David Brook's latest column begins:
Let us now praise Paul Wolfowitz. Let us now take another look at the man who has pursued - longer and more forcefully than almost anyone else - the supposedly utopian notion that people across the Muslim world might actually hunger for freedom.
Brooks should stop getting his news only from the Washington Times or the National Review. Lots of people all over the world, Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, Christian, Buddhist, atheist, have long believed that people across the Muslim world hunger for freedom. (In a perverse way, that's also Osama Bin Ladin's claim.)
This is a new idea for Brooks because it's a new idea for conservatives. Conservatives were the only ones who believed that freedom wasn't for everybody, that democracy was incompatible with certain cultures or religious traditions. Everyone else, including especially the human rights community, had long understood that democracy and freedom were everyone's future, and everyone's birthright.
Democracy has been on the march since Mahatma Gandhi took up its standard. Bush has simply now gotten in front of the parade.