RUMI shirts by Arash Norouzi
Jon Stewart on the Iranian Election Protests
The Daily Show — June 22, 2009

Arash Norouzi
The Mossadegh Project | November 1, 2010                   


Jon Stewart - (The Daily Show / Rally To Restore Sanity)

For a mere comedian and talk show host, Jon Stewart has amassed tremendous political clout. Who else could get away with calling the President “dude” during Barack Obama’s appearance on The Daily Show in October 2010? Just days later, his “Rally to Restore Sanity” with cohort Stephen Colbert drew crowds estimated over 250,000 to the Mall in Washington, DC — give or take a billion.

From the beginning, Stewart has supported the Green movement. The week of Iran’s disputed Presidential election, Stewart called the popular street protests in Iran an “intense and courageous display”.

The show’s June 22, 2009 post-election coverage began with media speculation over whether Obama was “doing enough” about the situation, then ran clips of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei blaming Iran’s enemies for the unrest, launching Stewart into the following schtick:

“How do we win with you people over there?!? We help overthrow the regime in the 50’s — you’re mad at us, we let you overthrow your own regime in the 70’s — you’re mad at us! Now we're just sitting here doin’ nothing, you’re still mad at us!”

Sarcasm notwithstanding, this bit still doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, actually. The Islamic regime happens to be the unplanned offspring of U.S. meddling, born as a desperate alternative to the U.S.-imposed Shah’s repressive, vice-like grip on the country. An Anglo-American coup had murdered Iran's democratic system in 1953 (a hostile act, to be sure), then propped up Pahlavi’s rule for over 25 years. Not surprisingly, that made some people mad. Eventually, America had no choice but to “let” (a callous, unconscious choice of words) the unstoppable 1979 revolution against the Shah occur.

The Islamic regime's illegitimacy is self evident. That does not mean, however, that America has not been trying to suffocate it with a variety of methods including “crippling” sanctions, threats and international isolation (that ain’t “doin’ nothing”).


IRAN PROTESTS 2022: Woman, Life, Freedom
IRAN PROTESTS 2022: Woman, Life, Freedom

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Related links:

Maziar Bahari’s Negligent Coup Narrative (Mossadegh, Oil and the 1953 CIA Coup)

British Comedian Rory Bremner on Iran

Senator Robert Byrd on Iran’s Inevitable Revolution



MOSSADEGH t-shirts — “If I sit silently, I have sinned”

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