Steven A. Cook, a senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, published an article in Foreign Policy titled, “What the NeoCons Got Right.” Mr. Cook does not include Iraq in what neoconservatives got right, though his dissent is intelligent and reasonable. But he argues that neoconservatives got Syria, Iran, and democracy right. He argues that the real problem we face with Iran is ontological, having to do with the metaphysical nature of that regime. And he argues that neoconservatism’s “forceful advocacy of democracy and freedom in the Middle East may have grated on many, but it did much to advance those causes in a region once described as ‘democracy’s desert.’”

As I said in my earlier post, on the matter of the Iraq war, we’re seeing evidence of a significant (and encouraging) climate change of opinion on national-security matters.

It’s a good reminder that with enough patience, things do have a way of working out.