially during Holy Week and on Good Friday.
The gay Passion of Christ breaks the deadly illusion that Jesus belongs exclusively to a particular time or group. Many condemn the gay Passion of Christ paintings as blasphemy, but I see them as a blessing that builds faith and a better society.
TUNIS, Tunisia (AP) — Tunisia’s prime minister said Sunday a leading suspect in a deadly museum attack on foreign tourists has been killed in anti-terrorist operations, as tens of thousands of Tunisians marched through the capital to denounce extremist violence.
State news agency TAP cites Prime Minister Habib Essid as saying that Khaled Chaieb, also known as Abou Sakhr Lokman, was killed overnight in an operation in the Gafsa region near the Algerian border. Chaieb is believed a prominent militant in al-Qaida’s North African arm, and suspected of leading or helping lead the March 18 attack on the National Bardo Museum.
Twenty-two people, mainly foreigners, and two gunmen were killed in the March 18 attack on the National Bardo Museum.
French President Francois Hollande, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and several foreign ministers and legislators from other countries are joining an anti-terrorism ceremony in Tunis after the march.
The Tunisian government called on all major political parties to join the march from the seat of government at Bab Es-Saadoun to the museum.
The international visitors are showing solidarity with Tunisia, whose fragile new democracy was deeply shaken by the museum attack, for which the Islamic State group claimed responsibility.
Tunisian protesters unleashed revolts across the region known as the Arab Spring, and Tunisia is the only country to have built a democratic system as a result.
Authorities are struggling with scattered extremist violence linked to various radical Islamic groups, largely linked to neighboring countries Algeria or Libya.
Interior Ministry spokesman Ali Aroui said Sunday that nine suspected “terrorists” were killed when security forces clashed with the suspects in the southwest region of Sidi Aich, near the Algerian border. He said several extremists were wounded in another clash in the northwest region of Kef, as part of security operations around the country ahead of the march.
NEW YORK (AP) — More than seven months before an explosion and fire leveled three apartment buildings in Manhattan’s East Village, utility workers discovered that the gas line to a restaurant in one of them had been illegally tapped, creating a hazardous situation, according to the company.
On Aug. 6, a meter reader at the restaurant detected the smell of gas and reported it, said Consolidated Edison spokesman Allan Drury. A gas crew dispatched to the site found multiple leaks in a gas line that had been tapped, Drury said, adding that the restaurant was the only customer in the building authorized to receive gas.
The discovery led Con Edison to shut down gas service to the building for about 10 days while the building owner made repairs. Gas service was restored after the utility deemed it safe, Drury said.
City officials suspect that leaking natural gas was the source of Thursday’s explosion and fire, which sparked a raging blaze that took hundreds of firefighters to quell. De Blasio visited a firehouse Saturday to thank some of them.
Meanwhile, emergency workers painstakingly looked for signs of two missing people, scooping through piles of loose brick, wood and debris with their hands and using dogs to search the rubble. Authorities acknowledged the chances of finding either person alive were slim.
Officials estimated it could take a week of 24-hour-a-day work to sift through the heap. “It’s going to be slow and arduous,” Fire Commissioner Daniel Nigro said.
Detectives issued posters seeking information on the whereabouts of the men believed to have been in the sushi restaurant on the ground floor of one of the collapsed buildings: 26-year-old Moises Lucon, who worked at the restaurant, and 23-year-old Nicholas Figueroa, a bowling alley worker who had been there on a date.
Their families showed photos of their loved ones and asked for help.
“We have just been walking down the streets, one by one,” brother Zacarias Lucon told the Daily News of New York. “We are just so exhausted and upset.”
Figueroa’s relatives said they were holding out hope.
“My brother is strong,” Neal Figueroa told reporters. “Even if he is still in the rubble, I know he would still be in a predicament to get himself out, and so I’m just praying for that.”
But hope was dimming. When asked about whether anyone would have survived, city Emergency Management Commissioner Joseph Esposito said: “I would doubt that very seriously.”
As some of the several evacuated buildings near the explosion site were declared safe for residents to return, Micha Gerland stood at a police barricade and surveyed the remains of his apartment.
“I still don’t believe it,” said Gerland, 37, who escaped with nothing but his wallet, phone, keys and the clothes he was wearing. “Who thinks that something like that happens?”
Inspectors from Con Ed had visited that building about an hour before the explosion and determined work to upgrade gas service didn’t pass inspection, locking the line to ensure it wouldn’t be used and then leaving, officials said.
Fifteen minutes later, the sushi restaurant’s owner smelled gas and called the landlord, who called the general contractor, Chief of Detectives Robert Boyce said. Nobody called 911 or Con Ed.
The contractor, Dilber Kukic, and the owner’s son went into the basement and opened a door, and then the explosion happened, burning their faces, Boyce said. Kukic, who has pleaded not guilty to an unrelated charge of bribing a housing inspector, declined through his lawyer to comment on the circumstances surrounding the explosion.
The building had an existing gas line intended to serve the sushi restaurant; the work underway was to put in a bigger line to serve the entire building, Con Ed President Craig Ivey said.
The landlord didn’t respond to calls and emails Friday and Saturday from The Associated Press seeking comment.
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Associated Press Radio Correspondent Julie Walker contributed to this report.
There’s nothing more frustrating than trying on a pair of jeans, committing to them by dropping cash, and then getting home and feeling disappointed by your decision. It sometimes seems as though the denim actually morphs between the time you leave the store and the time you get home — either that, or your body changed dramatically.
Just like that, HTC has quietly — well, maybe unintentionally — unveiled its latest phablet on its China website. With some minor differences, the One E9+ is pretty much what we saw on the certification database earlier this month. The biggest sell…
Oh, Christina Hendricks, we adore you.
The 39-year-old actress showed off her new strawberry blonde hair at the New York special screening for “Mad Men” on March 22. Wearing a ruby red sequin Vivienne Westwood dress, Hendricks’ locks fell elegantly against her shoulders. The golden highlights along her jawline add warmth to her creamy complexion.
Check out Hendricks’ strawberry blonde hairdo below, and see which other celebrity hair and makeup looks we loved this week.
Christina Hendricks
Hendricks’ hair color transformation really accentuate her stunning facial features. Her blue eyes appear brighter and seductive pout look fuller.
January Jones
By slicking her locks back into a center-parted chignon, Jones’ gorgeous strawberry lip color really shows. Groomed brows, black eyeliner on the upper lids and a touch of blush add the finishing touch.
Kerry Washington
The “Scandal” star rarely wears her hair this curly, but when she does, it is regal. The glossy ringlets frame Washington’s face perfectly and pair well with her plum eyeshadow and lip color.
Emmy Rossum
Rossum went for a casual-glam hair and makeup for the 2015 BNP Paribas Open with slightly undone waves, dewy skin and melon lipstick. This simple look is super easy to recreate and can be worn every day.
Tia Mowry-Hardict
The former “Sister, Sister” star has found her unique personal style with this blunt bob. Shimmer eyeshadow and a nude pout softens the ultra-sexy factor of her haircut.
Olivia Holt
Holt is proving that she’s definitely one to watch on the red carpet. Her loose waves, highlighted eyes and glowing skin are the perfect combination for this teen star.
We’re sick of our winter boots. They’re covered in salt stains, the heels are worn down and they just make us feel sad. But you know what doesn’t make us feel sad? Summer sandals.
This week, a few of our favorite bloggers rocked some pretty adorable footwear that is getting us inspired for spring. Whether you love slides, metallic heels or lace-up suede sandals, we’ve got a great pair for you.
Behold, the best footwear we saw on Instagram all week:
Natalie Joos’ wooden heels: Yes, they are insanely high but the thick heels would make them a breeze to walk in.
Danielle Bernstein, Athena Calderone and Kate Foley’s Isabel Marant sandals: We’ll take all three.
Kate Brien’s Brunello Cucinelli sandals: Coachella is just around the corner…
Pandora Sykes’s sandals: If summer 2014 was all about slides, summer 2015 is all about lace-up sandals.
Arielle Noa Charnas’s Manolo Blahnik heels: Tassel heels, where do we sign up?
Frédérique Tietcheu’s ASOS heels: Until it gets warm enough for open-toed shoes, throw on a pair of socks to keep your feet from freezing.
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