Sever Voinescu

Often described as a member of the intellectual faction close to President Traian Băsescu, Voinescu was characterized by political opponents as a person lacking in independence, a verdict which, in 2007, cost him advancement in the diplomatic service.

During his time in office, Sever Voinescu became known as a supporter of inner-party reform and pressed for the PDL's transformation into a conservative group, although he is still noted for taking sides against stronger critics of the party line.

"[7] In the political climate following the 1989 Revolution, Voinescu also became active on the public scene, originally as a member of the civil society platform known as Group for Social Dialogue (a membership which, in 2008, he listed as one of the "tidbits in my biography that I take pride in").

[8] Voinescu's articles covered a wide range of subjects, among which reviewers highlight his interventions on the topic of Romanian economy,[9] his posthumous homage to American literary theorist Susan Sontag,[10] and his defense of Chalcedonian Christianity against neo-Gnosticism.

[11] Voinescu established himself on the political scene after the 2004 legislative and presidential elections, when the Social Democrats were defeated by the Justice and Truth coalition (DA), which also successfully endorsed Băsescu as President.

[14] On the occasion, Social Democratic senator and Committee President Mircea Geoană, himself a former Ambassador to Washington, claimed that Voinescu's support for Băsescu made him a partisan option, and therefore unsuited for the office.

[3][14] In a November 2008 interview with Evenimentul Zilei, Voinescu provided his own take on the event, commenting that the reason presented by the Committee was "purely political", and arguing that: "In that [pre-referendum] context they would have outvoted God himself, had he been supported by Băsescu.

[3] He also pointed out that, although a member of a faction politically allied with Băsescu, he did not intend to placate the latter in his public statements, and criticized his party for resorting to "suspicious borrowings [and] bizarre additions" in order to meet the necessary number of candidates.

[3] Believed by Evenimentul Zilei to be the natural choice for a PDL Foreign Minister, he spoke in favor of continuing a close cooperation with the United States, and justified Romania's traditional qualms toward Russia.

[6] The candidature sparked negative comments from Jurnalul Naţional columnist Victor Ciutacu, who paralleled it with news that journalists Ungureanu and Cătălin Avramescu were also planning to run in elections as PDL affiliates.

Although describing Voinescu as "a coherent journalist", Ciutacu alleged that all three were basing their actions on their support for Băsescu, and that they were thus comparable to lăutari singers, "who, depending on how good their showmanship is, are rewarded by the man sitting at the head of the table.

"[17] In contrast, journalists at Gândul concluded that both Voinescu and Avramescu were electoral assets coveted by PDL leader Emil Boc, who, like other public figures from non-politicized areas, could bring help the party earn extra votes in the post-party-list era.

[19] In a January 2009 interview with Academia Caţavencu's Eugen Istodor, Voinescu stated his dissatisfaction with the post-election Emil Boc cabinet, founded around a PDL-PSD alliance at the end of failed negotiations between the PDL and the National Liberals.

Instead of debates between the candidates and letting the citizens decide, in the absence of any other influences, who should be the one to lead the country for the next five years, we have come to discuss a dubious, murky film, promoted on the screens of [media] mogul television stations with an obvious electioneering purpose.

"[23] Following Băsescu's eventual reelection, Voinescu also subjected to public ridicule the claims of various PSD members that their candidate, Mircea Geoană, had been a victim of negative parapsychological techniques, such as "energy attacks" and "violet flame" power.

[29] However, in an October interview with Istodor, Preda suggested that he still identified his own political partisanship with "the triad" of Voinescu, Macovei and Teodor Baconschi within a "collective identity" of PDL reformists, noting that he rejected the opposition parties as merely "preservers of the welfare state.

[35] Cristian Preda spoke of the voting inaccuracies as "an error" on the part of Anastase and Voinescu, claiming that the illegal but allegedly commonplace absentee ballot had rendered unreliable all Chamber attendance reports.

[30] In a November interview with Radio France Internationale, Preda elaborated that the party as a whole needed to apologize for the "embarrassing" incident, and, while noting that Anastase's removal was not an option, asked Voinescu to present a formal explanation.

[43] TV critic and Dilema colleague Cezar Paul-Bădescu, who describes OTV as "a station specializing in cadavers and characters on the fringe of humanity", declared himself puzzled by Voinescu's rationale, but noted: "maybe [his reasons are] the same ones that prompted president Băsescu to conclude, back in the day, that said channel was frequentable".

[42] Other cultural magazines also reacted negatively to Voinescu's explanation of OTV's secret fan base: România Literară called his analysis "useless and dangerous",[41] while Luceafărul took offense from the implication "that we are all headless beings with morbid inclinations".

[2] By 2008, Voinescu's Dilema Veche column was giving significant coverage to American politics, and were noted as a countercritique of Marxist takes on the world crisis,[45] with suggestions that the memory of communism as a "criminal utopia" needed to be preserved in unadulterated fashion, for the benefit of future generations.

[53] In summer 2011, with fellow pundits Valeriu Stoica and Cătălin Avramescu, Sever Voinescu attended the conference tour on "Issues of the Romanian Right", jointly organized by the PDL's Institute for People's Studies and the Hanns Seidel Foundation.

[56][57] Băsescu added that, instead of focusing on Boc, Voinescu should have spoken out against the "BVB triad" of PDL-ists who resist a change of platform: Radu Berceanu, Adriean Videanu and Vasile Blaga.

"[58] According to Voinescu, there is an untapped electorate that consistently votes against left-wing policies, but is increasingly disenchanted with the effects of right-wing governance, and tacitly supporting any conservative, conviction politics, "Thatcherite" solution to Romania's woes.

[60] He sketched out and advanced a proposal for a PDL Code of Conduct, which is supposed to regulate the party's response to criminal charges brought up against its politicians (past cases include Monica Iacob Ridzi or Dan Păsat), in what he described as an effort to increase transparency.

[65] Additionally, Voinescu expressed disapproval for some Boc cabinet policies which he sees as deviating from the PDL's right-wing credentials, including the "pensioners' basket" welfare program,[66] and publicly called for a radical change of the Romanian Constitution, deeming it "profoundly flawed" for what he interprets as a chronic failure to uphold the separation of powers.

[63] There was also a disagreement between Voinescu and President Băsescu in matters of world politics, after the latter went on record with a claim that Romania's future development depended on a hypothetical United States of Europe federation.

[74] He was also directing criticism toward the PDL's partner in government, the nominally left-wing National Union for the Progress of Romania, arguing that it could not expect to be included in the emerging party: "rest assured, nobody asked you in.

[77][78] In this capacity, he signed the protocol which gave Romanian support for Georgia's Euro-Atlantic integration, and expressed the official viewpoint that Russia had no reason to fear the national missile defense developed in Eastern Europe.

"[79] He and the party initially rallied behind Premier Boc: Voinescu expressed the viewpoint that popular indignation was not solely aimed at the PDL administration, but at the entire ruling class, and argued that the street demands for early elections were impractical.