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"As for the current state of Croatia, who knows? I’d prefer to hear from someone who doesn’t have a dog in this fight, as this writer evidently does."

There is something that the writer said, which doesn't quite makes sense to me. He said that Sanader controls the news source Javno. But Javno had the following report: Croatia Ruled by Mafia and Crime

If Sanader was Mafia and controlled Javno, you'd think that he wouldn't let them publish a headline like that.

I confess I have not really followed events in Croatia since the breakup, so I speak from ignorance. As far as I know, there may be some corruption—as there certain is, for instance, in Chicago or Washington—but things have been stable. That’s just a distant impression. But if things were really bad, we’d be hearing more about it.

As for economic troubles, what country isn’t having economic trouble these days?

I would have said, speaking mostly from ignorance, that Croatia did well to get out from under the Muslims, the Communists, the Nazis, and all the other malign forces that have been overrunning the region for the past century and more.

And that this reporter obviously is prejudiced.

Jeffery T. Kuhner has been writing articles critical of Croatia's HDZ not out of some objective view, but rather because he is very, very close to Dr. Ivic Pasalic, the man who lost his leadership bid for the HDZ to the current leader Ivo Sanader by 55% to 45%. Sanader represents the moderate faction within the party and Pasalic represented the hard right nationalist faction that has since been expelled and dispersed amongst several other parties.

Pasalic was President Tudjman's main advisor during the post-war phase and was loathed by Croatia's liberals and those working for George Soros.

I don't have hard evidence, but it's not difficult to conclude that Mr. Kuhner is on Pasalic's payroll. Pasalic has tried several times to get back into the political game but the Sanader machine has been an effective one, both wiping out the hard right and sidelining Croatia's liberals and socialists time and time again.

As for Croatia being a mafia state, corruption is still typically high (but normal on a Balkan level) as four decades of communism have imprinted such poor business standards and politics on the country.