Earlier this week, the House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly in favor of two pieces of legislation. The first acknowledged and condemned Turkey's genocide of Armenians more than a century ago, and the second slapped sanctions on Turkey while condemning that country's recent invasion of northern Syria, resulting in the slaughtering of our Kurdish allies. The former vote was 405-11; the latter was 403-16. These are, needless to say, veto-proof majorities, much to the chagrin of our Erdogan-appeasing president. Small handfuls of Republicans voted against each measure for various reasons -- including, perhaps in some cases, slavish devotion to the White House -- but the pair of bills passed with powerful bipartisan majorities. Democrats were unanimous on both votes, with one notable exception:
Only Dem vote opposing sanctions on Turkey: Ilhan Omar. https://t.co/wkMXXTd9Uu
— Josh Kraushaar (@HotlineJosh) October 29, 2019
We'll return to that decision in a moment, but Omar also voted "present" on the Armenian genocide issue. Why? Here's her explanation:
Omar's office has sent this statement to CNN explaining her present vote: pic.twitter.com/Gpj198jx0p
— Haley Byrd (@byrdinator) October 29, 2019
This garbled, morally-deaf pablum was panned by almost everyone, with many pointing out that it was the "All Lives Matter" equivalent of genocide condemnation. In fairness to the Minnesota freshman, this sort of disgraceful accountability-ducking equivalency was recently and explicitly deployed by House Democratic leadership in order to shield Omar from consequences for one of her spasms of overt bigotry. If it "worked" previously, so why not hide behind it again? I'm curious to know the real reason why she couldn't bring herself to join even the rest of the Squad in calling out a 20th century mass slaughter. Even worse, however, was her vote against sanctions for Turkey. But might this be consistent with her oft-stated view that sanctions amount to "economic warfare" and must be stopped? She's made that argument in opposition to US sanctions against terrible actors and abusive regimes in places Tehran, Caracas, and now Ankara:
Not just Turkey. In Iran, Venezuela, and elsewhere, we impose sanctions on the very people we say we are helping, without a plan for what comes next.
— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) October 23, 2019
It's economic warfare and it needs to stop. https://t.co/oYIfPxOy1k https://t.co/8AL1QcBds0
Imposing sanctions on criminal regimes ends up "hurting the people we claim to help," she's asserted. I strongly disagree with this naive and dangerous view, but at least it's consistent. Oh, wait:
.@IlhanMN said she plans on introducing the "Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions" resolution this week.
— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) July 17, 2019
"I believe and support the BDS movement." https://t.co/LR0XYJ2WqM
She's against sanctions for the Iranian regime, for the Socialist cretin in Venezuela, and for the Islamist butcher in Turkey, but she's passionately supportive of sanctions for...Israel -- a close US ally, a liberal democracy, and a pluralistic society that affords rights and protections to a wide array of minorities, unlike virtually every other country in the region. She's explicitly argued that sanctions harm the innocent populations of nations whose governments we are seeking to punish or coercively influence, yet she's perfectly comfortable with that harm landing on the people of Israel, which just happens to be the only (and tiny) Jewish state on earth. By all means, she effectively argues, let's wage "economic warfare" against them. There is a term to describe the sort of glaring and ostentatious double-standard that applies one set of rules to Jews, and another set of rules to everyone else:
I'll leave you with more intellectually-bankrupt, historically-illiterate, anti-Israel lunacy from a man whose keen moral instincts led him to honeymoon in the Soviet Union during the Cold War:
Bernie Sanders proposes redirecting Israel aid to Gaza. pic.twitter.com/ridHBILXbe
— Sameera Khan (@SameeraKhan) October 28, 2019
Sanders demands that Israel "fundamentally change" their relationship with Gaza, or else they risking losing US assistance and support. Israel unilaterally withdrew from Gaza in 2005, a wrenching decision that was made in the hopes of forging a peace. The result was the election of Hamas, a terrorist organization, by Gazans, and thousands upon thousands of rockets fired at Israeli civilians ever since. For this, Bernie believes it's time to get tough. On Israel. Extraordinary. Over to you, Madam Ambassador:
Just when you thought Bernie Sanders couldn’t get any more radical, he outdid himself. He wants to take money we give to Israel to defend itself from terrorists, and give it to Gaza, which is run by terrorists?? Unreal. Why isn’t every other Dem pres candidate saying he’s wrong?
— Nikki Haley (@NikkiHaley) October 29, 2019
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