How To Waste Time And Money, While Alienating An Ally

If you ever want to know one of the many reasons I have little confidence in Congress these days, all you have to do is read and/or watch the news on a daily basis. Since this Congress has taken up shop, promises have been blatantly broken and very little has been accomplished, with the exception of a bill that has no chance of becoming law. Right now, there is a stink being raised about the firings of the U.S Attorneys. Never mind that firings have been a part of each and every administration, prior to this one. Never mind that these are political appointments.

But beyond making a non-scandal a scandal and passing a bill that has no chance of getting signed, what else could they do to waste more time and money? Well, read this and you'll see.

A planned vote in the U.S. Congress that would classify the widespread killings of Armenians by the Ottoman Army as a genocide is threatening to make relations with Turkey unusually tense.

The speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, backs the resolution and at first wanted a vote in April. But under Turkish pressure, Bush administration figures have lobbied for the Democrats in charge of Congress to drop the measure.

With all of the promises that have been made and broken, just what makes this such a priority?

The article goes on to say:

Turkey vehemently denies that the deaths of some 1.5 million Armenians from 1915 to 1923 constituted genocide. It contends that they occurred in the chaos of war, as the Ottoman Empire was falling apart, and that many Turks were also killed when Armenians sided with Russian forces in the hope of claiming territory in eastern Turkey.

This occurred between 1915-23. The people that were responsible for this atrocity are pretty much all dead. I doubt you can find more than a handful still alive. Beyond that, there is no one in the current government that was involved and I challenge anyone to prove otherwise.

In my pensive reflections of the European (and others) parliaments that have condemned this nearly hundred year old action, I can not come to any other conclusion other than this is just another attempt by the bureaucrats in the EU to stall out Turkey's bid for membership in a weak and floundering EU. Understanding that the Democrats are enamored with the EU as some kind of panacea for the ills that befall the continent, it should come as no surprise that Pelosi and company are jumping on the bandwagon. Both the EU and the Democrats have much in common, where agendas are concerned. Both are good at creating smokescreens to hide the real truths they want hidden, mostly because they do not want their inefficiencies and failures to be front and center, for all to see.

But let's look at this from a "reality" perspective, shall we?

Turkey, traditionally, has been an ally of the U.S, from the days of WWII on. During the Cold War, there was much cooperation then and today, we see the Turkish government trying to offer help in the British hostage crisis. Turkey is a secular government, not an Islamic fascist state like Iran. But instead of using their pulpit to condemn them, they clearly demonstrate that would rather use it to condemn an ally.

Now, I have some questions about the Turkish government at times. And I know that we have had differences with them on Iraq and some other things, recently and along the way. But if we are going to build bridges to the Islamic world, we need Turkey to help us. And by putting up a ridiculous vote like this for consideration will only serve to alienate an ally, further than they already are.

Much gets said from the left leaning Europhiles about how we have alienated the Europeans, does this not fall into the same category? Does it not seem a bit hypocritical to call for something like this, when other things in the here and now are more pressing? Let's think about this for a minute. As old as this is, we can see more important issues that have come up over the last few years in which Congress has yet to recognize and condemn. Iran is now out of control, nothing from Congress. Syria is allying itself with Iran and they get a visit from Nancy Pelosi.

Surely, I am not the only one that looks at this from this perspective. Surely, this is not the way to build bridges with the Middle East. But in the grand scheme of things, politicians of any country are not the most principled people, nor are they most consistent.