Why Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is smiling

[Violet_Crumble]

Let's knock off this annual ritual of channeling our collective anger at Mahmoud Ahmadinejad every time the bozo visits the UN. The charade gets old quick. We parade him in front of the television cameras as some host asks him pointed questions that they already know the answers to (or not, in some cases: NPR asked him whether he listened to Led Zeppelin or the Beatles, as if those were the hottest two bands blazing up the pop charts). This line of questioning just allows the Iranian leader to cut a sympathetic figure.

Indeed, Ahmadinejad has become such a lightning rod that the most serious of protests can spiral downward into downright silliness. Yesterday at Dag Hammarskjöld plaza, over the din of church bells at Holy Family Church, shouts of "Shalom" at a rally could be heard blocks away. A rabbi said the Iranian leadership was involved in genocide worse than that of Rwanda or the Balkans, while someone unfurled a banner with a drawing of the Iranian president's motorcade hitting a "steampipe blast" - the usual doomsday stuff of protests.

There were pleas to "Stop Iran Now" but not a shred of clarity on a) what to stop Iran from doing, or b) how to stop Iran from doing it. There were impassioned pleas for Iran to curb its human rights abuses (Iran is the world's leading killer of juvenile offenders, according to Human Rights Watch). Then there were pleas for Iran to stop enriching uranium and violating nuclear safeguard agreements of the nonproliferation treaty. And, of course, there was usual boilerplate stuff aimed at the Iranian leader's Holocaust denialism and statements about wiping Israel off the map.

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Feel free to protest Iran's president as he bounces around town today and smirks before the cameras. But don't expect anything meaningful to change in our relations with Iran until we address Tehran's foreign policy, not just Ahmadinejad's rabblerousing rhetoric.

Stop falling into his trap. The best thing to do to somebody of his stature is to just ignore him. Sorry to say, but this is not Munich all over again. Ahmadinejad is a bit player on the world stage, not a leader bent on taking over the Middle East. By treating him like this outsized figure, we hand him undue influence and power. That is why every September he never stops smirking.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2008/sep/23/mahmoud.ahmadinejad.united.nations