In an interview on state television Sunday, Ahmadi-nejad pursued the theme of the lack of freedom in the United States. The regime goes to great lengths to paint a picture of an oppressed American people, presumably to counter the view commonly held in Iran that America is the freest country in the world.
Some think the regime campaign to portray the United States as riddled with poverty, unhappiness and oppression will make it less appealing for Iranians and reduce the brain drain to America. Others, however, think the campaign is not found credible by most Iranians and thus actually feeds doubts about all other claims by the regime.
On Sunday, Ahmadi-nejad said that the arrests of American citizens merely for expressing their viewpoints on the Holocaust was a good example of the total lack of freedom in the US.
But no one has ever been arrested for questioning the Holocaust in the United States.
There are laws in most European countries and in Canada under which people have been arrested, tried and even jailed for denying that 6 million Jews died in the Holocaust. But there is no such law in the United States, and can never be such a law because of the US Constitution.
It was an open question whether Ahmadi-nejad understood the US Constitution and was just lying in his comments or whether he was ignorant of US law and making an innocent error. Over the years, he has often made misstatements of fact. But since censorship in the Islamic Republic saves him from being questioned, he does not face factual challenges.
Ahmadi-nejad said he would raise the issue of the absence of true freedom in America during his annual visit in September to New York for the UN General Assembly.