Bush lobbies AGAINST calling the Turkey mass murder of Armenians as genocide., Somebody contact Mahmoud Ahmadinejad STAT! Options

[blaarg]

http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/10/10/us....ians/index.html

President Bush and key figures in his administration lobbied hard Wednesday against a House resolution that labels the killings of Armenians in Turkey during World War I as "genocide." "We all deeply regret the tragic suffering of the Armenian people that began in 1915. This resolution is not the right response to those historic mass killings," Bush said at the White House.

Wow. And we give Ahmadinejad so much shit for "denying the holocaust" and here Bush is doing something similar...

And before some people get all riled up, I know that saying that the holocaust never happened and recognizing the fact that mass killings occurred but not labeling them as genocide are two separate things, but still, it seems a bit hypocritical.

I still don't see how labeling something what it is as "not the right response." I guess the labeling a genocide is contingent on our relations with the perpetrators.

[Hartmann]

http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/10/10/us....ians/index.html
Wow. And we give Ahmadinejad so much shit for "denying the holocaust" and here Bush is doing something similar...

And before some people get all riled up, I know that saying that the holocaust never happened and recognizing the fact that mass killings occurred but not labeling them as genocide are two separate things, but still, it seems a bit hypocritical.

I still don't see how labeling something what it is as "not the right response." I guess the labeling a genocide is contingent on our relations with the perpetrators.

I don't agree with not calling it genocide though I think there is some real history reading needing to be done (we didn't call Sudan that either).

The reason he is against it being called that has nothing to do with "denying the holocaust" type reasons, instead it is political. The unrest in Turkey is making this necessary.

[cupcake]

the last thing we need is to alienate ourselves from one of the few moderate muslim countries out there.

there's no need to put a label that shit. we all know what happened and no one is in denial.

[cupcake]

furthermore...this shit is a hundred years ago.

we have bigger fish to fry in 2007 than making armenians feel better about what happened....to their great-(great?) grandparents.

[pebkac]

furthermore...this shit is a hundred years ago.

we have bigger fish to fry in 2007 than making armenians feel better about what happened....to their great-(great?) grandparents.

"Accordingly, I have placed my death-head formations in readiness — for the present only in the East — with orders to them to send to death mercilessly and without compassion, men, women, and children of Polish derivation and language. Only thus shall we gain the living space (Lebensraum) which we need. Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?"

-Adolf Hitler

And for the record, this isn't just a Bush thing. Clinton argued against acknowledging the Armenian Genocide as well.

This post has been edited by pebkac: Oct 10 2007, 12:24 PM

[cupcake]

CNN confirms that Turkey has recalled its ambassador to the United States over the Armenian genocide bill.
____________

great...

[jonathan83]

and shit hits the fan

[Hartmann]

All because someone wanted to make it "official".

[jonathan83]

i wonder if the US has officially made us responsible for the genocide of native americans?

[pebkac]

This isn't really a very simple issue.

Our close relationship with Turkey is beginning to remind me of the Cold War. Turkey is FAR from being a just or free society. And they're just as guilty of genocide against the Kurds as Iraq is (which I would say is a more important genocide to remember than the Armenian, not to make that into an argument against the resolution). In fact, they're still to this day trying to kill off Kurds. Yet we still support them because they're a "moderate" muslim nation of strategic importance.

I don't have an answer to the issue, but I'm not sure that we can make the ends justify the means here...

I guess my point here is that I'm not sure whether or not it's even a good thing for us to try to keep our alliance with Turkey. Sure it's pragmatic, but is it a good thing for us to do?

[pebkac]

i wonder if the US has officially made us responsible for the genocide of native americans?

A very good point. The US won't get anywhere very fast if we keep being hypocrites about things.

[TetraGrammaton C...]

just make it a requirement for people to watch ararat
it would be better than a conceptual name change.

[impala454]

i wonder if the US has officially made us responsible for the genocide of native americans?

Until Turkey gives reparations to the Armenians and grants them all sorts of special priveleges within their country this statement has absolutely no merit.

[jonathan83]

Until Turkey gives reparations to the Armenians and grants them all sorts of special priveleges within their country this statement has absolutely no merit.

of course it has merit. i posed this question as having nothign to do with turkey and armenia. i'm just curious as to whether we've said it was genocide with the native americans or not.

[impala454]

no I don't think "we've" said that.