President Bush on Thursday challenged Iran, Syria and two crucial Middle East allies of the United States — Egypt and Saudi Arabia — to begin embracing democratic traditions, and to view the fall of Saddam Hussein as "a watershed event in the global democratic revolution."
"Sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe," Mr. Bush argued, in a critique that embraced both Democrats and Republicans who preceded him, "because in the long run, stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty."
The speech, before the National Endowment for Democracy, appeared to be part of an effort by the White House to change American and world perceptions of the Iraq occupation, describing it in far broader strategic terms than the ouster of a dictator.
But it came at a moment when Mr. Bush is struggling to create democratic institutions in Iraq itself, and when the daily casualties among the American and allied soldiers have led many in the region to question whether the United States is capable of transforming the nation it invaded.
If this was Bush's strategy from the get-go, and if he stressed this earlier on instead of all that crap about WMD's, I must admit, that I'd have much more respect for him.
I wouldn't go so far as to say that I'd agree with him, because he's still fucked up a lot of things. But I certainly would have respected him.
But this spin on the war in Iraq is being emphasized far, far too late.