Bush’s Policy Chit-Chat: Undiplomatic Prose nytimes
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/18/world/middleeast/18prexy.html?_r=1&oref=slogin By JIM RUTENBERG
Published: July 18, 2006
STRELNA, Russia, July 17 — For anyone who has ever wondered what President Bush sounds like when the microphones are off, the answer, at least at lunchtime on Monday, was blunt to the point of profane, laced with a wiseguy edge and, like anyone forced to make small talk, willing to fall back on safe topics like air travel.
Using a vulgarity, Mr. Bush said at one point that Syria should get Hezbollah to stop its attacks on Israel, describing American policy in the kind of unfettered language that he acknowledged only weeks ago sometimes gets him in trouble when he uses it publicly.
Discussing diplomatic efforts in the Middle East, Mr. Bush said the approach favored by Kofi Annan, the United Nations secretary general, “seems odd.” Referring to President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, Mr. Bush said he “felt like telling Kofi to get on the phone with Assad, make something happen.”
The microphone caught him discussing global trade talks, his impatience with long speeches, even his preference for Diet Coke. For four minutes, the world was given an unscripted look at how he does business with his international counterparts, especially Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, who, apparently alert to the peril, brought the episode to a conclusion by turning the microphone off.