Dems struggle to differentiate between US and Iran

Democrats are having difficulty differentiating between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran.

On Wednesday, The View host Whoopi Goldberg insisted that Black Americans are just as oppressed as the Iranian people. Her remarks came in response to co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin, who was criticizing Iran’s totalitarian Islamist regime.

“Let’s just remember too, the Iranians literally throw gay people off of buildings, they don’t adhere to basic human rights,” Griffin said.

But Goldberg objected: “Listen, here’s the thing — let’s not do the — let’s not do that, because if we start with that, we have been known in this country to tie gay folks to the car,” she said to audience applause.

“I’m sorry, but where the Iranian regime is today is nothing compared to the United States,” replied Griffin.

“They used to just keep hanging black people!” Goldberg insisted as the audience applauded again.

Griffin stressed that the US government and the Iranian regime are not the same.

“The year 2025 in the United States is nothing like if I stepped foot wearing this outfit in Tehran right now,” she said. “I can’t have my hair showing, I can’t wear a skirt, I can’t have my arms out.”

But Goldberg pressed on : “That’s why I am saying that it is the same. Murdering someone for their differences not good whoever does it. It’s not good,” she said as the audience applauded a third time. 

“I think it’s very different to live in the United States in 2025 than it is to live in Iran,” Griffin repeated.

“Not if you’re black,” Goldberg said, then going on to complain about life as a Black American. “Every day, we are worried. Do we have to be worried about our kids? Are there kids who are going to get shot because they’re running through somebody’s neighborhood?” The audience applauded again.

When Griffin retorted that “there are places much darker than this country,” Goldberg insisted that “not everybody feels that way." She lamented that Black Americans only "got the vote in 1965," apparently referring to the Voting Rights Act.

A tyrannical Islamic regime

The Ayatollah’s regime executed over 700 Iranians in 2023 alone, according to Human Rights Watch. That figure doesn’t include women like Mahsa Amini, who was killed in prison after being arrested by morality police for not wearing her hijab. Other women, like actress Azadeh Samadi, were forced to undergo treatment for “antisocial personality disorder” after she was seen wearing a hat instead of a hijab. In 2009, when Iranian dissidents formed a Green Movement and organized protests, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps opened fire on the demonstrators, killing dozens. Homosexuality is punishable by death.

After Israel attacked Iran’s top commanders and nuclear sites last week, the regime restricted internet access to prevent Iranians from coordinating protests against the government.

Iran: The Middle East’s ‘most Western nation’

Goldberg is not the only one who feels the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran are cut from the same cloth. According to Richard Stengel, former President Obama’s under secretary of state for public affairs, the US has much in common with the Middle East’s “most Western nation.”

“They chant ‘Death to America,’ I went to Iran in 2014,” Stengel told MSNBC’s Katy Tur on Thursday. “I was sitting at a rally, these young guys were chanting ‘Death to America’ . . . They finished the chant and two young men came over and said, ‘Are you American?’ I said ‘yes,’ they said, ‘we want to welcome you to our country, we love American culture, we love American movies,’ and they wanted to talk about all of these things. Iran is the most Western nation in the whole Middle East. We have much more in common with them than a lot of countries that we do have alliances with.”

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