From the San Francisco Chronicle today:

"Elections do not make democracies, democracies make elections"

"They know their history, too. In 1920, the nations of the Middle East were created where no nations had previously existed by Western oil imperialism and the League of Nations solely to validate under international law the post- World War I joint oil monopolies France and England had created.

Pro-western monarchs and other rulers were installed to sign on the dotted line, legitimizing cheap Western oil monopolies.

At the same time, the Western capitals spurned the Arab national movement.

When the Arabs hear the term "democracy," they hear a code word for "We want a stable environment for oil."


I think this is pretty clear. What more does anyone need to know about why atrocities are happening in Iraq and why the rest of the world has to live with the fall-out from the occupation of Iraq.