|
 One man denies the Holocaust took
place.
The other man denies that global
warming is the most important issue of our time.
The holocaust denier also denies that he’s
marching his nation to the risky edge of nuclear proliferation, that he
supports Hizbullah, and that there are gays in Iran. The global warming denier also denies that he has any responsibility, as
president of the United States,
to lead the international community toward a treaty better than the flawed Kyoto, or even to
participate in the negotiations.
In many ways, Iranian President
Mahmoud Ahmedinejad and George W. Bush performed the same dance of denial on
Monday. Ahmedinejad posed as “an academic” at Columbia University,
aligning himself with the free examination of ideas, freedom of speech—a chameleon-like
performance, reminiscent of, well, a lot of academics. Bush just played hookie
from the UN Climate Summit in New
York, giving his best diplomatic bird to the world
leaders gathered to launch the UN’s efforts to replace the Kyoto Treaty in
2012. It was a missed opportunity for Bush to meet with the leaders of
developing nations, which must be brought under the next treaty’s aegis.
The American media raised up in
full-throated scorn at the Iranian president spewing his ridiculous jibberish at
Columbia. If
anyone objected to President George Bush’s insult to the UN (and the world
community), it didn’t make cable news. But that’s to be expected. An Islamic
radical maybe trying to get his hands on the bomb is a lot scarier than a hurricane
that might happen 20 years from now.
Barbara Tuchman wrote that human
folly was a constant in the major tragedies that have befallen humankind down
through recorded history. But we should not sell denial short. It is the path of not seeing, of not listening. Denial requires a
certain willfull mental blindness and deafness. Bush
and Ahmedinejad showed Monday that it is well within the reach of even the
world’s least accomplished deciders.
Trackback(0)
|
TrackBack URI for this entry
Show/Hide comments
Show/Hide comment form
