IRAN: the dichotomy of an Islamic state pretending to be a republic!

and how CIA’s 1953 coup impacted the 1979 Revolution

Was Iran’s 1979 Revolution an Islamic revolution? Many people claim no, that it was not. If that’s the case, then why did Iranians vote to transform their country into an Islamic republic shortly after the revolution? Then, just a few months after that, they voted for an Islamic constitution!

And here is another question: how do you write an Islamic constitution for a republic? As it turns out, the Iranian clerics of 1979 had no idea how to do this. And their conundrum back then made sense, because these are opposing ideas. The legitimacy of a republic is predicated on the rule of the people. But the legitimacy of an Islamic state is derived from the divine. A country cannot be a real republic and a true theocracy.

The story of how the mullahs solved this conundrum will make you laugh, and then, perhaps, make you sad. Because while this is all interesting history, lives were upended, and people died back in 1979. Deplorably, lives are still being upended in Iran and Iranians are still being killed — savagely so, by their own so-called “Islamic” government!

But the story of how the Islamic Republic came to be cannot be completely appreciated without recognizing…