Need Freeper help for research on Iran [Vanity]

[Tennessean4Bush]

Thanks in advance!

[Tennessean4Bush]

bttt mice elf

[piasa]

Someone needs help

[Calpernia]

[piasa]

If anyone knows, this guy does- check out his profile page:

http://www.freerepublic.com/~doctorzin/

[trashcanbred]

This is one article:

http://www.iranianvoice.org/article1352.html

[mystery-ak]

freeper needs help...

[mrsmith]

This guy can help you. Here's the only reference I've seen, but it doesn't give the provenance of the poll.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/865645/posts

[the Real fifi]

Dr. Zin a freeper, has a running thread on Iran and a blogsite about it, send him a personal message.

[MissouriRepublican]

Check this one. http://www.webprowire.com/summaries/278509.html

[BlackVeil]

The parliament in Iran, now, is different from the previous one, which more fairly reflected public opinion.

The last parlt was dominated by reformists, this one by hardliners. The reason is, that the Guardian's Council manipulated the most recent election, and would not allow most candidates to stand.

However, as for Iranian public opinion about the US, it fluctuates all the time. At the moment, Iranians are watching the situation in Iraq.

[freedom44]

Hope this helps:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1072-717362,00.html

From above article:

"A poll conducted by a state-owned company in Tehran in February revealed that 70 per cent of Iranians had a favourable view of the US (which is thus more popular in Iran than in Britain, let alone in France and Germany). "

[freedom44]

People have a difficult time separating public opinion and government opinion because they tend to picture these governments like our own. In that, if one doesn't agree with their ideology they merely vote them out. So if the government of Iran chants death to the US then the people must agree. Of course, that's not the situation in a dictatorship, especially a deeply unpopular one. The government in Iran is deeply out of touch with it's people, so deeply out of touch that other polls have shown their approval at around 15-20%

[freedom44]

Here's an opinion poll of Iranian diaspora as well as in the country:

http://www.iranian.com/Poll/archives.php?poll_id=87

Is it true that Iranians are the most pro-American (or least anti-American) people in the Islamic world?

-- No 18.47 % (121)
-- Yes 72.37 % (474)
-- Not Sure 9.16 % (60)

[freedom44]

Here's a good one by someone who actually visited the country.


http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/05/opinion/05KRIS.html?ex=1100581200&en=d332b4ffcd7e8a1e&ei=5070&oref=login

Those Friendly Iranians
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Published: May 5, 2004

TEHRAN, Iran

Finally, I've found a pro-American country.

Everywhere I've gone in Iran, with one exception, people have been exceptionally friendly and fulsome in their praise for the United States, and often for President Bush as well. Even when I was detained a couple of days ago in the city of Isfahan for asking a group of young people whether they thought the Islamic revolution had been a mistake (they did), the police were courteous and let me go after an apology.

They apologized; I didn't.

On my first day in Tehran, I dropped by the "Den of Spies," as the old U.S. Embassy is now called. It's covered with ferocious murals denouncing America as the "Great Satan" and the "archvillain of nations" and showing the Statue of Liberty as a skull (tour the "Den of Spies" here).

Then I stopped to chat with one of the Revolutionary Guards now based in the complex. He was a young man who quickly confessed that his favorite movie is "Titanic." "If I could manage it, I'd go to America tomorrow," he said wistfully.

He paused and added, "To hell with the mullahs."

In the 1960's and 1970's, the U.S. spent millions backing a pro-Western modernizing shah — and the result was an outpouring of venom that led to our diplomats' being held hostage. Since then, Iran has been ruled by mullahs who despise everything we stand for — and now people stop me in the bazaar to offer paeans to America as well as George Bush.

Partly because being pro-American is a way to take a swipe at the Iranian regime, anything American, from blue jeans to "Baywatch," is revered. At the bookshops, Hillary Clinton gazes out from three different pirated editions of her autobiography.

`It's a best seller, though it's not selling as well as Harry Potter," said Heidar Danesh, a bookseller in Tehran. "The other best-selling authors are John Grisham, Sidney Sheldon, Danielle Steel."

Young Iranians keep popping the question, "So how can I get to the U.S.?" I ask why they want to go to a nation denounced for its "disgustingly sick promiscuous behavior," but that turns out to be a main attraction. And many people don't believe a word of the Iranian propaganda.

"We've learned to interpret just the opposite of things on TV because it's all lies," said Odan Seyyid Ashrafi, a 20-year-old university student. "So if it says America is awful, maybe that means it's a great place to live."

Indeed, many Iranians seem convinced that the U.S. military ventures in Afghanistan and Iraq are going great, and they say this with more conviction than your average White House spokesman.

One opinion poll showed that 74 percent of Iranians want a dialogue with the U.S. — and the finding so irritated the authorities that they arrested the pollster. Iran is also the only Muslim country I know where citizens responded to the 9/11 attacks with a spontaneous candlelight vigil as a show of sympathy.

Iran-U.S. relations are now headed for a crisis over Tehran's nuclear program, which appears to be so advanced that Iran could produce its first bomb by the end of next year. The Bush administration is right to address this issue, but it needs to step very carefully to keep from inflaming Iranian nationalism and uniting the population behind the regime. We need to lay out the evidence on satellite television programs that are broadcast into Iran, emphasizing that the regime is squandering money on a nuclear weapons program that will further isolate Iranians and damage their economy.

Left to its own devices, the Islamic revolution is headed for collapse, and there is a better chance of a strongly pro-American democratic government in Tehran in a decade than in Baghdad. The ayatollahs' best hope is that hard-liners in Washington will continue their inept diplomacy, creating a wave of Iranian nationalism that bolsters the regime — as happened to a lesser degree after President Bush put Iran in the axis of evil.

Oh, that one instance when I was treated inhospitably? That was in a teahouse near the Isfahan bazaar, where I was interviewing religious conservatives. They were warm and friendly, but a group of people two tables away went out of their way to be rude, yelling at me for being an American propagandist. So I finally encountered hostility in Iran — from a table full of young Europeans.

[Ragnorak]

Start Here:

http://www.daneshjoo.org/

http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3258.shtml

These may be interesting too

http://www.c-d-i.org/index.shtml

http://www.time.com/time/europe/photoessays/vigil/4.html

http://www.iran-e-sabz.org/statements/solidarity.html

[freedom44]

How about feelings toward President Bush? This BBC World Service poll shows Iranians as most pro-Bush in the world.

http://globalnin.com/branchedsurvey/results.aspx?surveyid=20&languageid=2&partnerid=0&branchid=0&filter=region

BBC World Service

Total Votes: 78,242

Who would your choice for President be?

a. George Bush

Arabic 28%
English 16%
Spanish 17%
Persian 51%
Russian 44%
Urdu 8%
Hindi 17%
Portuguese 10%
Chinese Traditional 27%
Chinese Simplified 28%

b. John Kerry

Arabic 50%
English 76%
Spanish 76%
Persian 42%
Russian 44%
Urdu 51%
Hindi 84%
Portuguese 80%
Chinese Traditional 69%
Chinese Simplified 69%

c. Ralph Nader

Arabic 22%
English 7%
Spanish 7%
Persian 7%
Russian 5%
Urdu 8%
Hindi 3%
Portuguese 7%
Chinese Traditional 4%
Chinese Simplified 3%

[Mears]

Good Lord---look at all the info in 1/2 hour----FR is great!

[Veritas et equitas ad Votum]

http://regimechangeiran.blogspot.com/

[stolat]

I heard of the Iranian discontent for the first time on Free Republic. Thank you all, especially Dr. Zin. Can you tell us more about yourself, Dr. Zin, background, occupation, etc? Thanks in advance.