Matthew Yglesias takes issue with Charles Krauthammer, and then says something that I think is pretty strange:

What's at issue here isn't whether or not the January election will be Legimate in some abstract realm of the forms. The question is whether the election will, as the administration maintains, be useful in drying up support for the insurgency.

This is the problem with viewing democracy as a means to an end. Whether or not the elections have a significant short-term impact on violence is not the issue. The issue is whether or not the election will be Legitimate in the concrete "realm of forms", as Yglesias puts it. There may still be a solid minority of Iraqis and foreign fighters willing to blow people up after legitimate elections. But if elections allow the majority of Iraqis to choose their leaders, and those leaders take over virtually all responsibility in governing their country, then that is the issue. Even if violence stays the same or even increases.

Because democracy is an end in itself.