memeorandum: Facing Scorn, President of Iran Is Defiant to His Critics (Helene Cooper/New York Times)

12:05 AM ET, September 25, 2007

Top Items:

Allahpundit / Hot Air:

Video: There are no gays in Iran, says Ahmadinejad; Update: Photos — Iran executes gays — I've got Bollinger's surprising, much-lauded speech coming up, but enjoy this as a snack. Some rare derisive laughter from the audience greets this little pearl. — Maybe it was a translation error …

Discussion: Captain's Quarters, Cox & Forkum, Stop The ACLU, protein wisdom, Little Green Footballs, Blue Crab Boulevard, THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS and IMAO

CNN:

Iran's president on Israel, nukes and gays — NEW YORK (CNN) — Columbia University President Lee Bollinger excoriated Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Monday, going through a long list of documented actions and remarks by the firebrand Iranian leader and his government.

Discussion: Little Green Footballs, Thought Theater, The Jawa Report, Connecting.the.Dots, The Van Der Galiën Gazette, CTron, Right Wing Nut House, The Daily Gut, Harry's Place, The American Princess, Think Progress, Wonkette, TalkLeft, The Democratic Daily, Jules Crittenden and Shakespeare's Sister

irna.ir:

IRI President addresses students at Colombia University — Despite entire US media objections, negative propagation and hue and cry in recent days over IRI President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's scheduled address at Colombia University, he gave his lecture and answered students questions here on Monday afternoon.

Discussion: Captain's Quarters, Blue Crab Boulevard, The Corner and QandO

Matt / Think Progress:

Hunter: I Will Try To 'Cut Off Funds To Columbia University' Because Of Ahmadinejad Speech — Earlier today, Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) said in a statement that if Columbia University President Lee Bollinger "follows through with this hosting of the leader of Iran, I will move in Congress …

Discussion: 365gay.com, Bloomberg, Liberty Street, Salon, the talking dog, Washington Monthly, Hullabaloo, TIME, The Anonymous Liberal and City Room

Mere Rhetoric:

PHOTOGRAPHS TO HELP EXPLAIN WHY THERE ARE NO HOMOSEXUALS IN IRAN [CONTENT WARNING: GRAPHIC PHOTOS] (UPDATED: VIDEO ADDED) — Original: It's because they're trying to kill them all. These are two gay teenagers who were kept in a cage, publicly humiliated, gruesomely hung, and left to dangle in front of the macabre crowd.

T-Steel / The Moderate Voice:

An apology is in order! — Silly, Silly Man! — Those who sharply criticized Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs President Lee C. Bollinger for inviting Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to speak owe him a galaxy sized apology. You know who you are so I'm not naming names/blogs/media outlets.

Discussion: Comments From Left Field and Liberty Street

Sewell Chan / New York Times:
Iranian Leader, Calling Introductory Remarks Insulting, Addresses Columbia

Discussion: Eunomia, The Road to Surfdom, The Atlantic Online, The Washington Note, Gothamist, AMERICAN DIGEST and Take Our Country Back

Allahpundit / Hot Air:
Video: Bollinger's rebuke to a "petty and cruel dictator"; Update …

Discussion: Little Green Footballs, Israel Matzav, A Blog For All, Webloggin, Israpundit and Jihad Watch

Catherine Donaldson-Evans / Fox News:
Ahmadinejad Speaks of Love, Kindess, Beauty and God in Speech to National Press Club

Vanderleun / AMERICAN DIGEST:
Bollinger Rope-A-Dopes Ahmadinejad and Many Conservative Blogs …

Discussion: michellemalkin.com, Townhall.com, ShrinkWrapped, The Sundries Shack, Riehl World View, NYT, VodkaPundit, A Blog For All, Blue Crab Boulevard and Hot Air

B. Daniel Blatt / Pajamas Media:
"WE DON'T HAVE HOMOSEXUALS" — During his speech today …

Discussion: WCBS-TV, Classical Values, Telegraph, Betsy's Page and Gay Patriot

Helene Cooper / New York Times:
Facing Scorn, President of Iran Is Defiant to His Critics

Discussion: FP Passport

Frank James / The Swamp:
McCain: Columbia allows Iranian but not ROTC?

Discussion: The Hill

Juan Cole / Salon:
Turning Ahmadinejad into public enemy No. 1

Discussion: New York Times, Liberty Street, DownWithTyranny!, CommonDreams.org and New York Sun

Ben Smith / The Politico:

Clinton campaign kills negative story — Early this summer, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign for president learned that the men's magazine GQ was working on a story the campaign was sure to hate: an account of infighting in Hillaryland. — So Clinton's aides pulled a page from the book …

Discussion: Captain's Quarters, Moonbattery, Taylor Marsh, Hot Air, The American Pundit, Macsmind, TPM Election Central, Wizbang and TIME: Swampland

Logan Murphy / Crooks and Liars:

Shuster to Rep. Blackburn: "When was the last time a New York Times ad ever killed somebody?" — Tucker substitute host David Shuster confronts Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) about the blatant hypocrisy of the Republican party when he asks about Rush Limbaugh's Senator Betrayus smear …

Discussion: Cliff Schecter

Jon Healey / L.A. Times:

MoveOn.org's thin skin — MoveOn.org's excessively discounted broadside against General David Petraeus in the New York Times two weeks ago won't rank as its most successful tactic. The full-page nastygram appears not only to have solidified Republican opposition in the Senate for proposals …

Discussion: Horses Mouth, Don Surber and The Fix

David Paul Kuhn / The Politico:

Podhoretz secretly urged Bush to bomb Iran — President Bush and Karl Rove sat listening to Norman Podhoretz for roughly 45 minutes at the White House as the patriarch of neoconservatism argued that the United States should bomb Iran's nuclear facilities. — The meeting was not on the president's public schedule.

Discussion: The Newshoggers, PoliBlog (TM), MSNBC, Middle Earth Journal, Wake up America, A Tiny Revolution, Death and The Raw Story

Satyam / Think Progress:
Podhoretz Granted Secret Access To Lobby Bush On 'The Case For Bombing Iran'

Discussion: ECHIDNE OF THE SNAKES and Daily Kos

Associated Press:

Prosecutor: Sen. Craig is 'politicking' — MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Sen. Larry Craig is only trying to get out of his guilty plea in an airport sex sting because he doesn't like the political consequences, a prosecutor wrote in court papers filed Monday. — Craig, R-Idaho, has asked to withdraw …

Discussion: TalkLeft

Ezra Klein:

Fearful Nation — I genuinely don't understand the quaking fear over Ahmadinejad's interview at Columbia. When did America become so weak, so insecure, that we mistrust our capacity to converse with potentially hostile world leaders? Do we really believe the president of Columbia …

Discussion: The Newshoggers, The Atlantic Online, Eunomia, Washington Monthly and Unfogged

The Raw Story:

Chemical weapon disaster 'led to Syria strike' — Israel did not strike a nuclear weapons facility in Syria on Sept. 6, instead striking a cache of North Korean missiles, current and former intelligence officials say. — American intelligence sources familiar with key events leading …

Discussion: Booman Tribune, Hot Air, The Newshoggers, Weasel Zippers and Liberty Pundit

Lisa Schiffren / The Corner:

Eyewitness to Nonsense — Just came from the Columbia campus, where a shocking number of my classmates skipped out on discussion section to go watch the show. In the SIPA lobby I joined a hundred and some other people watching Bollinger on closed circuit TV.

Discussion: bustardblog and Riehl World View

Paul Krugman:

Bubba Isn't Who You Think — Since I've just published an op-ed about the enduring influence of race on Southern voting, I'm sure to be accused of being a typical Northeastern snob talking about poor white trash who don't know what's good for them. So I thought I'd mention an important point …

Discussion: The Atlantic Online, The American Scene and NewsBusters.org