Will the real America please stand up!

When it was announced that Columbia University had invited President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran to speak when he was in New York City, I was supportive of this effort to engage in dialogue with one of our many adversaries rather than continuing the saber rattling. Even in this fear obsessed post 9/11 country we should not be afraid to hear a point of view that differs from our own. Similar sentiments were expressed by author and progressive radio host Thom Hartmann.

Columbia University Shows True American Values
by Thom Hartmann

Columbia University, by inviting Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to speak, has shown confidence in the wisdom and adultness of their students and our republic.
Ahmadinejad is the president of a major nation in a vital part of the world, and we should have enough self-assurance and belief in our own system of government, and in the intelligence of our college students, that we can let them (and our larger public) evaluate his words, whatever they may be.
To be terrified of his speaking there (or, for that matter, laying a wreath at Ground Zero) is behavior one would have expected from a fragile régime like Khrushchev's USSR or Burma's military junta, not the bold, brave, and fearless USA.
We are the nation whose President Nixon reached out to and met with China's Mao Tse Tsung at the same time Mao was funding and arming the North Vietnamese to kill our soldiers in Vietnam. We're the nation whose President Reagan confronted Soviet President Gorbachev, who at the time had thousands of nuclear warheads armed and pointed at us and was actively funding and arming proxy wars we were fighting in more than a half-dozen nations. We're the nation whose President Roosevelt said, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself."
And let's also remember that the people of Tehran, Iran, produced one of the largest candlelight vigil demonstrations in the Muslim world in support of the USA the day after 9/11, repudiating the act and actors of that event. We still have the ability to make an ally of that nation, and shouldn't blow it by fear and bluster (or bombs). America is better and stronger than the nervous Nellies and chickenhawk war-mongers who currently have control of the Republican Party (and a few Democrats, apparently).
As JFK said: "We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values; for a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people."
We are not afraid. We are Americans!

I was, however, appalled at the behavior of Columbia University President Lee Bollinger. Not only was he rude to an invited guest and displayed complete ignorance of Iran and its government, but he also played right into the hands of the publicity seeking Iranian president. Common courtesy would dictate that when you invite someone into your home you treat him with respect. His ignorance of Iran is inexcusable as he has one of the foremost experts on modern Iran on his faculty, Gary Sick. A brief conversation with Mr. Sick would have allowed him to ask some very difficult questions in atmosphere of civil dialogue. As an Iranian blogger said: “A taxi driver in Tehran could have asked more difficult questions for President Ahmadinejad to answer.” Most of what President Ahmadinejad said in his speech was geared to his domestic audience and the “Arab street”. By aggressively attacking the Columbia event and organizing demonstrations attended mostly by Jews the American Jewish lobby allowed Ahmadinejad to portray the conflict as one between Iran and the “occupying Zionist regime”. Pictures of demonstrators in yarmulkes were all over the Arab press. This allows Ahmadinejad to portray Iran as a protector of the Palestinian cause against the “occupying Zionist regime” which plays very well on the “Arab street”. (Commentators in Israel have bemoaned the actions of the Jewish lobby. To see an example click here.) How do supposedly intelligent people do these things?