"Governments accountable to their people do not attack each other," said Bush. This may come as a surprise to descendants of those who fought for Southern independence from 1861 to 1865. Does Bush think Mr. Lincoln's government or those of the CSA, the Confederate States of America, were not "accountable" to their people? Yet 600,000 Americans died in that war between two democratic republics.

Turkey and Iraqi Kurdistan are democratic, but they appear ready to have a go at each other. Last summer, democratic Israel, enraged by a Hezbollah kidnapping, bombed democratic Lebanon for five weeks, killing a thousand Lebanese and rendering 10,000 homeless.

In 1914, the most democratic nations in Europe plunged into the bloodiest war in history. Free people in European capitals cheered lustily as their sons marched off to die.

Democratic peoples are not immune to blood lust.

"Young people who can disagree openly with their leaders are less likely to adopt violent ideologies," said Bush.

But Weimar was the freest government Germany ever had. Yet Nazis and communists battled constantly, and in 1933, a majority voted for them. Puerto Rican terrorists tried to kill Harry Truman, shot up the House and dynamited Fraunces Tavern in New York in the freest country on earth.

The anarchists, the Red Brigades, the Baader-Meinhoff gang, the IRA, the Basque ETA and the Islamist subway bombers of Britain all operated in democratic societies.

"(E)very time people are given a choice, they choose freedom," said Bush. Oh. In Iran in 2005, the people chose Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. In 2006, free elections gave victories to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Hezbollh, Hamas and anti-American radicals in Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua, who joined forces with twice-elected Hugo Chavez.

The German people chose Hitler and the Nazi Party.

It is one thing to believe democracy is a superior form of government. It is another to worship it, or ascribe to it powers or attributes that can ensure permanent peace among nations. As Douglas MacArthur said, citing Plato, "Only the dead know the end of war."

Democracy means rule by the people, and peoples can be as corrupt and bloodthirsty as tyrants and kings. Today in Moscow, Beijing and Hanoi, Lenin, Mao and Ho -- mass murderers all three -- lie in honor.