aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South

Monday, May 22, 2006

Czech pols duke it out

After clawing and squeezing my way through a medieval silver mine whose slimy walls were both reminiscent of the inside of Sigourney Weaver’s Alien AND poisonous (I can’t imagine that such a tour would be legal in the U.S.) I sat in a hillside restaurant eating something akin to Czech BBQ (don’t ask) when the bartender changed the channel and those gathered turned their attention to the television screen to watch this:

Czech Health Minister David Rath has been in a punch-up with his right-wing rival, Miroslav Macek, during a meeting of disgruntled dentists in Prague.

Mr Macek, a presidential adviser and former deputy PM who is also a dentist, broke off an address to slap Mr Rath hard on the back of the head.

Mr Rath responded by calling him a coward and the two men traded blows.

This rare case of violence in Czech politics comes two weeks before highly anticipated parliamentary elections.

As you might imagine I’m very interested in the political situation here. But the focus of our trip is music and theater so I have learned little so far. I do find that the people have a deep antipathy to George Bush without even realizing their apparent fondness for all of his policies except the war. We go to Prague at the end of the week, maybe I’ll learn more there.