There’s good and there’s bad in David Ignatius column on diplomacy with Syria but the genuinely absurd part of the column is not-at-all something Ignatius can be blamed for. And it’s right here at the beginning:

DAMASCUS, Syria — What positions would Syria take if it entered a dialogue with the United States about Iraq and other Middle East issues? I put that question Thursday to Walid Moallem, Syria’s foreign minister, and he offered surprisingly strong support for the recommendations made last week in the Baker-Hamilton report.

Note the dateline: Damascus. Note the interviewee: Syria’s foreign minister. It’s not that hard. I don’t have the budget for a trip to Damascus, and I bet I lack the clout for an interview with the foreign minister. But the State Department can surely swing the trip. Exploring the possibility of diplomacy requires, quite simply, nothing more than for Rice or Robert Zoellick or David Welch to, you know, go to Syria and ask what’s up. It’s lazy, insane, or just insane laziness not to do it. But no. Top officials will meet with the Syrian opposition but not the Syrian government. Because, I guess, if we close our eyes and wish hard enough, the Syrian government will just go away and the opposition will take over?

At any rate, here’s Ignatius’ complete interview with the Foreign Minister, and good for him for making the trip.

John Hood:

Denver is competing with New York City to host the 2008 Democratic convention. Many party leaders want to spotlight Colorado as an example of blue momentum in the mountain west, since Democrats have gained the state legislature, seats in Congress, and the governorship in the past two election cycles. But a resurgent Democratic constituency, organized labor, had been balking. Labor leaders said that Denver had few unionized hotels. Their complaints are getting results, as city government is working on the “problem.” City bonds helped finance a downtown hotel, so city officials have used their corresponding influence to help pave the way for a union to organize the workers. Union leaders who favor Denver’s bid want to use the convention business as leverage to organize additional hotels.

This is how the game is played, kids.

Hood seems to regard this as shady but, in fact, this is how the game is played and I say, “keep on playing.” Denver would be a good location for the 2008 Democratic National Convention. I think the party would like to see a Denver convention. And I think Denver would like to host a Convention. The problem is that there aren’t enough unionized hotels in Denver. So local politicians and labor unions are trying to use the possibility of a convention and other forms of leverage they have to organize local hotel workers. Sounds smart to me — I wish them luck.

Condoleezza Rice explains that there’ll be no new diplomatic initiatives with Iran and Syria because “neither country should need incentives to foster stability in Iraq.” What’s more, she “also said there would be no retreat from the administration’s push to promote democracy in the Middle East.”

Seriously, people, it’s time to grow up. Sitting around in the Situation Room and deciding that other countries just should do what we want them to do so there’s no need for diplomacy is insane. The way the world works is that if you want some countries to do some things, you need to discuss this fact with them, ascertain what their actual views on the matter are, see what they would want you to do in exchange, and then make a decision. Rice rejected this option “saying the ‘compensation’ required by any deal might be too high.” Get that again. She won’t talk to Syria and Iran to explore options because the price might — might — be too high. Why not find out?

The interaction of this “they should do it anyway” view with the democracy view is especially toxic. Promoting democracy, in this context, means putting an anti-Iranian government in Baghdad, putting an anti-Syrian government in Lebanon, and overthrowing the regimes in Damascus and Teheran. Let that be as desirable as you like, but it’s obvious that neither Syria or Iran is going to help us bring stability to anything as long as that remains the medium-term objective of our policy. Most insanely of all, given the circumstances insisting on “the administration’s push to promote democracy in the Middle East” isn’t going to actually promote democracy in the Middle East. It’s just going to ensure that Iraq slips ever-deeper into chaos and that we more-and-more lose our grip on the situation.