Final Word from Thursday, December 19, 2002
Václav Klaus' failure to influence the choice of his successor as ODS chairman has been overshadowed by the humorous story of his cellphone text message describing new Chair Mirek Topolánek as phony and vacuous. Blesk tabloid photographed Klaus' cellphone from a balcony during the ODS congress and put the picture of the text message on its front page. ODS is threatening to go to court, putting it in the same league as the Castle, which sued the operator of the www.dagmarhavlova.cz porno site. Imagine the scene in court: The two sides quibble over whether a text message is subject to mail secrecy before it's sent, or only after, and whether Klaus had already sent it. Klaus, who is now as politically alone as the castaway in the Police's "Message in a Bottle," would get to explain whether the SMS was a "fundamental misunderstanding" or an SOS to the world.