So, Ahmadinejad sets foot on American soil and the pundits go wild. I waited a day to digest all of this and formulate my position on all of this...so here goes...
As a lawyer I take the First Amendment very seriously. (Hear that Senator McCain?) I also believe that discourse on issues, no matter how radical the position, only helps solidify common sense based positions in most of our citizens, at least the ones that are paying attention. So, the question as put forth today seems to be, did Columbia University allowing Ahmadradicalizad to speak give him a positive leg up or did it hurt him because people saw how radical he was and what we're up against when looking to a civilized Iran...?
Word out there is a lot of people in Iran want him out of there anyway...they would like to be a modernized, free country where they can enjoy some of the same freedoms we do without worrying about some nut job bombing somewhere and getting them into a war. (Okay you libs and pink slippers out there...I'm NOT talking abou Bush...) So I am sure that a lot of people in Iran believed that this exposure to the world would be helpful in the rest of the world helping to something to get rid of this guy...but I'm not sure it worked.
If Ahmadradicalizad is a psycopath as I suspect he may be, the exposure only emboldened him. Let's remember folks, the last time he was here he thought some sort of golden aura surrounded him when he spoke at the General Assembly of the UN...
What it comes down to is that I graduated from a college that invited Mumia Abu-Jamal, a convicted cop killer from Philadelphia to speak at my alma mater a few years after I graduated. I have not sent one cent to my alma mater and quite frankly, when they call to ask me for funds I usually start to laugh spontaneously before I tell them "sorry" and hang up.
Columbia University had the right to invite him to speak, however, I hope Columbia alumni make the same decision I did and inform their alma mater of their feelings regarding their choice of speaker, however they choose.
And, along with everyone else, I am SHOCKED to hear that there are no homosexuals in Iran. Although, when you think about what probably happened to any that were apparent, it's incredibly frightening. Since the gay population in the audience at Columbia seemed to be the only "group" with any backbone to stand up for themselves I am anxious to see how the gay population as a whole, feels about any action we end up taking in the future against this madman dictator...we may be able to finally convince gay and lesbian population that most of us are content to let live, let live, and that we will fight against any kind of REAL discrimination any day of the week. When faced with nuclear annihilation we are all AMERICANS.
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