Does gratuitously bringing up the Armenian genocide increase or decrease our leverage in Ankara? The angry responses of Turkey's president and prime minister provide the answer. On Thursday, President Abdullah Gul called the resolution an "attempt to sacrifice big issues for minor domestic political games" -- an allusion to the far-from-negligible Armenian American lobby, which has long pressed for a resolution like this.But, it won't make us feel good if we don't pass a resolution condemning a regime for something THEY didn't do, or a condemnation that has already been issued and signed three times since 1915.
The absurdity is that the genocide of 1915 was not perpetrated by today's Turkish Republic, established in 1923, but by the Ottoman Empire, which collapsed at the end of World War I. You might as well blame the United States for the deportation of Acadians from Nova Scotia during the French and Indian Wars.
"If we hope to stop future genocides, we need to admit to those horrific acts of the past," argued Rep. Brad Sherman, a California Democrat and a sponsor of the resolution. Really? My sense is that all the resolutions in the world about past genocides will do precisely nothing to stop the next one.
And if -- let's just suppose -- the next genocide happens in Iraq, and the United States finds itself impotent to prevent it, the blame will lie as much with this posturing and irresponsible Congress as with anyone.
According to Michael Rubin, Pelosi said,
"this isn't about Turkey..it's about the Ottoman Empire..."Uh, Nancy, could you tell me where the Ottoman Empire is? Where are its leaders? It doesn't exist anymore, blockhead! The truth is this is about disrupting the MidEast even more and then turning around and blaming Bush for it.
Rubin's article shows you how this Democrat Congress is about nothing more than image and perception, and how they don't give a damn how it affects our missions around the world. Read it and know the truth about the Dems.
Babbin over at Human Events has more about the idiot thinking of San Fran Nan and the feel good nature (not to mention irrelevant) condemnation of a regime that no longer exists:
On October 11, Pelosi said, "While that may have been a long time ago, genocide is taking place now in Darfur, it did within recent memory in Rwanda, so as long as there is genocide there is need to speak out against it."OK, so riddle me this Ted Kennedy: Who is now trying to manufacture a conflict for the sake of political gain? Where is it being hatched from? Three guesses and Bush and/or Texas can't be one of them.
But the resolution is gratuitous and Democrats' timing suspicious. It's gratuitous because, in 1981, President Reagan referred to the Armenian massacre as genocide in a proclamation commemorating the Nazi Holocaust.
Why, if Pelosi is so committed to ending genocide, aren't she and Senate Democrat leaders doing something about the ongoing genocide in Darfur or the massacres of protesters in Burma?
Speaker Pelosi said, "This isn't about the Erdogan government. This is about the Ottoman Empire." Baloney.
The Democrat leadership could write and pass legislation insisting the UN intervene to save the living instead of using the memory of the dead to score political points. In neither case should we intervene militarily. But the lack of concern for ongoing mass murder proves the Democrats' only purpose is to enrage the Turkish government and end their cooperation on Iraq.
The timing couldn't be worse. Not only are we dependent on Turkey for our principal supply line into Iraq, we are in on the verge of a crisis with Turkey, trying to convince the Erdogan government to continue to refrain from attacking the PKK -- Kurdish terrorist forces -- that have been raiding into southeastern Turkey for years.
By the way, Mary Jo Kopechne could not be reached for comment.
