re: "Iranian student"
Your attitude is the right one. I like to cut new sources a bit of slack until otherwise notified. The Iraqi blogs I usually frequent are better-known ones, that have been scrutinized by the whole blogosphere and passed muster. All we've got is Zoners to do the job, but that's probably enough.
Again, note that an Iranian could have been in the U.S. for some time and still sound authentic. The Catch-22 is that if he is actually in Iran, any evidence good enough to convince us would probably be good enough to get him in trouble.