We've gone too far in thinking we can re-create an American democratic paradise in the Middle East.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
Certainly we've seen the enormous changes across the whole of the Middle East. The democratic genie is out of the bottle.
Therefore, the question is not whether such democratization is possible, but instead how to meet the yearning of the masses in the Middle East for democracy; in other words, how to achieve democratization in the Middle East.
We want to be, I think, an example for the rest of the Arab world, because there are a lot of people who say that the only democracy you can have in the Middle East is the Muslim Brotherhood.
It's not a democracy here, it's the Middle East.
I am aware of the thesis that the United States has long since invested exclusively in stability and this has obviated democratic transformation in the Middle East.
We need to remake the Democratic party. We need to remake America.
I don't think Iraq could be transformed overnight into a democracy. How can you take a country that doesn't have any kind of tradition of democracy, where its people have been brutalized and repressed for decades, and suddenly impose Jeffersonian ideals?
Several experts on the Middle East concur that the Middle East cannot be democratized.
The Iraqi war has transformed the Middle East.
Iraq can emerge as a beacon of hope and democracy in the Middle East, and the world, with our help.