Argentina: Supreme Court Ricardo Lorenzetti's Leap into the Void

After news of Supreme Court of Justice’s favorable ruling on government’s Broadcast Media Law (Ley de Medios Audiovisuales), the president of the Argentine high court has been deeply involved in a personal campaign in every single media available in order to restrain the bloody wave of criticism that foists on him a dangerous proximity to the Pink House and its passionate inhabitants.
 

At this point, it seems that Ricardo Lorenzetti’s effort has unavoidably won the opposite effect of that originally sought. Heavy media exposure embodied by the judge, in addition to justifications subsequently shared in corpore and by phone with newspapers helped the ordinary man (hardly interested in matters of legal nature) to create an idea about the lawyer from the city of Rafaela. And not precisely to link him to positive appraisals: Lorenzetti is currently perceived as an authentic peer of Norberto Oyarbide, as it pays to remember that federal judge residing in Recoleta began to backtrack the way towards his endless personal hell just as he decided to rescue the President from her indescribable operative blunders captured in her declaration of assets.
 

Thus, good old Lorenzetti turns his own service record to ashes, ventured into the same phases that would serve to define the behavior of not a few stuck-in-disgrace officials: unawareness –stage of proceedings in which to be distant from public opinion serves as self-protection and shelter for the actor–; commitment –momentum in which the personage being discussed takes an open position towards potentially destructing alternatives for his image–; and justification –a process in which the protagonist sees no other way out than to take hold of any acceptable method as long as his career and hidden ambitions do not disappear in a putrid sewage. Discredit –needless to say– becomes the last stop in this high-speed highway towards shame and intellectual delirium. Ricardo Lorenzzeti has landed upon this sort of 'finish line', summoned to gather far more bloody suffering than, for example, that allotted for kirchnerist officials in the future. Because nothing else than this was expected from them and, when considering the supreme, much of citizenry were still hopeful.
 

Even worse, the businessman from Rafaela has not done his colleagues from the judicial corporation any service. Public opinion was already aware of the discourteous molecular cohesion which has always combined judges and political leaders. The problem is that Lorenzetti’s stirring position regarding Broadcast Media Law and his vote have established that relationship, once adjacent and usually unnoticed, on ¨people’s agenda¨. Now, the Supreme Court credibility is at stake.
 

In feebleness, to break down the list of the lawyer’s potential and/or current enemies becomes mandatory, since every one of them influences (or will do so, soon) his methods and procedures; to wit:
 

- A growing spectrum of the 'judicial family', excessively dissatisfied with Lorenzetti’s high-profile behavior and his astonishing support to what they regard as National Government’s 'neofascist-like policies'. It is the same group who commands a local initiative close to the Roman mani pulite, a formula which in due time put an end to the most heavy connections between different mafia clusters and lofty links in the peninsula’s political class. The argument: proximity between certain judges and politics threatens to drag down justice administration as a whole; ergo, to remove or at least to isolate any member endangering the corporation existence itself and its raison d'être is mandatory.

- The military intelligence, that have devoted themselves to warn the Court’s magistrate about consequences of the so called Zanotti’s verdict, of which the former was the author and whose introduction reaches such profundity that its darkest aspects remain still undisclosed. The verdict being discussed blew up the sector’s retired and active personnel salaries. And that –according to sources– comes from ideological and budgetary pressures outlined by the notorious Verbitsky-Garré-Milani cabal, wise men who amplify the caliber of their orgasms by shooting at private property (unless it is their own).

- Don Ricardo’s (former) commercial partners from different enterprises in the Province of Santa Fe and catchment areas. Visibly disturbed by the judge’s heavy media exposure, they launched a two-way mechanism, which aims at covering their backs, on the one hand, and filtering specific information about Lorenzetti to the national press, on the other. Always aiming at, conveniently undeclared, protecting their businesses, and also acting as a pressure group from the shadows.

- The superstructure of the pro-government judicial trend, whose leadership is embodied by his colleague Eugenio Raúl Zaffaroni. He is the only member of the Court who does not need to request a hearing to attend the President’s Residence in Olivos, and who –in a discussed slip– confessed the existence of hectic lobbies. This body synergizes with Carlos Zannini (Legal and Technical Secretary) in terms of methodology and operations, and is in charge of reminding the protagonist of this analysis that backing off support for the Administration will no longer be accepted, in spite of the costs involved ('Pacta sunt servanda', a Latin expression made popular by the irreverent Elisa Carrió).

- The media-business consortium under Hector Magnetto [Diario Clarín]’s command, whose scribes will devote extra time to grind Lorenzetti’s image, in 'return' for his vote in favor of the controversial legislation that has  Martín Sabbatella performing the leading role of a run-down agent provocateur. A spectrogram in which it should be noted that in spite of being divided into ¨six little clarines¨, the Group will not split its firepower. Rather, quite the opposite is assumed: the consortium signals will serve as a catalytic instrument for the increasingly furious consumers of anti-K analysis and news. Action and reaction.

- A small group of atomized opposition lawmakers, who have turned Lorenzetti’s little sins into a political agenda which is making headway over public opinion. Finally, they are responsible for placing the Supreme Court of Justice president before journalism as an individual who can be 'pressured' (to borrow the term used by some remarkable operator of the Casa Rosada), determined to become intoxicated inside a crusade aimed at rescuing devalued Cristina Elisabet Fernández Wilhelm from an enormous institutional collapse. They are National Deputies who back up their rhetorical scheme on the well-known 'compensations' usually grasped by the court.
 

After all is said and done, this side effect was logical: pilling up confidential files and folders concerning Ricardo Lorenzetti’s figure has become a commonplace practice.
 

Meanwhile, the conclusion is obvious: in view of coercion and profusion of interests involved, Lorenzetti can no longer continue to officiate as a Supreme Court of Justice judge.

 

Probably in anticipation of massive questioning, the Lawyer reacted as any other tarnished political leader would have reacted, i.e., demanding a supportive statement issued by his peers –just as they did shortly before. This, in plain language means corporate action. A praxis which –intuition allowing– Lorenzetti seems to have copied from the manual of his favorite comrades within the National Government. 'Give it all', they say.


* Originally published in Spanish, on November 5th, 2003.

Translated into English by Débora Gravano Jordán