Borat Versus President Nazarbayev
The feud between the people of Kazakhstan--mainly one person, the president--and Borat continues, according to the New York Times. The Kazakh president was angry that many news outlets reported that the subject of his recent trip to the U.S. was to complain about Borat. While the Bush Administration can certainly sympathize with his troubles dealing with the media, President Nazarbayev wasn't making a special trip to complain about the comedian.
We think that the Kazakh government should embrace the Borat phenomenon more fully than they have; each angry denunciation makes them look foolish, and banning the importation of the film into the country doesn't make the argument that theirs is a totally free society any easier.
Many other countries around the world learned that the path to American tourist dollars is paved with insults: Americans all frequently visit Canada, France, Mexico and the UK, and they're snottier about those countries than anywhere else in the world. We kid because we love. Besides, more people know about fermented mare's milk now than ever before--what's bad about that?
Related Stories:
· Kazakhs Shrug at Borat While State Fumes [NYT]
· Borat [Jaunted]
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