From Hassan Fattah, writing in the Times about the election in Lebanon in which a former president, Amin Gemayel, lost a parliamentary election to an unknown opposition candidate:

“It’s the kiss of death,” said Turki al-Rasheed, a Saudi reformer who watched last Sunday’s elections closely. “The minute you are counted on or backed by the Americans, kiss it goodbye, you will never win.”

The paradox of American policy in the Middle East — promoting democracy on the assumption it will bring countries closer to the West — is that almost everywhere there are free elections, the American-backed side tends to lose.

True, that. Of course, the Times doesn't mention that the Gemayel family has long been (1) an openly Nazi-admiring force with overt fascist leanings, whose militia, the Phalangists, was responsible for many massacres, including the famous rampage at two Palestinian camps in 1982, and (2) Israel's closest ally in Lebanon for many years.

But this was an election in a Christian, mostly Maronite, district, where fascist leanings and Israeli ties shouldn't have been held against Gemayel. His son, Pierre, was recently assassinated. So was his brother, who was killed in 1982 after being installed as president of Lebanon by the Israeli armed forces. (Amin, too, later was elected president.)