Final Word from Friday, November 18, 2005
Education Minister Petra Buzková told LN she can't imagine anything passing in the cabinet if Jiří Paroubek disagrees with it. Paroubek has cultivated the image of a hard hitter who gets what he wants. But is it true? What about the cap on social security, where he caved in to the Communists? Or the battle over David Rath's dual position as health minister and head of the Medical Chamber, where he lost to Václav Klaus? Or his little-publicized comments to the Confederation of Industry, where he told the crowd what it wanted to hear about the labor code, only to be set straight hours later by Labor Minister Zdeněk Škromach? Paroubek talks like I-am-the-greatest Muhammad Ali but, when up against the ropes, he has to be saved by the bell. He has a glass jaw that will shatter if hit hard enough. Luckily for him, ODS has been wearing heavily padded gloves. [Czech Republic KSČM Communist Party social-security tax health]