President Václav Klaus has become a global internet sensation after pocketing a ceremonial pen at a diplomatic press conference, with videos of the incident garnering 1.5 million views and counting on YouTube.
In case you missed it, here’s the video from Czech Television’s 168 Hours program.
In the wake of the apparent gaffe, both presidents’ spokespeople were quick to point out Klaus had done nothing wrong.
Klaus spokesman Radim Ochvat said that it was “a pen with a logo of the state or office, which presidents and members of their delegation receive during state visits.”
No stranger to free stuff, Klaus got this cake from Hilton Prague for the 92nd anniversary of the founding of Czechoslovakia
It’s easy to see why this particular writing instrument caught the 69-year-old leader’s eye, as it’s encrusted with semi-precious Chilean lapiz lazuili stones.
Chilean President Sebastian Pinera’s spokeswoman Constanza Cea confirmed the president’s guests are free to take the pens, Associated Press reported.
This hasn’t stopped a Facebook group from being set up with the aim of generating a mass donation of pens, pencils and crayons to present to Prague Castle May 2.
It’s not the first time the Czech president has held such an expensive pen, either. At his swearing-in for his second presidential term in 2008, Klaus was presented with a 18-carat gold pen worth 1 million Kč (around $60,000), Radio Prague reported.
The pen was made especially for Klaus by penmaker Kohinoor, which once supplied the royal palace in Vienna during the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The company said at the time that they decided to make the Presidential Line of pens after another pen-related gaffe at the president’s swearing in five years earlier.
At that time in 2003, the newly-elected president was given a pen that wouldn’t write, and had to search his own pockets for one. Perhaps that explains this past week’s incident.
Marc Werman of PRI’s The World program interviewed The Prague Post Editor-in-chief Benjamin Cunningham about the gaffe April 14. You can listen to the interview here.
Why should we be surprised? This confirms the postulate that all politicians are corrupt. The Czech President is no different from your local councilman, state senator, assemblyman, alderman or other elected official. Nor is he different from your typical ambulance chasing attorney, tax cheat, disability cheat, plaintiff, welfare recipient, steroid using sports star or any other American or illegal immigrant that tries to get ahead by scamming the system. Corruption, theft, public malfeasance are all part of the system overseas and here in America. If you wan’t real change start by voting against your incumbent elected officials on the next election day.
I realize that it is popular to tear down politicians, but let’s be realistic here – this was a state pen, and an item that he is routinely entitled to. There is a very good chance that this gentleman collects these as mementoes, much like many of us collect souveneir spoons as mementoes of our various travels. As a penmaker, I have many clients who collect my pens, and have already reserved one for themselves out of multiple future issues, and as such pen collecting is indeed very mainstream.