the_mad_poster's Journal: Democracy In The Middle East?

So here come the democrats (in the sense of people who want democracy, not the political parties) in the middle east.

First Arafat kicks the bucket and the Palestineans elect a saner, more sensible leader. Saudi Arabia holds some limited elections, Egypt holds some corrupt elections, the Lebanese get pissed and start marching after someone, possibly Syria, blows up a beloved former PM, and now Damascus is rumbling with talk of change.

Was Bush right? Did Bush and his lackeys have it right about democracy in the middle east? Are we seeing changes spurred by the success of the elections in Iraq?

While I've never claimed that liberating Iraq would have been a bad thing if that's what we'd have actually set out to do rather than making it an excuse after the initial failure of Bush's doomsday taunting to pan out, I was highly skeptical about the prospects of a "viral" democracy sweeping the region. While there has hardly been a decisive blow struck here, this is probably the biggest change I've ever seen in my life.

So, perhaps I was wrong. Time will tell, but maybe I was wrong to be so skeptical about the idea of "planting" democracy.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Wow

[Hi_2k]

It takes a big man to admit when he's wrong. Not that anything's garunteed yet, but perhaps with more popular support for the war, more middleeasterers will join the democrats.

Election Comment

[StalinsNotDead]

Egypt holds some corrupt elections

Please link to an article or some other reference where the words "corrupt" and "election" when used together do not result in a redundant statement. I cannot recollect any such instances, up to and including the Class-Presidential elections back in secondary education.

invading Iraq had little to do with it

[NeMon'ess]

The Palestineans have been living next to a democracy. They saw that electing the head of Islamic Jihad isn't going to get them anywhere, so Abbas makes sense.

Saudi Arabia has been testing limited elections in Qatar for a few years now. Qatar may be officially a separate country, but the Saudis use it as a testbed. I will give that the USA may definitely have pushed/scared the Saudis into trying more democracy.

cripes

[bechthros]

Holy valium, Batman. Who are you and what have you done with TMP?

Is democracy a good thing? Of course it is. Is middle east democracy a good thing? Sure, if it's for real and the people really want it. For as modern America is showing repeatedly, an uninformed or apathetic populace is pretty much mutually exclusive with democracy. The founders knew this and were very public about the fact that any democracy that doesn't educate people is a democracy in name only, and is soon subverted by the will of