Little Man In The Big Apple

Little Man In The Big Apple

By: Rachel Marsden

An open letter from a New Yorker to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad:

Dear Mahmoud,

I hear you're coming to the UN General Assembly, and had planned a visit to my 'hood.

But the NYPD, citing security concerns, apparently won't let you near Ground Zero. If I was training and arming the enemy in the war on terror, I'd expect some safety problems around the site of North America's largest ever terrorist massacre, too. Trust me, Mahmoud -- it's for your own good. You should see what some New Yorkers do to far less annoying attention whores than yourself.

Why not try the Holocaust Memorial Museum instead? You could hand out flyers for your next Holocaust denial conference. You know, reach out to the crossover crowd.

CBS's Scott Pelley told you that "visiting the (site) would infuriate many Americans." You responded, "The American nation is made up of 300 million people. There are different points of view over there." And don't you know it, buddy!

For example, there are people on the left who think you're a compassionate guy because after you kidnapped those British sailors and Marines earlier this year, you ultimately let them go. Kind of like an arsonist who burns down your house and then offers to help rebuild it. So sweet.

You seem to know exactly where your fans are -- hence this speech you're scheduled to give here at Columbia University.

When an Ivy League university like Yale lets a known member of the Taliban warm a coveted seat in the name of diversity, you can be sure the water is already warmed and ready for your big splash.

Columbia's president pontificates, "It should never be thought that merely to listen to ideas we deplore in any way implies our endorsement of those ideas, or the weakness of our resolve to resist those ideas, or our naivete about the very real dangers inherent in such ideas."

But really, Mahmoud, isn't it just an exercise in redundance? When your pal, Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, flashed a Noam Chomsky book during a recent UN meeting, how was that unlike the average college experience?

It would be different if you were some kind of repressed voice in the wilderness, but you even have your own TV networks (state TV and an English language satellite channel, Press TV). It's not like we don't know exactly what you think about everything: That you're enriching uranium like crazy and don't give a damn. That Bush and France's Sarkozy are idiots. That Jews are the bane of your existence.

But it's unlikely you'll have to deal with as many crazy campus protesters as a conservative speaker would. Most people who dislike you (a) have jobs to go to, and (b) are capable of constructing cogent arguments, rather than letting a bumper-sticker slogan slapped onto a sign speak for them.

WORLD IS SAFER

The upshot of megalomaniacs like you chilling at the UN is while you're here, the world is safer. But maybe you can take your iron-fisted tactics to my local NYC movie theatre? If you wanted to torture people who yelled at the screen, I wouldn't consider that a human rights violation.

Face it, these UN meetings are just an opportunity for guys like you to huff and puff and swing your Johnson around on the world stage. Personally, I'd rather see you settle things like real men -- in a drinking contest against (German Chancellor) Angela Merkel.

Love from your favourite infidel,

Rachel

PUBLISHED: TORONTO SUN (September 23/07)