Kristin Breitweiser raises a rare voice of sanity in the uproar over Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad's request to visit Ground Zero. Read her article in The Huffington Post. (You may recall that Breitweiser was a New Jersey mother, before she became a leader among the 9/11 widows and widowers.)
Part of what she has to say: "The fact is, people are transformed by visiting the open wound of Ground Zero. Perhaps it is naïve to hope for this when it comes to Ahmandinejad. By September 2007, however, we have come to understand a few things. We can no longer go it alone as a nation, when it comes to fighting terrorism and making our world a safer place. We need a global approach. This necessarily means talking to scoundrels, rogues, and unsavory characters that we don't like."
The predictably outraged reaction to Ahmedinejad's request combines ignorance (it's clear that many people think Iran was mixed up in 9/11 and has ties to al Qaeda--the Bush administration has pushed the latter line--although Iran is Shi'ite and bin Laden and his coterie are extremist Sunnis who view the Shi'a as apostates) with demagoguery. It is another example of the way we learned exactly the wrong lessons from 9/11, which in turn helps to explain our parlous position in the world today.
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Not that such a visit would ever be used as a tool to spread more of his harebrained propaganda and lies. After all he such a world class proponent of human rights.
So, Duayne, who do you think got the better of it? The US, which let him spew his harebrained propaganda and lies, or Ahmendinejad, who had his foolishness exposed to anyone whose mind was not already made up in his favor?
Freedom of speech, as has been said endlessly, is not for the thoughts we agree with, but the ones that we hate.
Why are we afraid of people like Ahmedinejad? Why don't we have faith in the ability of people to make the right decisions (George W's two terms notwithstanding)?
Ahmendinejad was the winner. He wasn't speaking to convince Americans, rather to show others of his bent how weak America is. This wasn't an attemp to reconcile differences on his part.
Look at how the muslim media is highlighting the rudeness in which he was treated by Columbia but not mentioning the things that were said that was obvious foolishness. For it to be exposed it has to be reported.
Freedom of speech is a tremendous right and one that has been hard fought for. That doesn't mean we have to extend it to non-citizens that have no agenda other than to use it to recruit more to their anti-american hate.
Here is link to articles published by the IRNA to backup my prior post:
http://www2.irna.ir/index.php?option=com_newssearch&task=pageing&st=columbia+university&ti=1&tx=1&limit=15&limitstart=0&lang=en
The official news agency of the regime wrote [IRNA],
Strong, scientific and accurate answers of the President of Iran to the questions raised by the academicians in Columbia University made them applause and showed that they are not affected by the propaganda of the American Media. They officially asserted in a poll that they agreed with Ahmadinejad’s statements. The American televisions, which thought tricky questions will surprise the president, showed the program live. These sources, some of which are controlled by the Zionists, were shocked after the results of the poll came out.
According to the poll, the majority of the participants agreed that Columbia’s invitation of Ahmadinejad was a good decision…. Many Americans called the network to emphasize on the importance of freedom of speech in America…
A few people, some of whom were connected to the Zionists, protested against Ahmadinejad’s speech, but the poll showed that these were only a minority in the American society.
We weren't playing to the Iranians who support the regime, but to those who do not and who can learn the truth on the Internet or through other means (many Iranians travel to countries where they are out from under the regime's propaganda). We were also playing to people in third countries who still, somehow, despite all that's happened in the past 7 1/2 years, believe in the US as a fount of freedom and truth. And most of all, we were expressing our deepest values as a nation.
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