Ahmadinejad’s Legacy: Top 10 (Mis)Hits

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad leaves office with little to show for eight years in power. Here are 10 moments we won't forget.

This is Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

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In fewer than two weeks, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad leaves office with little to show for eight years in power. Iran’s toxic economy is often blamed on his mismanagement as much as on international sanctions. Politically, his reelection in 2009 ignited the largest protests since the 1979 revolution.

By 2013, even his peers charged that he was aligned with a “deviant current.” All eight candidates campaigned on anti-Ahmadinejad tickets in the mid-June election to replace him.

Even the supreme leader, who once put his own credibility on the line to support Ahmadinejad, openly criticized him.

He may well be best-remembered for his incendiary statements

Even his humor was puzzling:

"I have traveled to all the continents except for one, and I know what is going on out there. Everybody is eager to hear the Iranian people's message. The world is rapidly becoming Ahmadinejad-ized, if I'm allowed to make a joke," he said in 2006.

With that in mind, here are the top 10 quotes that Robin Wright feels will represent Ahmadinejad's rhetorical legacy.

1. He claimed the U.S. orchestrated the 9/11 attacks

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"Some segments within the American government orchestrated the attack to reverse the declining American economy and its grips on the Middle East in order to save the Zionist regime… The majority of the American people, as well as most nations and politicians around the world, agree with this view."

- Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at the United Nations

2. He said Osama bin Laden was in Washington, D.C.

"Our position is quite clear. Some journalists have said bin Laden is in Iran. These words don't have legal value. Our position towards Afghanistan and against terrorism is quite clear... I heard that Osama bin Laden is in Washington, D.C…Yes, I did. He's there. Because he was a previous partner of Mr. Bush. They were colleagues in fact in the old days. You know that. They were in the oil business together. They worked together."

- Interview with George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s Good Morning America, May 2010

3. Calling the Holocaust "a myth"

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- Speech in Tehran, September 2009

4. Claiming the West created HIV/AIDS to 'plunder' Africa

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- Comments in Tehran, January 2012

5. "In Iran, we don't have homosexuals"

"In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your country … In Iran we do not have this phenomenon. I don't know who's told you that we have this."

- Speech at Columbia University in New York, Sept. 2007

6. Endorsing suicide bombers as "an invincible weapon"

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"Iran can recruit hundreds of suicide bombers a day. Suicide is an invincible weapon. Suicide bombers in this land showed us the way, and they enlighten our future."

- Comment during visit to training camp, April 2007

7. Saying that Iran should reverse family planning and double its population to triumph over the West

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- Comments on his goal of doubling Iran's population, October 2006

8. Calling the decision to report Iran to the UN for failing to comply with nuclear inspections "the funniest decision I've seen"

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- Comment after the International Atomic Energy Agency reported Iran to the United Nations for failure to cooperate on nuclear inspections, February 2006

9. Saying Israel will be 'wiped off the map' (among other threats)

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"Anybody who recognizes Israel will burn in the fire of the Islamic nation's fury."

- Speech to World Without Zionism student conference in Tehran, October 2005

"We say that this fake regime [Israel] cannot logically continue to live… Open the doors (of Europe) and let the Jews go back to their own countries."

- Comments to reporters in Tehran, April 2006

"Those who think they can revive the stinking corpse of the usurping and fake Israeli regime by throwing a birthday party are seriously mistaken."

- Comments on Israel’s 60th anniversary celebration, May 2008

10. Predicting a sort-of rapture in which Jesus Christ returns with the Muslim Imam Mahdi

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- New Year's greeting to Christians, December 2006