In a Washington Post Op-Ed published on June 22nd, 2004 by Jackson Diehl entitled “Backing Bush’s Mideast Vision,” the author argues that, despite any misgiving about President Bush’s policies, Bush opened the door for the discussion of democracy in the Middle East. Despite the unpopularity of President Bush and his Road Map plan for peace, Europeans, American on both sides of the political spectrum and some Arabs have rallied around his cry for democratic reform. While many may disagree with the method by which President Bush has chosen to pursue these goals there has also been broad agreement around the world in favor of reform in the Arab world. Diehl believes that even though the combination of recent events has tied the President’s hands and severely weakened his Road Map Plan, it was his continual attention to democratization that paved the way for this new call for democracy in the Middle East.

“A lot of these people don't think much of George Bush, which is one reason why the coalition hasn't entirely coalesced. But almost all of them say that Bush's preaching on democracy over the past year, and the modest action that has come with it, has changed the terms of debate about the future of the Middle East, both in and outside the region. Bush's campaign "frightened people," King Abdullah of Jordan said in an interview here last week. "But it also allowed some of us to say that if we don't come up with our own initiative, something will be forced on us. And once you say you are going to reform, you trigger a process that you can't turn back…"

“Another indicator comes in the release of a paper this week by a cross section of parliamentarians and policymakers from the United States and Europe, few of them supporters of Bush but all of them ardent advocates of democratic change in the Middle East… In essence the group's paper calls for a more muscular version of the Bush policy -- without the compromises forced by transatlantic tensions and the blow back from Iraq. While it acknowledges the need for homegrown Arab reform movements, it emphasizes that these are most likely to arise outside existing governments. It argues that the West should focus on supporting these movements while linking aid, trade and other cooperation with governments to concrete progress on reform -- particularly in those countries, such as Egypt, where the regimes are both U.S. clients and entrenched autocracies.”

"’The West cannot export democracy as such. At the same time, the West can and in our view, must play a critical supporting role from the outside -- as it has in democratic breakthroughs and transitions in other parts of the world," says the paper, which was developed in months of transatlantic discussions sponsored by the German Marshall Fund. "This is a generational project for which we must summon historic staying power.’"

“If it all sounds a lot like Bush's vision, that is part of the point -- to show that there is a constituency for a Middle East democracy movement extending well beyond this White House. "What we were trying to do is demonstrate that it's possible to build a bipartisan coalition for this vision across the aisle and across the Atlantic," says Asmus. "The Bush administration has made a start. The question is will we follow up and will we come up with a long-term blueprint."

“The next step is unlikely to come from an administration preoccupied with Iraq and the upcoming election or from Arab governments. Progress on Middle East democracy will depend on independent movements seizing on the space Bush has opened and widening it. The German Marshall coalition aims its paper at similar groups of activists and intellectuals in the Arab world, some of which have produced their own groundbreaking manifestos in recent months. Taken together, the voices of these pro-democracy networks are still drowned out by the naysayers and skeptics, in the region and even in Washington. But time, and history, are probably on their side.”