I think Rob mistakes my point, or I didn't make it effectively. Of course democracies do go to war -- even in the 21st century! -- but it's how they get there that is important in this case. The Russo-Georgian war (are we calling it that yet?) was a huge shock because many international observers didn't see it coming. People were not similarly surprised when the U.S. invaded Iraq -- it took quite a bit of debate, including in the U.N.
I also think it's hard to speculate about Putin's popularity in a hypothetical democratic Russia, since he has been in control of the media and stifling all dissenting voices for so long -- this is less a discussion about democracy than it is about liberal institutions. But, just because Tom Friedman's silly McDonald's theory has been disproved by this conflict doesn't mean that democratic peace theory should go out the window, too. As with China, Americans have an unfortunate tendency to forget that Russia isn't really a liberal democracy. I'll concede, however, that the war may have happened anyways.
My real problem, though, is with the excitement on the left about attacking John McCain for portraying this as a conflict between a democracy and an autocracy. That's not why McCain is wrong -- he's wrong because he's making crazy statements about escalating the conflict rather than deescalating it and because he has consistently supported policies that encouraged Georgia to be more belligerent rather than less. Any lefty complaining about the backfiring democracy agenda that the Bush administration has pushed should be tempered by the realization that it is a good thing for the U.S. to have a democracy agenda -- it just can't be accomplished through imperialism and militarism.
--Tim Fernholz
