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  • Gang And Armenians

    GANG AND ARMENIANS
    By Harut Sassounian

    Lragir.am
    20 Oct 2010

    Media Unfairly Bashes All Armenians Because of Alleged Crimes of a Few

    The first problem with the widely circulated reports that several
    Armenians have defrauded Medicare out of millions of dollars is that
    these individuals are innocent until proven guilty. Only after a court
    establishes their guilt, they can be labeled as crooks or criminals.

    It is even more outrageous that the good name of all Armenians is
    being tarnished by sweeping media generalizations, bringing intense
    feelings of shame to millions of law-abiding Armenians who are overly
    sensitive about their reputation. Last week's sensational headlines
    referring to an 'Armenian crime syndicate' or 'Armenian criminals'
    completely traumatized the Armenian-American community. Exploiting
    the media hype, all sorts of racists, Armenian-haters, and naturally,
    some Turks have come out of the woodwork to post vicious anti-Armenian
    comments on various internet sites.

    One of the most insulting references to these arrests was made on
    the radio/internet show called 'The Young Turks.' As if the name of
    the show was not offensive enough to Armenians, the co-hosts, Ana
    Kasparian, an Armenian-American, and Cenk Uygur, a Turkish American,
    last week repeatedly bashed the accused as well as all Armenians.

    The fact that Kasparian is an Armenian makes her comments even more
    offensive. Trying to be funny or entertaining does not give her a
    license to hurl insults at individuals who have been merely accused,
    but not convicted of any crimes, and the community at large for
    the alleged crimes of a few! Here are excerpts of the co-hosts'
    disgraceful remarks:

    Kasparian: 'Dozens of Armenians throughout the United States have
    recently got arrested for Medicare fraud. Now this is an age-old
    trick of Armenians. This is what Armenians do. OK. And that's a
    gross generalization. And a large majority of these offenders lived
    in Glendale, California. I am not kidding. That's a fact.

    Uygur: That's literally true! [Chuckling]. By the way, I am amused
    by the Armenian community Medicare fraud in Glendale. [Imitating an
    Armenian accent]: "You do Medical fraud? Of course. Who doesn't do
    Medicare fraud? Come now!" Is that close to an Armenian accent?

    Kasparian: It's close. So, what these individuals would do is, they
    would steal the identities of doctors, identities of hundreds of
    thousands of individuals in the United States and they would make
    false claims. They would create these phantom health care clinics
    that don't even really exist and then bill Medicare for treatments
    that never happened and then Medicare would send this money to these
    fake doctors or these doctors that have their identities stolen....

    Uygur: Let me give you a little detail how it works. It's kind of
    interesting. So, they steal a list of doctors' names....

    Kasparian: ...There is shame on two different sides here. Shame on
    the Armenians and shame on the government for not realizing it until
    now -- until these Armenians stole $163 million from Medicare [The
    correct figure is $35 million].

    Uygur: You know what? That is a pretty good scam. You gotta give it
    up to them. They are working up in Glendale. [Chuckling].

    Kasparian: And it wasn't just in Glendale. These are Armenians
    throughout the country. Like, we got Armenians in New York City, we
    got Armenians in California, a couple in Ohio, some in New Mexico,
    some in Florida, all over the place. It's a massive operation. They're
    all connected. They all know what they're doing. It's insanity. In
    fact, officials equated this to the mafia. This is like the Armenian
    mafia operating in the United States. Part of me felt like I should
    be a little proud of that, because I am kind of a bad ass, but another
    part of me of course was humiliated. I feel so bad for the people that
    are victims of this. Because not only the government gets millions
    of dollars stolen from them, there are people who have their identity
    stolen. So these Armenians can sit at home, drive their Rolls Royces,
    and not do anything.

    Uygur: I'm gonna take a little controversial view on this. Obviously,
    they couldn't be more wrong -- busted, go to jail, etc. We are not
    having any of that conversation. On the other hand, it is a little
    ingenious.... You know what happens! People get greedy. Once you got
    that scam going, and you haven't got caught in a long time, you think
    let's churn this thing out. Everyone wants a piece of the action. Next
    thing you know, everybody in Glendale knows, and they all want their
    cut in it. Of course, there is an ugly side to this. One of the guys
    I believe you saw in the picture was 'vor.'

    Kasparian: By the way, 'vor' means 'ass.' I'm wondering why all of
    the news articles refer to him as 'vor.'

    Uygur: The news articles claim that 'vor' means 'thief-in-law' which
    is a bizarre thing....

    Violating all legal and journalistic norms, the co-hosts of the
    show never once use the words 'alleged' or 'accused' to describe
    the defendants. If the charges against some of these individuals are
    dropped, Kasparian and Uygur could be sued for libel.

    So far tens of thousands of viewers have seen this particular
    episode on various internet sites. Thousands more have heard
    it on radio. Over 800 viewers have posted comments on YouTube
    alone. You can watch the show and post a comment by clicking on:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUrFaecJOqE.




    From: A. Papazian
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