The United Nations just finished its annual meetings in New York.

If you saw any of the coverage, you will agree that it was quite a circus, with special credit given to the leaders of Libya, Iran and Venezuela who played with the United Nations like a cat with a little mouse.

But did you know this?

According to Time Magazine, a few weeks ago, President Muammar Gaddafi “…submitted a proposal to the United Nations to abolish Switzerland and divide it up along linguistic lines, giving parcels of the country to Germany, France and Italy.

Although the motion was thrown out because it violates the U.N. Charter stating that no member country can threaten the existence of another, some Swiss leaders are still concerned that Libya could use its year-long presidency of the U.N. General Assembly, which began Sept. 15, to keep up his vitriolic attacks on their country.”

Why such an animosity for the poor Swiss?

Because in July 2008, Gaddafi’s son, Hannibal, and his wife were arrested by police in Geneva for allegedly beating their two servants at a local hotel.

Of course, Gaddafi is also known for his incredibly stylish and varied clothing, his all-female phalanx of body guards and for always setting up a Bedouin tent, in which he sleeps and receives dignitaries when he is travelling all around the world.

On his U.S. trip, his first time in 40 years since he has been generally regarded as a terrorist regime, he had lots of problems finding a property on which to stake out the tent, because no one wanted him anywhere near their neighborhood.         A Donald Trump property north of New York had neighbors call in the housing and zoning inspector who commended that the tent building be stopped immediately.

Each speaker at the U.N. event was given 15 minutes, which Gaddafi extrapolated to mean that for him this would be 90 minutes instead.

His performance, with scraps of paper with scribbled notes, him ripping up the U.N. Charter, throwing pieces of paper around and declaring the U.N. Security Council the “Terrorism Council” was a real show.

A few weeks ago, the release of Abdel Baset al-Megrahi, who was convicted for his role in the bombing of a Pan Am airplane over Lockerbie, Scotland, was the big Libyan story.

The Lockerbie bombing killed 270 people — most of them Americans. A Scottish official ordered the release of al-Megrahi, who has prostate cancer, on grounds of compassion. When al-Megrahi arrived in Libya he was greeted as a hero. Gaddafi is suspected of having ordered the bombing of the Pan Am plane.

Gaddafi has a long history of being a very bad boy and was implicated in massacres in Rome and Vienna carried out by terrorists linked to Libya.

He has also actively pursued a weapons of mass destruction program and was building a massive underground facility in the desert.

On April 5, 1986, a bomb exploded in West Berlin’s La Belle disco, killing two U.S. servicemen and a Turkish woman. Ten days later, the United States attacked Libya with air strikes.

This is all for real. You can’t make this up.

Some 11 million and 17 million people died in the genocide committed against Jews, and also ethnic Poles, the Romani, Soviet civilians, Soviet prisoners of war, people with disabilities, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and other political and religious opponents.

The Helmsley Hotel in New York actually canceled a banquet for which Ahmadinejad was on the guest list. The hotel management said the man who called the Holocaust a lie was not welcome.

Then we found out about the new secret facility where Iran is probably developing enriched Uranium for its supposed nuclear weapons program about which Iran has been lying to the world and U.N. weapons inspectors for years, defying international law.

The flamboyant Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who a few years ago said he could smell the sulfur from the devil George W. Bush while at the podium of the United Nations was the least colorful of a string of amazingly entertaining world leaders.

So, all told, I think the United Nations is a great opportunity for the world to observe famous leaders staking out their places in history and judge for themselves.

Steffen Schmidt is a Proffessor of Political Science at Iowa State University. Reprinted with permission from syndication at www.insideriowa.com, Iowa’s Internet Magazine. ©2009

Watch Dr. Schmidt’s video blog on YouTube.