Armenia

I haven't weighed in on the Armenian genocide -- and Congress's political decision to condemn Turkey for it -- because I've been busy and because it's such a strange political aside. I mean, does anyone besides Armenians and Turks care what the Ottoman Empire did early in the previous century? It didn't hit home to me until I saw Pelosi on the teevee yesterday answering questions about it. Specifically, she promised it would definitely come to a vote.

Only the Turkish themselves deny that the Armenian population in that part of the world was wiped out by a concerted, organized effort.

But, frankly, it doesn't make a lot of sense of to alienate one of our few allies in that region, a still relatively moderate Muslim population. And I have to figure that the inhabitants of Turkey and the greater Middle East must see this as the height of hypocrisy as Iraq is being systematically depopulated as a result of our actions.

As for Pelosi's motives for bringing it to the floor. Ezra says she blew it. John Cole says it's a cowardly way to affect the execution of the war.