Ayatollah Khomeini

NY Times Cohosts 'Oil and Money' Conference; Iranian Oil Minister to Attend
By Tom Blumer | September 20, 2015 | 6:28 PM EDT

A year ago, Tim Graham at NewsBusters noted that the New York Times was "offering 13-day tours of Iran guided by Times journalist Elaine Sciolino" at the bargain rate of $6,995 per person. Among other things, it promised "excellent insights into ... (the) life and accomplishments" of Ayatollah Khomeini, the ruthless Islamist leader who posed as a liberator, but then imposed a fundamentalist Islamic state after taking control of that country in the late 1970s. Those tours are still active, and popular.

Given that background, I suppose we really shouldn't be all that surprised that Ira Stoller at SmarterTimes.com reported a related development this morning. With the imminent lifting of Western sanctions against Iran, the ever-opportunistic International division of the Times is cohosting an October 6-7 "Oil and Money" conference in London (I promise, I'm not making this up). 

ABC Omits Latest Rant from Iran’s Supreme Leader in Nuclear Deal Coverage
By Curtis Houck | September 9, 2015 | 9:37 PM EDT

On Wednesday night, ABC was the lone network to omit from their coverage of the Iran deal rally that Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei offered a new rant hours earlier in which he promised the country will not cooperate with the U.S. on any other issue beyond the deal in addition to predicting that Israel would not exist in 25 years.

Barnicle: Obama Iran Deal an 'Extraordinary Feat'
By Mark Finkelstein | April 10, 2015 | 8:07 AM EDT

For Iran, Mike?  On today's Morning Joe, reliable Obama fan Mike Barnicle managed to keep a straight face while lauding the Iran deal as an "extraordinary feat." He did so despite poll numbers displayed showing that a huge majority of Americans don't think the ayatollahs will keep their promises.

Let's see: sanctions lifted while centrifuges keep spinning and nuclear scientists beaver away in hardened, bomb-resistant facilities.  Extraordinary, yeah.

MRC's Tim Graham: If Time Gives Miley Cyrus 'Person of the Year,' They Should Just Shut Down
By NB Staff | December 5, 2013 | 2:29 PM EST

Neil Cavuto of the Fox Business Channel brought on MRC’s Tim Graham last night to discuss the sad fact that Miley Cyrus is leading Time’s online poll for Person of the Year. Cavuto said it’s a done deal. “I am here to tell you, Tim, confirm this is going to be the end of civilization as we know it, she will be.”

“If they’re going to do that, it ought to be more controversial than them putting Saddam on the cover, or the Ayatollah Khomeni,” Graham shot back. (Video below)

Dallas Paper's Religion Blog Snickers at Alabama-Iran Parallel
By Matt Philbin | February 12, 2009 | 1:42 PM EST

Update (13 Feb. | Ken Shepherd): Tomaso responds here, dismissing the notion that he exhibited any liberal bias. Commenters to his blog post are divided.

Condescending secular elitism isn’t just for the coasts anymore. It can even come from red state Texas.

On The Dallas Morning News’s Religion blog Feb. 12, Bruce Tomaso wrote a post called “Alabama and Iran Have Something in Common.” It stemmed from a recent Gallup poll that asked people around the world, “How important is religion in your daily life?” The poll found, among many other things, that nearly the same percentage of the population of Iran (83 percent) and Alabama (82 percent) said that religion was important to them.

Tomaso thought this was a riot: “Since I've never been to Iran and haven't spent enough time in Alabama to have a well-formed opinion, I refrain from cleverly drawing further comparisons,” he wrote. “But that doesn't mean you wiseakers can't!”