WHAT'S WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE?
Maybe it's a new "Clean Hands" policy....





From the popular German magazine, Der Spiegel ("the mirror"), a piece entitled "Faux Paws"....

In Central Europe, when they say politicians have to press flesh, they mean it very literally. Custom dictates that you always greet someone with an un-gloved hand, no matter the weather. When US President George W. Bush didn't remove his warm leather gloves while meeting Slovak diplomats after his arrival in Bratislava on Wednesday night, he created quite a public stir. The protocol malfunction -- while offensive to those who were proffered the leather encased hand -- may not have been nearly as big a deal if it weren't for the fact that the reception was being broadcast live on national television. It's understandable that in temperatures only just above freezing that the president and his wife would want to keep their fingers warm (Laura remained be-gloved, too), but some protocol officer should have warned them in advance. "I don't know whether this is usual in the United States, but it is not in our countries. They may have not been informed about Central European habits," said Deana Lutherova, a Slovak protocol expert, said to the Czech news agency CTK. Yeah, apparently they weren't. Still, on the grand scale of diplomatic faux pas, this hardly rates alongside, say, vomiting on a prime minister and then falling over. Bush Jr. continues to do his daddy proud.