Democracy in Iraq Too Idealistic

As the war in Iraq drags on, more Americans lose hope of establishing democracy in the violent and unstable country. The United States' original goal, to create a model democracy with a self-supporting oil industry and society in which women had rights and the people were free from security and financial challenges, today seems absurdly unrealistic.
As we began studying the formation of America's republic, I could not help but wonder how we expected to establish a democracy in Iraq when we still do not elect our own president by popular vote! However, as U.S. officials begin to look at the situation in Iraq more pragmatically, they admit that they had been too optimistic, and are "shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning." The Bush Administration did not understand just how important it was to Kurds and Shiites that they be granted a higher status, and officials now say "We set out to establish a democracy, but we're slowly realizing we will have some form of Islamic republic." Not only are Kurds and Shiites expecting political privileges, but women's rights will not be as well established as the Administration had hoped, because the Iraqi government will have to accommodate Islam in order to ensure political stability.
The establishment of the Iraqi government is, in many ways, similar to that of the United States'. In the beginning, America's goal was democracy. However, officials decided this to be unrealistic, as positions of government could not be decided by popular vote, because the common people were ill-equipped to choose the best candidate. The original ideas were too idealistic, and to make sure the government would be stable, they had to be more realistic and make America a republic. In Iraq, while a complete democracy sounds great, the chances of it succeeding are very slim, and so the U.S. must forfeit some of its original plans for Iraq, because the now, the ultimate goal is a stable government with improved human rights.