Foreign journalists have to have an approved interpreter assigned them, which they have to pay for, who also acts as guide. As an Iranian, even writing for foreign media, I've been mercifully unrestricted.

The city of Tehran is a very modern metropolis, and there's an emphasis in the Islamic republic on science and advancement and technology.

A popular bumper sticker post-9/11, and pretty faded these days, proclaims drivers of the cars to be 'Proud to be an American.' It really should say 'Lucky to be an American,' for I doubt very much that the drivers had much say in having been born here, and are not old enough to have participated in the drafting of the Constitution.

I know that my cell phone in Iran... is bugged, and they listen in, and my emails, I'm sure, are monitored inside Iran. They have my email address; it's not like they can't snoop on it.

It strikes me often while I am in Iran that were Christian evangelicals to take a tour of Iran today, they might find it the model for an ideal society they seek in America. Replace Allah with God, Mohammad with Jesus, keep the same public and private notions of chastity, sin, salvation, and God's will, and a Christian Republic is born.