Washington Post article underscores contradictions in US vote on Armenian claims

A recent article in the Washington Post newspaper has called on Turkey not to take seriously the US Congressional vote on the non-binding resolution on the so-called Armenian genocide bill.

Post writer Jackson Diehl asserts that Turkey's behavior regarding the controversial bill should be "like one of the Western democracies," and that Turkey should simply "shrug its shoulders" and move on with regards to the bill. Diehl also notes in his article that no one much will place importance on the non-binding Armenian bill, pointing to another non-binding resolution passed by the House of Representatives against the Iraq war as an example.

Dielh also uses his article to point to the estimated 70-80 ethnic Armenian voters who live in US Congressman Adam Schiff's district, a fact he asserts helped shaped Schiff's heavy involvement in the writing of the bill. Diehl also recalls that many other ethnically Armenian voters live in Speaker Nancy Pelosi's district; Pelosi has reiterated her support for the bill many times.

At one point in his article, Diehl touches on what he portrays as the lack of knowledge on the part of most House of Representatives members to even decide on such a long past subject as the alleged Armenian genocide. Says Diehl, "Just think, 435 House of Representative members, most of whom don't even know the difference between a Sunni and a Shiite, will decide on whether or not to approve of Adam Schiff's version of events which occured 92 years ago in the northeast region of Turkey."