Highly entertaining stuff.

I don’t know where you get the impression that what I wrote somehow supports the U.S.Government’s official policies towards the country of Iran. To make it clear, I do not.

As far as their (and the media’s) “demonisation” of Ahmadinejad, I’m going to tie that into your qualifying remark that the Iranian President properly translated said “There is no gay problem in Iran.” — The REASON there is “no gay problem in Iran” is because they are executing anyone convicted of the crime of being gay.

So there may be some European arrogance at work after all, in the form of Europeans being arrogant enough to think that their governments and their media gives them a crystal-clear picture of the world and its only us poor Americans who are in the dark on some of these issues.

The bottom line is that regardless of U.S. policy, the opinion that Ahmadinejad and the country he represents are duly demonized by their own words and actions remains well founded. And beyond that, sticking to the topic at hand, Adams demonstrably has his facts all-wrong. The only thing you attempted to support him on was the translation and what he wrote doesn’t agree with your translation at all, so I’m at a loss to decipher why you think the man’s credibility is no longer in question.

no one seems to share Mr. Adams’ drastically different interpretation of what Mr. Ahmadinejad said.

Actually, several respected scholars endorse his position, as do I. Have you read Professor Juan Cole on the matter? Arash Norouzi? Google it or try this link.

Iran, it is worth repeating, has never threatened the US. Nor has it ever threatened Israel’s existence (as well as the propagated myth of President Ahmadinejad’s purported “wipe of the map” comment is an acknowledged mistranslation, Iranian Jews also number in their tens of thousands in Iran and are proud Iranians happily residing there as a continuous community for hundreds of years.

In contrast, the Likudnik-steered Bush administration has repeatedly threatened Iran with nuclear first strikes. In 2002, the US Nuclear Posture Review envisioned the use of nuclear weapons on a first strike basis, even against non-nuclear armed states, in a policy of “offensive deterrence”. We recall that when questioned about the use of nuclear weapons against Iran, President Bush responded that “All options were on the table”.

Many people outside the USA don’t share in this demonisation of Ahmadinejad and Iran. What we see of your media is what is alarming to us. What has become of America, a place we should be looking up to? This is not “European arrogance” either, I’m from a country that is an English-speaking US ally.

I support what Adams says about “myth” as a worldview. As a social scientists, that’s how I immediately understood the term. As for the “Iran has no gays” comment, even Seymour Hersh (see Democracy Now! interview) has confirmed, from Persian-speaking colleagues) that the Iranian President properly translated said “There is no gay problem in Iran.”

President Ahmainejad may be a loose cannon lost in translation, but he is not an anti-Semite.

Where I totally agree with you is how he was introduced by Lee Bollinger: “Mr, President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator.” That is totally disrespectful considering Ahmadinejad was an invited guest. Let the man damn himself with his own words, but don’t attack him before he’s even had a chance to speak.