The Face of A True Betrayer

Just when you thought it couldn't get much worse, this political divide between the supporters of the military and the defeatists who would have the U.S. lose in Iraq at any cost, it does. Now the House of Representatives is set to vote on a non-binding resolution condemning the genocide of Armenians in Turkey. In 1915. By a government that no longer exists.

Why is now the time to press the issue? Why, indeed.

According to wikopedia, this is the definition of genocide: the deliberate and systematic destruction of an ethnic, religious or national group. According to an article I read written by Richard Cohen in the Washington Post, an excellent article it is, the term was coined in 1943 by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish-Jewish emigre. It is natural that the term conjures images of the Holocaust as it is uttered. Solely by definition, the term genocide does not apply to the events in Turkey, according to Cohen. It is reported that as many as 1.5 million Armenians were killed but not all Armenians all over Turkey. Large communities like Constantinople were untouched. This is not a claim any German city can make concerning the genocide of Jews.

For 26 years, Steney Hoyer, Democrat whip in the House of Representatives, claims he has been pushing this resolution. As recently as 1998 the resolution was voted out of the House Foreign Relations committee with a bigger margin than it did this time around. Yet, in 1998, then President Clinton asked Speaker Hastert not to bring the resolution to the floor for a vote. Clinton argued our military would suffer. He was especially concerned about the no-fly zone missions executed by the fighter pilots securing the Iraqi air space.

That was a Republican working with a Democrat President, as opposed to now, a Democrat working with a Republican President. That was then. This is now.

Turkey is a Muslim nation. Turkey is a member of NATO. Turkey is trying to win acceptance into the European Union. Turkey provides a way into Iraq for our troops' supplies and fuel. Turkey is a democratic nation in the middle east. Turkey is a friend of Israel. Are you getting the picture?

So, today the true face of a betrayer is Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House. She has the power to bring or not bring the resolution, non-binding, to the floor for a vote. She chose to betray the troops, to betray the President, to betray the nation of Turkey at this delicate time, a time of war, and bring the resolution to a vote. She claims the vote will show "who we are as a country." She called any reprisals from Turkey "hypothetical" and that the vote would not be derailed.

When the House Foreign Relations Committee voted the resolution out of committee and the vote was announced, the reaction from Turkey was swift. They recalled the ambassador from Washington and cancelled two visits to the U.S. by at least two of its officials, according to AFP.

Did I mention that while this vote was occurring, Sec of State Rice was in the region and is now scrambling to make amends to our partner in the war on terror, Turkey? She was there to jump start the peace talks of Israel and Palestine but now she is dealing with this debacle. "Look at a map", is what the former Ambassador to Turkey, Mark Parris said in an interview last night. Turkey reluctantly signed on to help us in Iraq and now the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are jeopardized.

The resolution is opposed by 8 former U.S. Secretaries of State, including Maddy Albright. Rep. Jane Harmon was a supporter of the resolution until she traveled to the area last February and observed the facts on the ground. Like Pelosi, she is a California Democrat. She questions the timing of the resolution and wonders why Pelosi thinks it is necessary to embarrass a "moderate Islamic government in perhaps the most volatile region in the world." Good question. I thought it was Grandma Mimi and her fellow Dems who were so critical of President Bush and how he worked with other nations for support in the war on terror.

This looks to be yet another back door attempt to force defeat and surrender in Iraq by the surrender monkeys running the Democrat party today. They do not have the courage to bring about a vote on cutting funding to the war in Iraq, nor do they have the votes to pass that, so they have chosen a policy of 'slow bleed' as feeble slanderer Rep. John Murtha stated not long after the Dems took the reins in the House and Senate in January.

These are the true betrayers of our country. This non-binding resolution directly affects the safety and comfort of our soldiers on the ground in Iraq and in Afghanistan. It jeopardizes the successful workings of the Kurds in northern Iraq. The northern border of Iraq, the one bordering Turkey, is shaky at best without the resolution. There is a history there of violence at that border. This resolution, non-binding, threatens an Islamic nation striving for modernity and trying to show the two terms don't produce an oxymoron.

This resolution is also a bit personal, here at Casa Karen. The husband in the house has a personal friendship with an Armenian Christian living and working in the Baghdad area. I will continue to say, as bad as the war effort has been at times, when you have a face to put on the Iraqi struggle it is impossible to turn your back on them. My husband was in Iraq in 2003 and developed friendships with some of his Iraqi colleagues. Some were Muslim. Some were Christian. The Christians are best described by Abu Danny. The term Abu means 'father of' and Danny was the name of this man's son. That is the moniker by which he chose to be known. He welcomed my husband, the only American around, into his home and to a family birthday party. This at a time when my husband was the only American at his hotel in Baghdad and the Iraqis were afraid to speak to him, for fear he would be labeled CIA and they would be killed for speaking to him. Fear was in the air, everywhere. It was how Saddam ruled.

Abu Danny is trying to come here to live now. His daughter has moved here to Michigan. His two sons have moved to Jordan. He struggles to remain helpful in the Iraqi oil industry. He has been here to Houston to be hosted by my husband for classroom instruction. He sends the occasional e-mail to say hello and that he is still alive. He updates my husband about others they mutually know.

The defeatists do not support the troops. The defeatists do not support the people of Iraq. The defeatists do not want anything but power. They are not worthy.

Betray us? That would be Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Her non-binding resolution is all show, nothing more than to tweak the President at the expense of a NATO ally. She shows the same lack of judgement she showed when she went to Syria when she was asked not to. She is an old political hand. She knows exactly what she is doing.

She is a traitor.