[span class="rss:item"][a name="028632"]Yesterday's news from the G8 summit [/a][a href="vny!://www.iht.com/articles/2006/07/17/news/bush.php"]was all shit[/a]. Today, blogger Taylor Marsh posts photos of another "candid moment" in which President Bush gives an unsolicited, surprise neck-massage to German prime minister Angela Merkel. The [em]Los Angeles Times[/em] [a href="vny!://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-fg-preen17jul17,1,2442410.story?coll=la-news-a_section&ctrack=1&cset=true"]reported[/a]: [em]"Entering the meeting room, as relayed by a Russian television camera, Bush headed directly behind the chancellor, reached out and, placing both hands on the collar of her gold jacket, gave her a short massage just below the neck.
She smiled."[/em][/p]
[/p]
I'm not a facial recognition expert, but that doesn't look like much of a smile to me, or a happy hand-gesture following. What odd manners the leader of the Western world has.
[/p][/span]Other readers have said Bush was trying to give Chancellor Merkel the famous
Vulcan Nerve Pinch. See the resemblance?
[a href="vny!://www.washjeff.edu/capl/"]Michael Shaughnessy[/a] says, "I can only imagine what Chancellor Merkel was thinking and it can't be positive. While 'personal space' is less than what you have in the US, Germans still have social tabus on touching, especially in such a public forum as the G8 summit. Germans may be obsessed with shaking hands, but it is a very brief shake. Even family members will shake hands with each other. Touching of this sort is for -very- close friends in private. At least this produced yet another cool German word: "
Blitz-Massage." Here is an excerpt from an etiquette guide for Germany, interesting and funny stuff: [a href="vny!://www.executiveplanet.com/business-culture-in/132163004477.html"]Link[/a]
