Ahmadinejad's Mahdi Complex

Mahdi is not a particularly big deal in Shi'ism, but it's a very, very big deal to Iranian crackpot-in-residence Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

In an absolutely must-read piece in RCP, Ahmadinejad's Mission and Mysticism, Daniel Pipes detail's Mahmoud's long history of fascination with the idea that Mahdi, "the restorer of religion and justice who will rule before the end of the world" is coming soon, very soon, and Iran must pave the way.

And could, we have to wonder, Ahmadinejad see himself as Mahdi? Check this out:

He often raises the topic, and not just to Muslims. When addressing the United Nations in September, Ahmadinejad flummoxed his audience of world political leaders by concluding his address with a prayer for the Mahdi's appearance: "O mighty Lord, I pray to you to hasten the emergence of your last repository, the Promised One, that perfect and pure human being, the one that will fill this world with justice and peace."

On returning to Iran from New York, Ahmadinejad recalled the effect of his UN speech:

One of our group told me that when I started to say "In the name of God the almighty and merciful," he saw a light around me, and I was placed inside this aura. I felt it myself. I felt the atmosphere suddenly change, and for those 27 or 28 minutes, the leaders of the world did not blink... And they were rapt. It seemed as if a hand was holding them there and had opened their eyes to receive the message from the Islamic republic."

There's his picture at the UN. Anyone see an aura around him?

Am I alone in thinking, "If the left jumped all over James Watt's end-time pronouncement, where are they on this one?"

But unlike Watt, Ahmadinejad isn't apologizing. Unlike Watt, Ahmadinejad has or soon will have his finger on a nuclear button. And unlike Watt, Ahmadinejad's god isn't one known for spreading his word peacefully. Or, as Pipes puts it:

The most dangerous leaders in modern history are those (like Hitler) equipped with a totalitarian ideology and a mystical belief in their own mission. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad fulfills both these criteria, as revealed by his UN comments. That combined with his expected nuclear arsenal make him an adversary who must be stopped, and urgently.