COLUMBIA: Cancelling, then un-cancelling, Ahmadinejad?

UPDATE: Related thoughts here.

ANOTHER UPDATE: More here.

FINALLY: Michael Barone emails:

Just a random thought on Ahmedinejad speaking at Columbia.

Columbia doesn’t host ROTC or (I think) military recruiters on campus, because it would be just too offensive to do so, because the military obeys the law passed by a Democratic Congress and signed by Bill Clinton which bars open homosexuals from serving in the military. OK.

But Columbia does host Ahmedinejad who heads a government which executes homosexuals for the crime of being homosexuals.

So it’s obnoxious beyond belief to exclude homosexuals from military service, but it’s not obnoxious beyond belief to hang them from the neck until dead.

I’m inclined to think that Congress and the military should rethink their policy of barring homosexuals from military service. It’s a long argument, which I’ll omit from this post. But I don’t have any trouble joining the 99.99% of Americans who oppose execution of homosexuals for homosexual acts. And who think it’s a barbaric act, incapable of being supported by any decent argument.

Why does Lee Bollinger think a man who heads a regime that executes homosexuals–not just excludes them from military service, but hangs them by the neck until dead, in public ceremony– should be honored with an invitation to speak at Columbia?

Because Ahmadinejad doesn’t like Bush, and that covers all sins?