Missing the point on Ahmadinejad

So Mitt Romney is outraged that Columbia allowed Ahmadinejad to speak at their World Leaders Forum.

Here's the thing: Ahmadinejad is an asshole. He also happens to be a world leader, thus fitting into the world leader part of the forum. He isn't the leader I would choose to have and there's a good case to be made that he's not the leader the Iranian people would have chosen nor would currently choose, if given their druthers.

But what do we gain from stomping our feet and ignoring people like Ahmadinejad, or perhaps even worse, acting like our own little version of vitriol-spouting hateful anti-intellectual demagogues? Let's be smart, people: give the man a little rope and he'll make the most of it!

I entitled this post "Missing the point on Ahmadinejad." So what do I mean, what point am I saying that Romney and many others who protested Ahmadinejad's appearance are missing? Simply this: many people were protesting Columbia allowing Ahmadinejad to speak. Instead, protest against Ahmadinejad himself. We should be actively supporting Columbia for providing a clown like Ahmadinejad the platform and opportunity to expose to the world the stupidity and incoherence of his ideas and positions (please, if there are no homosexuals in Iran, who are those people you've been hanging for homosexuality?).

So go ahead and protest. Just protest the right thing, the repressive theocratic wanna-be dictator, and not the wrong thing, the organization that gives that repressive theocratic wanna-be dictator the opportunity to demonstrate his moral and intellectual bankruptcy for all the world to see.