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One other quick point: you decry the big, bad leftist media for misrepresenting our governance of Iraq. It's not really that bad, you say. I won't even debate this broken-record leftist media schtick, but will instead ask a simple question: In this case, is not perception reality? The perception of the rest of the world - and the rest of the Arab world, in particular - is exactly what matters, like it or not.
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But perception changes and the truth comes out eventually. We can give in to our opponents and live an illusion while hiding our head in the sand or we can take decisive action and be above the momentary peer pressure of the world. Russia feed their people propaganda against the US and the West for decades, but this enforced perception was burst by the underlying truth. So, no, I do not agree that reality is perception. An illusion can be maintained for a time, but not indefinitely. And it is not just a few extremists who wanted to kill us on 9/11, there are millions who actively or at least indirectly supported them.
By the year 2025, the true fruits of our actions will be visible for all to see who can see. They will be so obivious that all except for the completely fantatical or mindless will have to aknowledge them. If we do poorly, they will know. If we do well, they will know as well. We can give them the illusion of help, but in reality shaft them. In 2025, it will come back to haunt us. Or we can help them now even though it is difficult doing the right thing and incurs present day perception that we're shafting them. But in 2025 we can hope to see rewards for our actions.
Do we go for the short term gain, but make the problem worse. Or do we go for the long term solution, even if it is much more difficult now. I choose the latter.