Genocide Denial Shocks Genocide Denier: Part II

The Stiletto Blog ^ | August 6, 2007

[theothercheek]

The fallout from Armenian Genocide denier James Taranto’s July 26^th column, "It Didn’t Happen," continues over these charges of countenancing genocide against Barack Obama and of genocide denial against John Kerry:

Barack Obama's latest pronouncement on Iraq should have shocked the conscience. In an interview with the Associated Press last week, the freshman Illinois senator and Democratic presidential candidate opined that even preventing genocide is not a sufficient reason to keep American troops in Iraq. …

One may take the position that genocide would not be the likely result of an American retreat from Iraq. That is the view of Mr. Obama's Massachusetts colleague John Kerry … He draws on the Vietnam experience in making the case that the outcome of a U.S. pullout from Iraq would not be that bad. …

Mr. Obama's blasé cynicism about the possibility of genocide in Iraq is of a piece with Mr. Kerry's denial of the humanitarian catastrophe that followed America's departure from Vietnam.

And Taranto went much further in this Wall Street Journal video:

"[I]t’s OK to allow the genocide of Arabs and Muslims … I think that’s absolutely shocking. …"

On Friday, Taranto appeared on "Lou Dobbs Tonight" to participate in a political roundtable on Obama’s recent string of foreign policy gaffes (along with Republican strategist Ed Rollins and New York Daily News political columnist Michael Goodwin). When Taranto again accused Obama of saying he would "be willing to tolerate genocide in Iraq," Dobbs called him on the over-the-top charge:

DOBBS: Well, when you said he suggested he would use genocide. Would you like to give a little greater amplification to that?

TARANTO: Yes, he said he was asked by the Associated Press a couple of weeks ago if he thought that preventing genocide was a sufficient reason to keep people in Iraq. And he said no. He said...

DOBBS: That's quite a different statement than what you just suggested.

TARANTO: He said - I mean...

DOBBS: I understand, but...

TARANTO: How is that different from saying that genocide is a price worth paying for American retreat. I think that's appropriately fair reformulation of what he said.

So there you have it: Taranto’s accusation of Obama is based on his own "reformulation" of what the presidential candidate actually told The Associated Press:

"Nobody is proposing we leave precipitously. There are still going to be U.S. forces in the region that could intercede, with an international force, on an emergency basis. There's no doubt there are risks of increased bloodshed in Iraq without a continuing U.S. presence there." … It is my assessment that those risks are even greater if we continue to occupy Iraq and serve as a magnet for not only terrorist activity but also irresponsible behavior by Iraqi factions."

But then, it’s not the first time this of thing has occurred at OpinionJournal. In his "Best of the Web Today" (BOTWT) column of June 15^th, Taranto savaged Harvard professor Jessica Stern based on a since-discredited New York Sun article by uncredentialed freelance writer Heather Robinson that Stern complains included fake quotes meant to further a political agenda. To date, neither Taranto nor his wannabe pundit have clarified the record on the disputed quotes, or offered Stern an apology.

It is wearisome to be James Taranto’s conscience – but someone’s gotta do it. His boss, Melanie Kirkpatrick, has yet to hold Taranto accountable for his ethical and professional lapses, and Taranto apparently is not high profile enough to attract the scrutiny of Howard Kurtz, Jack Shafer or other media watchdogs.

Having said that, The Stiletto resents being in the absurd position of having to defend the likes of Obama and Kerry when there are so many legitimate reasons that she could be attacking them.

Editorial Note: Regular readers of this blog know what The Stiletto thinks about Taranto’s hypocritically smearing others as being genocide deniers. Here’s Kerry’s response. Like Dobbs, he questions Taranto’s reporting: "But, even accepting Mr. Taranto's estimate of 165,000 Vietnamese deaths - double that of most academic sources - this is a significant decrease from the preceding eight years when 450,000 civilians and 1.1 million soldiers were killed."

The Stiletto submitted this comment about Kerry’s Letter to the Editor, but (surprise, surprise) OpinionJournal declined to post it:

In the October 13, 2006 edition of Best of the Web Today, James Taranto wrote "We have no opinion on whether the events of 1915 constitute genocide or not ...," which, though subtly worded, is as classic an example of genocide denial as one will ever come across.

1. "The events of 1915" is an indirect reference to the genocidal slaughter of 1.5 million Armenians by the Ottoman Turks.

2. Having "no opinion" on the Armenian Genocide requires maintaining a willful ignorance of the voluminous record of eyewitness accounts by journalists, missionaries, diplomats and survivors, and of the numerous books based on them.

3. The phrase "constitute genocide or not" subtly invokes every tactic of Genocide/Holocaust deniers in one stroke. Among them (as cogently enumerated in Wikipedia): the targeted ethnic group conspired against the accused state with its enemies; death tolls have been exaggerated; the victims provoked the actions against themselves, through either armed insurrection or exploitation of the majority; the evidence supporting a genocide thesis was largely fabricated.

Taranto would like to believe that his delicate phrasing offers plausible deniability against charges that he is an Armenian Genocide denier. John Kerry and Barack Obama probably won't think so - and would be right to ask why a genocide denier is calling them genocide deniers.

PS I do not expect this response to be published because when I raised the same points in a post on the Political Mavens Web site, James Taranto pressured the site's editor to remove the post, thus squelching my free speech rights.