But it's not what you might expect. If it went as it sounds, this is the way you're supposed to meet with a leader like that. Mainline Truths has the story.
Sometimes the only way to "dialogue" with evil is by saying no. Firmly, No, we won't meet with you because your behavior and your avowed ambitions are completely unacceptable.
You dialoguw with the guy's representative, not with him. Because meeting with him gives him stature with his own base. And you want that base to know that there are limits to what the West will tolerate. Like genocide. We don't tolerate people who announce that they mean to wipe out an entire nation.
Take a look at what Marty Peretz had to say about inviting the President of Iran:
Maybe you read my posting "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner," (September 17) which was the first place you could have read that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was meeting with select members of the Council on Foreign Relations. Well, how select? Even former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who'll run after anybody, refused to attend. The guest list was the "B list," what with Martin Indyk, Brent Scowcroft, and Maurice Greenberg (yes, formerly of AIG) being about as distinguished as they come. Which is not very. Did the attendees learn anything? Only if they know nothing ... which certainly isn't the case. Do they still believe they could persuade him that Auschwitz actually happened? Well, anyway, for a partial account of the encounter, read the report in this morning's New York Times. http://www.tnr.com/blog/spine?pid=39981
The Presbyterians would have done better to thunder at him from the pulpit, or to bring a thousand busloads of morally outraged congregants to the big demonstration in the street outside the UN.
The problem with this Church is that the clergy is so starved for stature in the world that thwy will go anywhere and meet with anybody to prove that they matter.
Just say no.
Sometimes the only way to "dialogue" with evil is by saying no. Firmly, No, we won't meet with you because your behavior and your avowed ambitions are completely unacceptable.
You dialoguw with the guy's representative, not with him. Because meeting with him gives him stature with his own base. And you want that base to know that there are limits to what the West will tolerate. Like genocide. We don't tolerate people who announce that they mean to wipe out an entire nation.
Take a look at what Marty Peretz had to say about inviting the President of Iran:
Maybe you read my posting "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner," (September 17) which was the first place you could have read that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was meeting with select members of the Council on Foreign Relations. Well, how select? Even former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who'll run after anybody, refused to attend. The guest list was the "B list," what with Martin Indyk, Brent Scowcroft, and Maurice Greenberg (yes, formerly of AIG) being about as distinguished as they come. Which is not very. Did the attendees learn anything? Only if they know nothing ... which certainly isn't the case. Do they still believe they could persuade him that Auschwitz actually happened? Well, anyway, for a partial account of the encounter, read the report in this morning's New York Times.
http://www.tnr.com/blog/spine?pid=39981
The Presbyterians would have done better to thunder at him from the pulpit, or to bring a thousand busloads of morally outraged congregants to the big demonstration in the street outside the UN.
The problem with this Church is that the clergy is so starved for stature in the world that thwy will go anywhere and meet with anybody to prove that they matter.
http://www.newcriterion.com/archives/25/09/have-spoken/
Roger Scruton
good link. Roger Scruton is well worth reading.