The best political news of 2004: the Afghan election.

Against all dire predictions and threats from terrorists, Afghanistan held the first presidential election in its bloodstained history. The winner was Hamid Karzai, 46, a politician of the majority Pashtuns, who emerged with 55 percent of the 8 million votes cast. A bigger winner was the Afghan people, who, thanks to the U.S.-led intervention and their own willingness to fight for freedom, tined up to vote. The biggest winner is the cause of democracy in the world, and especially in this region, which much of the West assumed was too culturally backward to express a longing for freedom. Credit should go to President Bush's choice of Karzai as a reader. With his appointments and parceling out of U.S. aid for the past three years, Karzai has sprit the ethnic opposition, undercut the most dangerous warlord, and built a coalition that ran a winning campaign. We were there for him; now he's there for democracy, and we should invest strongly in his nation's growth. We should recognize the power of this message: If the loosely connected Afghan tribes can do majority rule and minority respect, so could the more literate Iraqis, numerous Egyptians, rich Saudis, and misted Palestinians.