Apologize? Like Hell.
Gerard van der Leun says that we all owe Columbia University President Lee Bollinger a big, fat apology (via Instapundit). So does “T-Steel” writing at The Moderate Voice (via memeorandum).
See, Bollinger stood on the stage with Mad Mahmoud and gave him a really stern scolding, which is supposed to make it AOK that he had the murderous little twit as a guest of his University in the first place. Folks like me are, I suppose, supposed to listen to Bollinger’s monologue and cheer while Ahmadinejad gets a virtually free run to speak without serious challenge.
Yeah. Bollinger will get an apology over my dead moldering corpse.
What did Ahmadinejad lose? Nothing he did not have before. Those in the US who consider him a monster still do so. Those who are inclined to forgive his bloodthirsty ways are still as forgiving. In fact, his opening paragraph brushed away everything Bollinger said as if it has no more weight than a starved gnat.
I think the text read by the dear gentleman here, more than addressing me, was an insult to information and the knowledge of the audience here, present here. In a university environment we must allow people to speak their mind, to allow everyone to talk so that the truth is eventually revealed by all.
Certainly he took more than all the time I was allocated to speak, and that’s fine with me. We’ll just leave that to add up with the claims of respect for freedom and the freedom of speech that’s given to us in this country.
Many parts of his speech, there were many insults and claims that were incorrect, regretfully.
How do you imagine that response – just that bit – will be seen as a rebuttal around the world? Do you think it will seem ineffectual? Dream on. Mad Mahmoud took Bollinger’s speech, crumpled it up, spit on it, and kicked it out the window in five succinct sentences. Bollinger should be embarrassed that he was dismissed that easily.
What did he gain, though? Well, would that we could ask Robert Levinson and Ali Shakeri, still held hostage by Mad Mahmoud. Perhaps we should ask some of these folks (via James Lewis) how they feel, those who are still alive and able to get to a microphone without being throw back into prison by our honored guest:
1. Akbar Mohammadi, a student leader, reported tortured to death (www.iranpressnews.com)
2. Abed Tavancheh, 23, a blogger, “arrested and tortured … sustained permanent damage to his kidneys…”
3. Ahmad Batebi, student dissident in 1999, arrested and released after six years, re-arrested on July 29, 2006. Fate unknown.
4. Mansour Ossanloo, the leader of the independent trade union representing the workers of the Vahed Bus Company in Tehran.
5. Ahmadinejad is “also suspected of involvement in the assassination of Abdurrahman Qassemlou, a leader of Iran’s Kurdish minority, in Vienna in 1989.”
How about we find some of those Iranian students – the ones who aren’t in prison right now or in hiding – and ask them how much harder their job of gaining the freedom to walk down the street with someone of the opposite sex without being beaten to death got because Lee Bollinger felt the need to invite their oppressor to town and give him the stage?
Yeah, okay. Enough of that noise. Bollinger doesn’t deserve an apology. Sure, he really tore that Islamist beast a new tailpipe, but it doesn’t make up for the fact that the big story won’t be his speech. The big story will be that Mad Mahmoud shrugged off Bollinger’s speech with no effort whatsoever and got to speak to the world, without interruption, to say whatever he wanted to say and that he did it here.
Shame on Lee Bollinger – vast and eternal shame. And shame on Messers van der Leun and “T-Steel” for the very suggestion that Bollinger receive anything but our scorn. No speech could make up the heinous error he made in having Ahmadinejad as his honored guest no matter how fiery nor impassioned.
No related posts.
Category: Blogs and Blogging, No More Tyrants
Thanks Jimmie for reading my post.
I don't feel shamed simply because I know President Ahmadinejad is a slimy, nasty, and lying little man. I didn't like Columbia inviting him at first but withheld judgement seeing if they were actually going to hit him hard with questions. It happened and I was please. Lee Bollinger was accused BEFORE this event of sympathizing with Ahmadinejad and being a fringe leftist nut. He was nothing of the sort.
Now I do understand the intensely strong feelings you and others have. If he was allowed to visit Ground Zero, I would have teleported myself to his face and applied some of my Tang Soo Doo training liberally to his body. But I respect Lee Bollinger for doing exactly what he said he would do. And Ahmadinejad looked stupid no matter how his speech is spun.
The real issue/problem in Iran is the Supreme Leader of Iran, the Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. That guy IS the heart and soul of Iran. And he pulls all of Ahmadinejad strings along with controlling his human bombs.
By the way, I'm not a member of the left or right (I have issues with both). Been a moderate independent my entire adult life.
So what that they hit him hard with questions, though? What good did the questions do? How did they overcome the huge boost of legitimacy that the invitation gave him?
Did you see how breezily Ahmadinejad brushed off everything Bollinger said? Now how do you think that's going to be reported around the world? How do you think that will be read by the people bleeding and dying for their freedom in Iran? How do you think that's going to play in Iraq where Mahmoud's power base is killing our soldiers and Iraqis every day?
That's where today mattered and Bollinger played right into the little fascist's hands.
Ahmadinejad "breezily" brush off everything because he is a stone ugly fool. Substitute "breezily" for "stupidly". Look Jimmie, Ahmadinejad can get a stage anywhere. He's a walking stage. That can't be helped. BUT he wasn't allowed to just spit his venom without being checked. And the "check" is important in today's always plugged in world. More and more will come to loathe him because he can't defend himself. And who did it to him? Some American university guy and some students.
And as far as those in Iran that are "bleeding and dying for their freedom" unless they stand up to him or we attempt another Iraq style liberation, him and the Grand Ayatollah will continue to persecute them.
Jimmie, I absolutely respect your passion on this issue and others. But there are despots visiting the U.S. regularly (like some of those African leaders supervising holocausts in their countries). Ahmadinejad is just another one of those despots who's own words de-legitimizes him.
You may well be right, T-Steel.
I think in six months, the image of Mad Mahmoud standing unfazed at Columbia University will be a far more enduring image than anything Lee Bollinger has ever said.
We'll see.