Columbia University president Lee Bollinger blasted Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad while introducing him yesterday.

“I am only a professor, who is often a university president, and today I feel all the weight of the modern civilized world yearning to express their revulsion of what you stand for. I only wish I could do better. Mr. President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator.”

It’s easy to get distracted by all the heated rhetoric coming out of Dick Cheney’s shop and forget just how offensive it is to have the president of a country actively question the impact and magnitude of the Holocaust. Ahmadinejad behaves like a loon, and that should not be lost in the effort to avert a potentially catastrophic war between our two countries.

While Ahmadinejad’s remarks were met with a mix of applause and boos from the audience, he provoked outright laughter when answering a question about repression against homosexuals in Iran. “In Iran, we don’t have homosexuals, like in your country,” he said. “We do not have this phenomenon. I don’t know who’s told you that we have it.”

It should be obvious to everyone that this is an inaccurate statement, but if you need proof:

In 1969 I still thought I was straight… although I was starting to get the… idea that I might not be. I went to Europe for the summer with my girlfriend and when she went back to the U.S. in September to finish her senior year, I headed out in my VW van for India and parts unknown. In Tehran I had met an Iranian guy and had my first sexual encounter with a stranger. I have no idea how he’s been since the Revolution– we never developed any kind of a bond beyond that 20-30 minute encounter in downtown Tehran (in my van)– but I think he’d be shocked to have heard what Iran’s crazy president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said at Columbia today about how there are no homosexuals in Iran.

I don’t know that it is fair to say that Ahmadinejad ‘exhibits all the signs of cruel and petty dictator’. On the surface, it would be more accurate to say that he exhibits all the signs of an idiot. But he is no idiot:

In 1976, he took Iran’s national university entrance exams (konkoor) to gain admission into Iran’s top universities. His test score ranked him 132nd among over 400,000 participants that year,[19] landing him at the Iran University of Science and Technology (IUST) as an undergraduate student of civil engineering.

After the Iranian Revolution, he entered the Master of Science program for civil engineering in 1984. In 1989, he became a member of the Science faculty at the university where he had studied.[20] In 1997, he received his Ph.D. in transportation engineering and planning from the Science and Technology University.

This is not a man that is blinded by faith and unacquainted with scientific method. He knows that the Holocaust happened and he knows there are homosexuals in his country. Calling him a dictator eliminates the possible explanation for his bizarre exclamations. His strange behavior is explained by the simple fact that he is not a dictator, but a politician.

Ahmadinejad became the 6th President of Iran on August 6, 2005, after winning 62% of the vote in the run-off poll, nearly twice that of ex-President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Ahmadinejad’s current term will end in August 2009, but he will be eligible to run for one more term in office in 2009 presidential elections. [37] He received the presidential authorization from Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei on August 3, 2005

And politicians craft their rhetoric to appeal to certain constituencies.

Ahmadinejad generally sent mixed signals about his plans for his presidency, which some US-based analysts considered to have been designed to attract both religious conservatives and the lower economic classes.[31] His campaign motto was, “It’s possible and we can do it.” (ی‌شود و می‌توانیم).

In his presidential campaign, Ahmadinejad took a populist approach, with emphasis on his own modest life, and compared himself with Mohammad Ali Rajai, the second president of Iran. Ahmadinejad said he had plans to create an “exemplary government for the people of the world” in Iran. He is a self-described “principlist”; that is, acting politically based on Islamic and revolutionary principles. One of his goals has been “putting the petroleum income on people’s tables”, referring to Iran’s oil profits being distributed among the poor.

And he has cultivated a populist image.

Even after being elected President, Ahmadinejad continued living in a simple apartment flat and eating meals brought from home, in his office. Both of these traits contributed to his widespread support amongst the poorer classes of Iran.

Rather than call him a dictator, we should call him a demogogue. He is not the commander-in-chief of the armed forces and he doesn’t control the Iranian intelligence agencies. His term is limited, and to remain in office he must win reelection in 2009. And, while we should expect the field of competitors for the presidency to be limited by the Council of Guardians, we should also expect that the approved candidates will have a real shot at beating Ahmadinejad at the polls. Iran is not a dictatorship. It is a democratic country where there are varying degrees, at different times, of top down control over acceptable debate and policy.

While it is inaccurate to call Ahmadinejad a dictator, it is not inaccurate to say that he often says crazy things. He has claimed that a 16-year old girl created nuclear energy in her home and that a special aura surrounded him during a speech at the UN and kept world leaders enrapt. This proclivity for nuttiness led former CIA officer Bob Baer to say, “”If you’re sitting in Tel Aviv and you believe they’ve got nukes and missiles — you’ve got to take them out. These guys are nuts and there’s no reason to back off.”

There are at least two problems with Baer’s analysis. First, it’s possible that Ahmadinejad is ‘nuts’ but it is more likely that he is pandering to his largely uneducated and religiously conservative base. But even if he is nuts, he is only one guy…not ‘these guys’. And, second, he is not commander-in-chief and he cannot order an attack on Tel Aviv.

As for whether Columbia, or other American institutions, should let him speak…it’s pretty obvious (from his remarks about homosexuality, for example) that he will do more to discredit himself and his government if he is allowed to speak than if he is not. Refusing to let him speak gives him the moral high ground.

Lee Bollinger’s remarks may have been a little over the top…a little inaccurate. But his sentiment is largely on the mark. Iran’s human rights record has deteriorated under Ahmadinejad’s rule.

According to Human Rights Watch, “[r]espect for basic human rights in Iran, especially freedom of expression and assembly, deteriorated in 2006. The government routinely tortures and mistreats detained dissidents, including through prolonged solitary confinement.”

There’s no question that Bollinger was justified in calling Ahmadinejad ‘cruel’ or in saying that there is ‘revulsion’ for what he stands for.

It is proper and salutary for us to have an open debate about Iran and U.S.-Iranian relations. But we should be clear about one thing. There are no good reasons for our two nations to go to war.