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[Tyrone Slothrop]

Here are the best things I've seen on both sides:

Alex Massie (links omitted):

• Amidst suggestions that Nancy Pelosi will in fact put the Armenian Genocide resolution in her pocket, it's been quite something to see so many self-styled liberals shake their heads and mutter that, you know, while we feel for the poor Armenians - and please, don't for a moment doubt the seriousness of our compassion - that feeling does extend to doing anything other than cave to Turkey' desire to muddy historical waters that are plenty clear enough (and have been for 90 years) to most reasonable observers. Still, it must be reassuring to be told, We'd like to help, we really would, but it's just too difficult.
  
  For some reason the Washington Post has run a number of pieces taking this brave stand. Something should be done for the Armenians but nothing should be done that might mean anything, even on a symbolic level.
  
  Daniel Larison knows much more about Ottoman history than I do and he dismantles Richard Cohen's rather rotten column in his usual, exemplary style.
  
  One thing I'd add, however, is that it is remarkably rich for Cohen to say that the slaughter of the Armenians, while terrible, falls short of genocide even as he notes that the term was coined by Raphael Lemkin who, Cohen says, "clearly had in mind what the Nazis were doing to the Jews". What happened to the Armenians was not, therefore, genocide it was just "plenty bad".
  
  But of course Lemkin himself deliberately cited the suffering of the Armenians when he first wrote about genocide. He didn't seem to share Mr Cohen's belief that there is only one kind of genocide.
  
  Then there's Fred Hiatt, the WaPo's editorial page editor who thinks the resolution should be spiked because, well, modern Armenia isn't properly democratic. Or something like that. [Hat-Tip: Matt Zeitlin] Hiatt laments that the Armenian diaspora should have concentrated on having the genocide recognised rather than ensuring that Armenian civil society was constructed upon sounder foundations. And, yes, clearly it would be good if there were an Armenian George Soros to preach for - and fund - institutions for an open society. Hiatt thinks, however, that Armenia should forget the past and emulate the Baltic states. Well, fine, but as Anne Applebaum correctly reminds him, the Balts are pretty keen on re-examining and restoring their histories too.
  
  But just because Armenia isn't perfect - well, let's just say that seems an odd reason to suppose that persuading Turkey to recognise the genocide is a quixotic cause that would only be contemplated, let alone chased, by people with no sense of priority or perspective.
  
  As a half-Scots, half-Armenian friend emails me to point out:
  
  Imagine an alternate universe in which a 15 year-old Israel was surrounded on three sides by an Iranian state that not only questioned the Holocaust, but had been responsible for it. It's an imperfect analogy, but not a ridiculous one. Even the WaPo wouldn't blame Jewish Americans in that scenario for having skewed priorities.
  
  Indeed.
  
  Perhaps everyone would have had a more comfortable time if the matter had never been raised at all and perhaps many of those members of Congress still on board with the resolution are motivated by parochial concerns and maybe there will be some uncomfortable consequences that stem from doing the right thing. So be it. When the government of the United States is asked to recognise a genocide it seems to me that you have to have some strong reasons - and a pretty strong stomach - to side with those who would deny the genocide's existence. That's true even when the victims are form a small country of little strategic or other significance.

James Fallows (emphasis in original):

• Before leaving China, I hadn't heard about the House of Representatives' vote on a resolution condemning Turkey for the Armenian genocide of the World War I era.
  
  Now that I've heard about it, I find that it leads naturally to this question:
  
  Is America insane??????
  
  To be more precise: have the Congressional Democratic leaders lost their minds in not finding a way to bottle up this destructive and self-righteously posturing measure?
  
  Maybe they think that the U.S. has so many friends in the Islamic world, especially in countries bordering Iraq, that it should go out of its way to make new enemies?
  
  Or -- and this is truly appalling possibility -- perhaps they think that America’s moral standing is so high at the moment that we will be admired and thanked worldwide for delivering condemnations of sins committed in the waning days of the Ottoman Empire?
  
  Why not go all the way? How about a resolution condemning China for the millions who suffered in the Cultural Revolution and the tens of millions starved during the Great Leap Forward – right as we’re seeking China’s help on Burma, North Korea, the environment, etc? I mean, for each Armenian the Ottoman Turks slaughtered, at least ten Chinese citizens perished at the hands of the regime whose successors still rule the country. And the government's official stance of denial is just about as strong. So, why not just tell them they were evil? The timing would be especially nice during China's current Party Congress.
  
  I'm sure we could get a unanimous vote for a resolution condemning North Korea for any of a hundred grievous offenses; that would be a good complement to the recent nuclear deal. Why not one denouncing Russia for the Czarist pogroms, to accompany efforts to reason with/rein in Putin? Maybe another condemning England for its subjugation and slaughter of the Scots, to say nothing of the Irish – while also asking Gordon Brown to stay the course in Iraq? What about Australia for its historic treatment of the Aborigines? Or the current nations of West Africa for their role in the slave trade?
  
  The Armenian genocide was real; many Turks pretend it wasn’t. They are wrong, and we should stand for what's right. But it’s hard to think of a more willfully self-indulgent step than lecturing Turkey's current government and people 90 years late.