Jonah Goldberg is exactly right in warning that "Pursuing elections before you've cultivated liberal values is a recipe for Hitlerism or Hamas-ism" while suggesting "If there's a strong-man who wants to be Ataturk [who modernized, secularized and liberalized post-Ottoman Turkey], we should give him some leeway."
That is why Kuwaitis and Jordanians should be left to continue their measurably steady movement towards electoral democracy, with or without constitutional monarchism, with quiet encouragement from Washington; the regimes in countries like Egypt, Yemen, Bahrain, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Qatar given varying degrees of prods and admonishments to receive liberal parties and advocates; and the virulent governments of Syria and Iran undercut in every way possible. In debate on American foreign policy, too much attention is paid to the means of cultivating freedom — when it is ends that matter.