America's
relationship with China did not crumble when Hillary Clinton challenged its
government to stop censoring the Internet last year, or when she challenged the
country to account for the dissidents it has
disappearedover the years just days before last week's summit between presidents Barack Obama and
Hu Jintao. America's Arab friends did not walk away from their alliances with
the United States after Clinton
told them, at a
recent public forum in Qatar, that "people have grown tired of [their] corrupt institutions and stagnant political order." Such
public candor not only encourages dissidents in repressive societies, but
stimulates debate among elites, who often privately admit that the Americans
have a point. It can contribute to those magical moments -- unpredictable,
infrequent, but in the longer scheme of things inevitable -- when stagnant
order gives way to vibrant change.