The Taliban's answer was not the only available solution. Again things really aren't that hard to evaluate as right or wrong if you have fundamental principles to guide you. It's real hard to tell right from wrong if you don't have any. A free society has the power to debate and shape those principles into generally applicable laws according to general consensus. Tyrannies do not. I'm also pretty sure the Taliban fell victim to the corrupting influence of power. I believe their abuse of power grew with time. Afghanis were greatly relieved at their restoration of order, but they did not willingly accept the full scale abuses of that regime in trade for order.

It appears you missed the impact of the fall of communism in eastern Europe, the riots and protests in China, the protests in Burma, the protests in Iran, the celebrations in Iraq and Afghanistan after the fall of their governments, etc as well when it comes to interpreting what people want. Frankly I consider it very arrogant to think that only educated Americans or western Europeans can aspire to our ideals, that these are above the poor and ignorant of other countries.

I fully agree that an educated electorate is needed for democracy to work at its best and abhor the degeneration of political debate in this country to sound bites and screaming matches. A poorly educated electorate has also been taken advantage of on numerous occasions by would be tyrants, but that doesn't mean even weak democracies aren't better than tyranny's. Most of Eastern Europe has handled the growing pain issues you raise and progressed to working democracies being integrated into western Europe. Of course many tyrants have also been overthrown for the sake of democracy. According the the current Bush bashing I guess that means we should just give up on promoting Democracy because it's not easy.

Regards,
Mark