Should Ahmadinejad be Allowed to Speak at Columbia?

So sorry I didn't actually write anything to "defend" my view Rox. Something else intruded on my time thus keeping me from doing so when I voted.

I have no problem with this idiot spewing forth his hatred of all things western. Free speech is free speech. If he wants to stand on the corner of Wall Street and spew his venom, all power to him. He has done a really fine job of getting his views out while sitting in the comfy confines of Iran. But I do have a problem of an American university giving him a platform to spew his hatred. But of course it seems my liberal friends here think otherwise. It just seems to me to be enough hatred in this world without giving a platform to someone who openly wishes for the destruction of our country.

I've read often on A2K from other conservatives how they think the liberals must support our enemies. I think I'm going to start believing them.

And that's all I have to say on this matter because there really is no need for me to come back and debate this issue with you Roxxxanne or anyone else. This opinion you all are taking disgusts me so I'll leave now before I exercise my free speech rights and say something that will cause hard feelings between myself and a couple of you who I consider to be A2K friends.

I find placation and pandering often robs tyrants of power.

Allowing someone to speak and inviting someone to speak are two very different things, but you're not really intelligent enough to tell the difference.

McGentrix wrote:

Allowing someone to speak and inviting someone to speak are two very different things, but you're not really intelligent enough to tell the difference.

Inviting someone to speak doesn't equate to either placation or pandering, but you're not really intelligent enough to know the difference.

And I mean that, seriously. You are not intelligent enough to know the difference. This fact becomes more and more obvious every time you post.

Cycloptichorn

Cycloptichorn wrote:

McGentrix wrote:

Allowing someone to speak and inviting someone to speak are two very different things, but you're not really intelligent enough to tell the difference.

Inviting someone to speak doesn't equate to either placation or pandering, but you're not really intelligent enough to know the difference.

And I mean that, seriously. You are not intelligent enough to know the difference. This fact becomes more and more obvious every time you post.

Cycloptichorn

I know you like to throw your insults around when challenged, it must be a fun game for you as often as it happens.

Ahmagettinafootjob does not represent the type of person anyone in America should be willing to host. Aside from his visit to the U.N., his time in America should be limited to his convoy and an airplane.

What could he possibly have to say that would be of interest to anyone, especially at a university campus? Maybe he can explain to them how the dirty Jews created the holocaust and that is why they should be eradicated from the Earth. Or, perhaps he will say something negative about the current American administration. I know you lunatics on the left eat that **** for breakfast. I bet most of the people that would want to go hear him would probably rather have him as their representative to the UN.

So, placate your hero cycloptichorn, pander to his insanity and perhaps someday you can be just like him. An insane little man.

Turning Ahmadinejad into public enemy No. 1
Demonizing the Iranian president and making his visit to New York seem controversial are all part of the neoconservative push for yet another war.

By Juan Cole

Sept. 24, 2007 | Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to New York to address the United Nations General Assembly has become a media circus. But the controversy does not stem from the reasons usually cited.

The media has focused on debating whether he should be allowed to speak at Columbia University on Monday, or whether his request to visit Ground Zero, the site of the Sept. 11 attack in lower Manhattan, should have been honored. His request was rejected, even though Iran expressed sympathy with the United States in the aftermath of those attacks and Iranians held candlelight vigils for the victims. Iran felt that it and other Shiite populations had also suffered at the hands of al-Qaida, and that there might now be an opportunity for a new opening to the United States.

[Instead, the U.S. State Department denounced Ahmadinejad as himself little more than a terrorist. Critics have also cited his statements about the Holocaust or his hopes that the Israeli state will collapse. He has been depicted as a Hitler figure intent on killing Israeli Jews, even though he is not commander in chief of the Iranian armed forces, has never invaded any other country, denies he is an anti-Semite, has never called for any Israeli civilians to be killed, and allows Iran's 20,000 Jews to have representation in Parliament.

There is, in fact, remarkably little substance to the debates now raging in the United States about Ahmadinejad. His quirky personality, penchant for outrageous one-liners, and combative populism are hardly serious concerns for foreign policy. Taking potshots at a bantam cock of a populist like Ahmadinejad is actually a way of expressing another, deeper anxiety: fear of Iran's rising position as a regional power and its challenge to the American and Israeli status quo. The real reason his visit is controversial is that the American right has decided the United States needs to go to war against Iran. Ahmadinejad is therefore being configured as an enemy head of state.
/QUOTE] http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/09/24/ahmadinejad/index.html

No, you are wrong. He is NOT simply another person. That's the part you don't seem to understand.

He is the leader of a country that is seeking nuclear weapons, that has publicly stated he wishes to see other countries obliterated and is a general prick on human rights.

Knowing the facts on this man is not building him up as a devil, and it does not give him power. He already has that through the oppression he and his government use on the folks back home.

If you want to sit in your comfy Berkeley home and ignore one of the most dangerous men in the world coming here and speaking before a bunch of idiots that will be hanging on his every word, that is fine for you. I am sure your ignorance will be greatly appreciated by him.