What'll it be? Will we lead by example or force?  Now that
America has settled its beef with Saddam Hussein, all eyes are
turning to Syria. Top American officials have recently charged
the Syrians with possessing chemical weapons, harboring leaders
of the fallen Iraqi regime, and allowing Syrian "volunteers" to
travel to Iraq to kill Americans. How we handle those rising
tensions will provide the first clues to how the administration
plans to convert our military victory in Iraq into a political
one.  In the current issue of The Washington Monthly, I argued
that the move against Iraq was only partly tied to Saddam's
weapons of mass destruction, and even less to his supposed ties
to Islamist terrorist groups. The deeper rationale was based on
the belief– widely shared at the Pentagon and by Vice President
Dick Cheney– that the root cause of terrorism is the Middle
East's endemic autocracy, corruption, and poverty.  In a 21st-
century version of the domino theory, the reasoning goes,
toppling Saddam and rebuildi