The Politest Politicians

Last night there was a debate on Belgian television, with 4 politicians all running for a high government office arguing this and that. Since all were French speakers from the southern part of the country, I imagine most of the topics centered on how terrible the politicians from the northern (Dutch speaking) part of Belgium were. Each was probably trying to demonstrate to the public how they and they alone could truly hate the other part of the country. Kind of like a "round table discussion" on Fox News, where each "expert" takes his/her turn at dissing the president, vying to see who can come up with the most outrageous claim. But always in a fair and balanced way. Right.
But what made this debate absolutely unique was that at the conclusion, each of the 4 candidates pulled out a shopping bag and distributed gifts to the other 3. I'm not joking here. It appeared that this was the high point of the debate (it sure would make our own a lot more interesting to watch). The gifts ran from the mundane (e.g., the female candidate got 2 large bouquets) to the fashionable (one candidate, known for his bow ties, received two new, colorful ones), to the downright bizarre (one male candidate gave another a pair of very yellow boxer shorts). My French wasn't good enough to allow me to catch the political significance of the underwear, but, once again, I am not making this up.
If all Belgian politicians could carry this politeness over into their law-making, they might actually be able to have a functioning government in Brussels.

Yellow boxer shorts; I still can't get over it! Could you imagine U.S. presidential debates where each candidate had a gift for the other? Think of how much fun this would have been with Bill Clinton running...