Ivo Sanader, a former prime minister of Croatia, got only eight years and a half for three cases having to do with corruption and organized crime that reached all the way to Austria, Hungary, and Germany. The first two cases involved oil and gas, while the last one was about financial shenanigans with the Hypo Alpe Adria Bank. The golf scam that he helped run in Croatia has never reached the court. All in all, the court’s decision concerning his punishment says that crime pays. More important, the greater the crime, the smaller the punishment. That is the court’s message in plain words. Now surprisingly, the president of Croatia, Ivo Josipović, has labeled it as high treason, no less. And he is a professor of law, forever watchful of his tongue. In other words, the court has acted against the interest of the state and the nation. And so has Sanader, it goes without saying. In fact, I wonder how many Croatian politicians since independence would be able to escape the same verdict. One high treason after another for a couple of decades. Croatia in a nutshell.