Saturday, March 29, 2008

I actually watched the speech of Mu`ammar Al-Qadhdhafi. I am bitterly disappointed how much New TV promotes that mentally disturbed man: the promotion of him by New TV is only increasing. The fact that New TV has been signing agreements (to train and advise the launching of new Libyan TV stations) with the Libyan government and ruling family is irrelevant of course. New TV declared Qadhdhafi "the star of the summit." Arab summits have no stars, and certainly Qadhdhafi is less of a star than a potato. I know that Western governments often dismiss leaders they don't like as "crazy," but in the case of Qadhdhafi it really applies. And Qadhdhafi's pontifications are now more jarring than ever: he wants us to ignore his radical foreign policy shifts. Today, he gave a speech that he used to give when he used to espouse a rejectionist foreign policy. It is cute that the US administration lets him get away with a fiery speech here and there provided that he continues in his subservience to US political, economic, and military interests. Personally, I can't, as a teacher on a college campus in the US, forgive this dictator--assuming I want or can forgive him for his crimes--for the downing the of a plane that was carrying mostly college students from Syracuse University. Shame on the families of the victims who accepted to forget their loved ones in return for sums of Libyan cash.