[Captain Kirk]

Well...if he said desirable he is wrong. It is probably a pipedream, at least for the foreseable future. In any case, it is matter for the Iraqis to decide, not us.

[mountaineer]

I can see I should have included Condoleezza Rice's comments in my post (part of the sections I omitted because I was getting tired of typing):

"(The Iraqi Interim Authority) is an enabler ... for the Iraqi people to be involved in the administration of their own country," said National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice in a recent speech at the White House. "And it becomes the first stage or a basis on which you can begin to build a representative government that can be then affirmed by the Iraqi people."

.... Rice said the IIA will not be a coalition-imposed provisional government. Rather, one emerging from the "broad base that it must be ... people outside (Iraq), people inside, people who have for decades fought for a free Iraq and people who are being freed - it's got to be representative of ethnic and religious groups in the country, and it has to be broadly based"

_____________

So a representative republic cannot be created overnight. Does that mean we shouldn't even try to help the Iraqi people create a government that treats them as free human beings. Again, what is it about freedom and self-determination that so offends John D. Rockefeller IV?