The Online Beat: "Let the people of Lebanon vote--under the watchful eye of election monitors from the UN, the Carter Center and other international agencies--on whether they want the Syrians to leave on the more-or-less immediate timetable that Bush is promoting. My bet is that the majority of Lebanese voters would tell the occupiers to exit. But as someone who has spent a good deal of time in the region, I suspect that the vote would be closer than many observers from afar imagine. That's because after the horrific instability and violence of the 1980s, there is a portion of the Lebanese population that sees the Syrian military presence as a stabilizing force in a country that is deeply divided along lines of religion, ethnicity and class. The fact is that pro-Syrian parties have won a lot of votes in Lebanese elections, and it is not unreasonable to think that they will continue to do so in the future.

If President Bush really believes, as he told the Lebanese people on Tuesday, that 'Lebanon's future belongs in your hands,' then he should support a popular referendum that could settle the question of what future the Lebanese people want.

The president should not stop there. He should also support similar referendums regarding the occupations of Palestine and Iraq -- where polls suggest there is widespread opposition to the presence of foreign military forces."

(Via The Nation Weblogs.)