James Joyner reiterates a point I made last night:
it takes more than just one successful election to achieve democratic order; we need to see, at the very least, a peaceful transition that follows another fair contest. January 30 deserves a special place in history. But, if we’re serious about democratization, then we’ll treat it as the beginning — not the culmination — of comprehensive political reform.
Indeed. And if we are to avoid the failures of Vietnam (which is the context in which he discusses the issue), we have to be serious about not just elections, but democratic institutions and practices (and therefore not just in promoting a pro-US government–the ideal is that the new government would be at least moderately pro-US because of gratitude and self-interest, not because we installed puppets).
Further, the need to work hard for long-term stability is why talk of immediate withdrawal (a la Ted Kennedy) is reckless and simply wrong.
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