Benign isolationism?

This article from The New Republic approaches from another angle a subject that my co-worker Eddie and I were speaking about on Wednesday.  Kaplan argues that my nation's public seems weary after the past 3 1/2 years, in which, far from History having "ended," it arose from its grave and grabbed us by the throat--and (my little addition follows here), just like in Night of the Living Dead, our response was to set it on fire.  Though Kaplan doesn't say this, it could also be that even embedded in Bush's recent mantra that "America is safer" is the suggestion that we can relax a bit now . . . though, as some writers have noted recently, he and Cheney have offered few second-term proposals beyond "Stay tuned."  But no matter how much we may want to collectively chill, Kaplan goes on to say, the world has a history of not letting us do so, and it's not likely to do so now.
My friend Eddie and I were talking about all this on Wednesday.  Eddie, I must say, is one of those friends who is a bit frustrating to have as a friend: he's pretty well read, especially in terms of politics and social history, but he absolutely LOVES to talk, most often without establishing beforehand that his targeted audience has either time or inclination to BE his audience.  He literally does not greet me when he and I first  see each other in the mornings; he begins to talk as though a few minutes had interrupted us instead of (in the case of my schedule) a full day and a half.
Anyway.  We both agree that it's incredibly naive on the part of some people who say we have to pull out of Iraq as soon as possible as a way to atone for our ill-advised adventure there in the first place.  I argue here that we now have no choice but to stay and make as certain as we can that Iraq becomes a bona-fide self-governing entity, and we have no choice because our very actions have made it thus.  With Eddie, I furthered that argument (and here we link up with Kaplan): that to my mind, what the Bush administration has committed us to--the eventual democratization of the Middle East-- is not some short-term adventure . . . assuming, of course, we think that's something worth pursuing. 
For the record: I think it is, but as Iraq shows me, though people can certainly agree as to the ends, the means by which we achieve them are another matter.  We have to do this.  We must show everyone--not just Arabs, but our allies and ourselves--that these ideals we claim to have entered into Iraq for mean something, that "democratization" is not a mere political goal but a policy that that transcends a president's term or a political party's platform.  And we must do this in order to repair the damage we've caused to our image in the world as a result of Iraq.  Otherwise, we'll continue to see our prestige in the world slip away; even our allies will cease to trust us, much less support our actions; and would our enemies need any more provocation?  To be sure: we ARE weary of all this history, but a goodly portion of it we have brought on ourselves.  To claim weariness and then withdraw now would be to quit, to retreat--but it would also signal to the world that we don't see our own democratic principles as worth even working for, much less fighting for.