"Mr. President, You Exhibit All The Signs of a Petty and Cruel Dictator": Welcome To Columbia, Mahmoud!

All three cable nets are zoomed in on Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and have been for the past hour, and we're predicting a ratings spike because wow was that ever tense TV — at least at the beginning when badass Columbia prez Lee Bollinger unleashed a can of whoopass on his distinguished guest. In the same breath as standing up for open discourse and faith in the students' capacity for measured indivdiual evaluation Bollinger hammered Ahmadinejad on the execution numbers in his country, his denial of the Holocaust, his call for the destruction of Israel and his crackdown on human rights. "We do not honor the dishonorable when we open our public forum to their voices," said Bollinger in a shot across the bow. Then he said, "Mr, President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator." Yowsers.

The audience, shot wide from the back of the room, revealed a noticeably large number of yarmulkes.

When he finally took the floor, Ahmadinejad chided Bollinger for his "insult to information" and rapped him for taking up all of his time. Ooh, snap. Then he babbled for what seemed like ages. At one point someone in our office exclaimed, "is he actually saying anything?" Also, the high-pitched voice of the female translator — sounding agitated and shrill — began to grate. No wonder people are so cranky at these summits.

Luckily, the nets were on hand to helpfully distill the speech for viewers via the trusty chyron, like this "Breaking News" gem from MSNBC: "Iran's President: Realities of world not limited to physical realities." Er, thanks. We then switched to Fox, which was like candy for the eyeballs with that much more color on the chyron and a super-special Ahmadinejad bug in the lower right-hand corner, glowering appropriately, so his visage would be doubly emblazoned on our eyeballs. He did say that about Iran's gay population, though — possibly there are less gay Iranians because they have a much higher chance of being executed? Just a guess.

Find accounts of the speech here here and here, plus the liveblog of the speech by the NYT's Sewell Chan here. Though reading it you don't get the disturbing effect of some of the random bursts of applause. Also, watching him dissemble on whether he was calling for the destruction of Israel was sort of chilling. Oh and his "fresh viewpoint" perspective on the Holocaust is also the furthest thing from refreshing. Still, good on Bollinger and Columbia for hosting, in my view. Lots of people will know lots more thanks to this event. Not from anything Ahmadinejad actually said, mind you, but still.

Comments

[Prakosh]

04:20 PM on 09/26/2007

The Senate, including Hillary Clinton, just voted to give Bush the authority to take "military action" against Iran. Given the previous actions of our president, I would think that Mr Ahmadinejad has far serious problems than any slurs, no matter how ill-considered, or wrong-headed, from an under-fire University President. Yes, the media has piled on, that is what they do, they are no brighter or educated than the average college graduate, and as they have demonstrated over and over, that isn't very bright at all. MSNBC still has not even mentioned the Senate vote; even though they are talking about Clinton, her election chances and the war with Iraq. They just showed Code Pink being dragged out of a hearing but they still haven't reported the Iran amendment vote. WHY?
Are they trying to figure out how to spin it?

[shedances]

12:15 PM on 09/26/2007

Columbia University president Lee Bollinger is absolutely right: Their guest is a "cruel" and manipulative dictator, who needs to be held accountable for his statements & actions. I'm glad, also, that this particular leader had to face difficult questions about his past callous remarks ... esp. those surrounding the atrocities of the Holocaust.

Quite possibly, viewers ~ both in the U.S. & abroad (including in the guest's home country of Iran...) ~ will gain something significant from viewing this invited discussion.

I hope so.

KELLI

[BluGrrl]

11:24 AM on 09/26/2007

Let me make it clear that I do not like the Iranian President and view him somewhat like a snake in the grass and I certainly don't trust him.

BUT I see the President of Columbia University as staging a publicity stunt. The only reason he had Ahmadinejad at his school was for the publicity, so he could put his big head on camera and berate the Iranian President and score brownie points with the American people and the Jewish community.

[Chefrad]

09:11 AM on 09/26/2007

Ahmadinejad was invited to speak to the students and faculty, not to debate Mr. Bollinger.

The fact that the likes of Abe Foxman has begun circuating Bollinger's "introduction" provides a fair hint as to who Bollinger's real audience was: the "David Project" shock troops of the Lobby that doesn't exist.
The same people who shut up Tony Judt, sabotaged Norman Finkelstein's tenure, and kept "Rachel Corrie" playing in church basements, i.e., the "champions of free speech."

[gulopartisan]

07:54 AM on 09/26/2007

Bollinger did just fine. Our gutless, complacent journalists have convinced us that confrontational truth is "tacky." It's not. Maybe with the lesson of Bollinger, a few traditional media lace shirts will set aside their Chablis and start interviewing the fascists and thugs running this administration.

[BluGrrl]

11:34 AM on 09/26/2007

fat chance of that happening.

[pansycritter]

07:26 PM on 09/25/2007

This is a rather embarassing and pathetic Huffingtonpost. Compared to George W. Bush, President Ahmadinejad lied no more and no less.

We are not America if we are afraid of ideas that do not conform to our touchy-feely huggy-fest.

Sorry Ms. Rich Huffington, this is not acceptable. You show your stripe and your wealth.

[Chefrad]

12:28 PM on 09/25/2007

Bollinger's treament of Ahmedinejad was bad form, and not just by middle eastern standards. Every single point made by Bollinger a) has been made before in the US medIia b) could be made without personal insults c) would have been made during the question sesssion anway.

This bit about lots of yarmukes being in the audience is transparently antisemitic, given that we know from countless book reviews of Waky and Miersheimer, that there is no such thing as a pro-Israeli lobby.

[brantl]

10:16 AM on 09/26/2007

Ever heard of AIPAC? Wake up and smell the coffee.

[BluGrrl]

11:33 AM on 09/26/2007

Excuse me? How is pointing out the number of yarmulkes in an audience "antisemitic"? Would I be "anti blonde" by saying "wow there were a lot of blonde's at the peroxide convention"?

Seriously, how lame... But keep crying "wolf", does you a lot of good...

"no such thing as a pro-Israeli lobby" ????

Ever heard of AIPAC before? Oh, the word "AIPAC" is probably "antisemitic" in your world too.

[eaglecapri]

09:22 AM on 09/25/2007

I'm pretty sure Mahmoud Ahmadinejad could care less of what americans think of him. He may have been a bit rattled, but he's over it. He's like George Bush in that respect. He's going to keep lying, pushing his agenda and could care less what we think.

[BluGrrl]

11:37 AM on 09/26/2007

Personally I think that GWB and MA have more in common than either would be willing to admit. For instance, they are both extremely unpopular, not only in their own countries but throughout the world. They are both religious fanatics and have more faith in Theocracy than Democracy. They both lie to their own people and commit acts that are detrimental to the long term peace and prosperity of their countries. The list goes on...

[autodefensa]

10:47 PM on 09/24/2007

The tone of this article is no more serious than some trivia about a celebrity becoming pregnant, getting caught with drugs or filing for divorce.

Yet with Ahmedinejad, issues of wars and world peace hang in the balance. I'm appalled by the way the media, government officials, and Columbia's president treated Ahmadinejad and would, if I could, apologize to him and the Iranian people.