From the sound of things, Lee Bollinger gave the president of Iran what-for:

Ahmadinejad smiled as Columbia President Lee Bollinger took him to task over Iran’s human-rights record and foreign policy, and Ahmadinejad’s statements denying the Holocaust and calling for the disappearance of Israel.

“Mr. President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator,” Bollinger said, to loud applause.

He said Ahmadinejad’s denial of the Holocaust might fool the illiterate and ignorant.

“When you come to a place like this it makes you simply ridiculous,” Bollinger said. “The truth is that the Holocaust is the most documented event in human history.”

…

“You are either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated,” Bollinger told Ahmadinejad about the leader’s Holocaust denial. “Will you cease this outrage?”

Ahmadinnerjacket blew off the questioning, saying he just wanted more research on the matter and went into his prepared speech.

“I should not begin by being affected by this unfriendly treatment,” he said.

He did not address Bollinger’s accusations directly, instead launching into a long religious discursion laced with quotes with the Quran before turning to criticism of the Bush administration and past American governments, from warrantless wiretapping to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

He closed with boos and cheers and then began answering questions with lies.

So Bollinger lit the tiny dictator up, but to what end? Ahmadinejad simply moved past the outburst and spit his usual propaganda. He should not have been there, and regardless of Bollinger’s comments and questions, he was wrong to allow this to happen.

UPDATE

Here is Bollinger’s introduction: