Bush's Armenian Pledge

[Doug]

DOUG
The GOP and Bush want to avoid acknowledging the Turkish genocide of the Armenians. Now. But what did Bush say a few years back?

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Chicago - During a recent trip to Chicago (2003) to promote his tax-cut plan, President George W. Bush made statements to members of the Armenian National Committee (ANC) reaffirming his campaign pledge to "ensure that our nation properly recognizes the tragic suffering of the Armenian people."

Bush made the statement while visiting the Chicago Mercantile Exchange...

In response to Soulakian's query, the President replied that "The Armenians are great people. You know I made a promise to you before I was elected," Bush stated.

..."We were encouraged to hear that President Bush intends to honor the
campaign promise he made to the Armenian-American community," stated Rita Sarrafian of the ANC of Illinois. "The entire Armenian-American community will be anxiously waiting to hear the President clearly and unambiguously characterize the Armenian Genocide as a genocide," she concluded...

A partial text of Bush's letter appears below.
"The twentieth century was marred by wars of unimaginable brutality, mass murder and genocide. History records that the Armenians were the first people of the last century to have endured these cruelties. The Armenians were subjected to a genocidal campaign that defies comprehension and commands all decent people to remember and acknowledge the facts and lessons of an awful crime in a century of bloody crimes against humanity. If elected President, I would ensure that our nation properly recognizes the tragic suffering of the Armenian people." (George W. Bush 2-19-2000)

Read the rest here.

[LaWood]

Sometimes WPE* must have a difficult time getting around.
He has one foot in is mouth and one in his ass.
.

WPE = worst president ever.

[Dardedar]

DAR
Has congress ever acknowledged genocide of the American Indians?

[Doug]

DAR
Has congress ever acknowledged genocide of the American Indians?

If they did, they probably took it back later...

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

I doubt that the U.S. Congress has ever acknowledged the genocide of the indigenous peoples, but under Clinton the gummint apologized for the mistreatment (and ripoffs) of those on reservations. Part of the Aemrican Indian genocide issue is, of course, responsibility - and since over 90% of said genocide happened prior to any U.S. government, you can see why Congress might decline to take responsibility that is more or less implicit in the official acknowledgement.

We could trumpet Germany's genocide of Jews (among others - Gypsies, brown-skinned people, slavs, "barren" women, etc), because we'd just beat them in a war and there was nothing they could do about it. Turkey, on the other hand, has a number of things they can do that we don't want them to do if we officially acknowledge the Armenian genocide.

[Tony]

This is another one thats going to give this historian ulcers. Truth gets trumped by realpolitik again.
The real fun problem is the Kurds. Can Turkey invade Iraq too? Everyone is doing it.
And still, U.S. planes at Incirlik AFB are grounded so Turkish planes can bomb Kurds, we used to protect from Hussein with those very same planes. Now they bomb Iraq while we negotiate for them to stop. Bet the Iraqi's feel real sovereign about all this.
Our covert support against the PKK just might totally offend the one group who has sucked it up and accepted American involvment in Iraq. Joy joy.

[Doug]

I doubt that the U.S. Congress has ever acknowledged the genocide of the indigenous peoples, but under Clinton the gummint apologized for the mistreatment (and ripoffs) of those on reservations.

DOUG
Compare that with Reagan, who said at Moscow University that the United States "humored" the "primitive" Indians with treaties and reservations.

I think he also said that Native Americans should become U.S. citizens, ignorant of the fact that this had already happened.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Reagan was probably mental age 13 at the time he said it. That's what they used to teach in history when he was a kid. Ditto the citizenship thing. (Which has also been used to break treaties. When the Indians weren't citizens, we could break treaties with them apparently without showing need. Once they were citizens, "common good" - Western PA really NEEDS to drown your reservation for a lake to waterski on - kicked in and we broke a few more.)