Ahmadinejad shocks world with conciliatory speech at UN

No wiping Israel from the map.

Not a mention of the Great Satan.

Looks like Ahmadinejad wants to go out of his political career like a lamb and not a lion.

With the exception of the Canadian delegation, none of the Nations of Virtue left the room during the speech.

The Canadians have of course been floundering on the shoals of their own incompetence with their various forays into the diplomatic arena of late.

Letting Italy take care of the Canada desk in Iran.

Renting rooms in various UK diplomatic missions instead of fielding their own.

Diplomacy is of course a serious business, and it has been amply evident since the ascent of John Baird to head  Foreign Affairs that the Canadians have abandoned the field.

Baird is scheduled to address the General Assembly on Friday, after all the serious players have gone home.

Italy goes where Canada fears to tread

Just a week ago Canada's tough talking Foreign Minister John Baird announced that Canada was closing its embassy in Tehran.

It must have occurred to him after the fact that this unilateral move left a multiplicity of Canadian interests in Iran effectively stranded.

So today he announced that henceforth, Canada's interests in Iran would be represented once again.

By Italy!

Is Canada's foreign service establishment so grotesquely inept that we need to outsource threat assessments to the private sector and delegate the handling of Canada's interests in Iran to a third country?

Apparently so.

That's what happens when you appoint a light-weight like John Baird to the post of Foreign Minister.

We look like inept dolts, playing at diplomacy instead of doing any.

At least it got us a pat on the back from Netanyahu.