"The War Against Democratic Choice in Egypt and Syria"

Here's the biggest problem with CBC reporter Nahlah Ayed's thoughts on these elections. She fails to acknowledge that democracy is more than a matter of casting a vote; that, in the absence of a strong democratic tradition and institutions which can support it, there's no way a "democratic" election in places like Egypt, Syria or the Palestinian territories will spark a Western-style "evolution" to freedom; that such elections will, in fact, result in decidedly non-democratic groups--the Muslim Brotherhood, or Al Qaeda, or Hamas--being the peoples' choice.

In other words, it will be a one-time democratic election (a la the one which brought the Nazis to power in Weimar Germany).