The US has screwed over Iran badly. Iran was the first democracy in the Middle East, nationalized their oil industry and the US through the CIA staged a coup, installing the Shah.

The regime of the Shah was brutal and repressive, the SAVAK being the Iranian secret police who enforced the repression. The SAVAK was trained and equipped by the US's CIA, including methods of torture. The people of Iran resented what had happened.

When the Shah was overthrown he stayed out of the country. Many Iranians wanted him returned for trial, a la Saddam, as he was certainly guilty of crimes against humanity as well as iranians. Instead, the US granted him a visa to come for cancer treatment.

At that point the Iranians took the US hostages. Many of them were CIA agents under cover, but all were swept up. (Frankly, if I had been Iranian I might have been in favor of public hanging considering what these people had done to my fellow Iranians.)

And the rest is history. In the US, Iran is excoriated as a rogue nation. How and why it distrusts the US is completely understandable, and the US continues to mess with the country.

And, because she nationalized some of her oil resources, Bush was trying the same thing with Venezuela. If you've noticed the anti-Chavez posts here, they started after he nationalized oil and have nothing to do with human rights in the country. Same story, different country.

Arf