Why Now?

I remain curious about the timing of Foreign Affairs Armenian genocide vote. All of the available evidence suggests that local politics principally informed the committee members' votes: election year plus Armenian constituents equals 'yay' vote.

George Harris, a former State Department analyst now at the Middle East Institute, said the machinations of domestic politics were playing a key role in the affair -- one year out from the next presidential elections.

"The Democrats won control of Congress and they have to show they can do something," he said, adding that Pelosi, like many others who support the bill have powerful constituents in the Armenian community.

I looked for district demographic data to support that, but it wasn't immediately forthcoming. Nevertheless, the "all politics is local" model seems sensible enough. And where the geopolitical repercussions were so apparent that even President Bush anticipated them, it's doubly disappointing. (After all, the President is a man that expected to spend $50B liberating Iraq -- one ninth of the spend to date.)

In end, I'm just happy to see that the responsibility of government isn't affecting the Democratic moralistic ethos:

The committee this week passed the bill to the full House floor after Lantos had called a vote of "conscience" and argued the United States had a moral duty to describe the killings as "genocide" despite the consequences.

Oh, brother.

The same "conscience" doesn't flinch at the sight of Turkish tanks rolling towards northern Iraq's Kurds, and the American soldiers there?