Bush's Back Rub Magnified in Cyberspace

[cal04]

An impromptu back rub that President Bush gave German Chancellor Angela Merkel is now massaging millions of funny bones.

A 5-second video and series of photographs recently posted on YouTube.com and various blogs show Bush surprising Merkel at the G-8 Summit by quickly rubbing the back of her neck and shoulders. The chancellor immediately hunches her shoulders, throws her arms up and grimaces, though she appears to smile as Bush walks away.

The video has been one of the most popular clips on the Web and spawned countless remarks on the particulars of etiquette for world leaders. Coupled with Bush's use of an expletive at the summit and a U.S. senator comparing the Internet to a ''series of tubes,'' the incident reveals anew the power of the Web -- and YouTube, specifically -- to beam embarrassing political gaffes around the world.

Larry Sabato, professor of politics at the University of Virginia, agrees that today, public figures have to be more careful in ''a thousand ways.'' But he maintains sites like YouTube can be revealing.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-Bush-YouTube.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

[John Q. Citizen]

1. "Magnified" is misleading. Echoed or publicized would be a lot

more accurate, IMHO.

[blonndee]

2. Woo hoo! A bit of a counterpoint to the corpmedia's

"reporting" on the issue when it occured. As usual, the internets are waaaay ahead of the game.

[Mandate My Ass]

3. Even if it is *magnified* which is highly dubious

it's only because the MSM refuses to cover any news item, foreign or domestic, which is either critical of Bush or merely reports his repeated blunders, until they can no longer ignore it. Then they simply respond, "the blogosphere is so shrill and partisan."

[Jack_Dawson]

4. Can someone link me to the Ted Steven video?

I'm over 30 and can't navigate YouTube

[Roland99]

5. The one about the internet tubes? It's at CrooksandLiars.com

Gotta go back to July 13