What kind of idiot would do that? The same kind of idiot who, in his book Prisoner of Zion (Counterpoint, 2013) finds similarities between the Taliban and himself, as in this description of his attempt to force his will on a girlfriend: "I grabbed her cellphone and threw it against the wall. ... [The cellphone] was what kept her from doing what I knew was right." The kind of troubled and troubling idiot, in other words, whose lifework has been to expose the deeds of authoritarian ideologues like himself.