Electing Good Men

So Hamas won the Palestinian elections. They will run the Palestinian Authority.

Clearly we have to cut off aid to this government. They are terrorists and we must not just accept them as worthy of our aid.

But this does not mean we do not trumpet free elections in Palestinian territory. Think of the street cred we get in the Moslem world by showing that our promotion of democracy is not just code words for putting in puppets. If Moslems want to elect whackos, they are free to do so. But the lesson should also be that then they are on their own to enjoy their chosen representatives.

And we can afford to make this statement with the Palestinians. This isn't Saudi Arabia after all. At worst, if the Hamas-run PA decides to carry out its vision of killing Jews, the Israelis will have a green light to use their military power to smash up the PA instead of negotiate. Heck, back in 1990 or 1991 when the Algerian Islamists won elections, I thought that with the end of the Cold War and the end of high stakes geo-politics, it would have been better if they had been allowed to take office rather than have the Algerian government cancel the elections and crack down (not that I'm saying we could have stopped it). Why not let them prove themselves incapable of ruling or see if governing might moderate them?

So now a small and weak PA has elected nutballs. Maybe this was a reaction to Fatah corruption. Maybe the Palestinians really do want death to the Jews. Better to know, right? If the former, in time more rational leaders may be elected. If the latter, better to have the veneer of civilization stripped away from the government so everyone can see who they are.

So let's cut off aid to the PA but funnel it to NGOs that build democratic institutions and civic organizations. Our goal should be to promote democracy. So rather than trying to nullify this election result, we should make sure that there will more elections, and that those results will be honored by even a Hamas government that loses.

We can't make them elect good men. But we can insist they keep holding elections until they decide to elect good men.

And think of the effects in other more imprtant countries that see that we really do support democracy even when we don't like the results. This could be revolutionary in its impact.

UPDATE: Not everyone is thrilled with our pursuit of democracy. One NRO writer is not and includes this definition of democracy as a reason not to like elections: "If you define democracy as a balance of forces in which no group's rights may be trampled with impunity[.]" No, I don't define democracy that way. The point that democracy requires more than voting and must have a civic society that accepts give and take; and accepts losing with confidence that there will be another round of debate is well taken. And I noted this fact. But democracy does indeed require actual "voting" done in a free manner. Trying to promote democracy without voting is just ridiculous.