One thing my mail proves so far is that “democracy-hawks” is not a good label and I should have come up with a better one. In my mind, the column was already too long and I didn’t want to go on for another couple of hundred words on the related concepts of democracy-building and counter-insurgency. But they are importantly different and I could have done a better job conveying that I recognize that.

I didn’t mean to suggest, for example, that Fred Kagan — who is one of the great thinkers in this country — was blindly obsessing over Islamic democracy. I mentioned Fred, as I mentioned Rich, Bill Kristol, Jen Rubin, and Pete Wehner in the context of contending that the condemnations of George Will went too far. I didn’t say, didn’t mean to imply, and don’t believe that anyone in that group — who I read religiously because I learn a lot from them — is a dewey-eyed democracy dreamer. Because I am more alarmed than most over the problem of Islamism, I imagine I might disagree with some or all of these friends on the degree of that challenge, but not the existence of it. And some of us probably wouldn’t disagree much about the degree — no one in that group, to my knowledge, has ever urged the “religion of peace” nonsense. And while Rich and I have debated whether “religion of peace” was useful as a “polite fiction,” the underlying assumption of that debate was that it is a fiction.

My critique of the democracy project was intended to be directed at the policy-makers (in the Bush administration with precursors, Ken Pollack has noted, in the Clinton administration) who decided that democracy promotion was sensible counterterrorism policy and who have clearly ignored or understated the challenge of Islamism. My use of the term “democracy-hawk” was not helpful in making that distinction. In my aforementioned debate with Rich, I objected to his use of the term “To Hell With Them Hawks” because I thought it grossly oversimplified and thus misstated my position. Having made that complaint, I should have been more sensitive to the likelihood that using a label like that that was bound to have a similar effect. I’m sorry about that.

I’ll have more to say about the substance of what Rich, Mark, and Michael (who is happy to be known as a “democracy hawk”!) have thoughtfully raised. This is a very good debate, among people who want to get the policy right, and I’m glad we’re finally having it.