Michael Totten: "The Kurds are friendlier, and more pro-American, than Canadians."

"The Palestinians aren’t the only people in the world who seek and deserve a homeland of their own. But the squeaky wheel gets the grease. The Kurds do not receive billions of dollars in Western aid. The Kurds do not receive endless media attention. There are no rallies on Western campuses demanding their freedom, nor does the United Nations Security Council require that a state be created for them, although--unlike the Palestinians--they fought honorably against their enemies and have already carved out a moderately prosperous, free, and functional de-facto state of their own. They are America's allies, but most Americans know nothing about them."

That's from Michael J. Totten's expansive analysis, No Friends But The Mountains, available in full here, from this month's Azure magazine.

Years from now, when historians look back on the journalists who made the greatest contributions to a public understanding of the conflicts in Iraq and the Middle East during the first few years of the 21st Century, Michael J. Totten, a blogger, freelancer, and independent reporter from Salem, Oregon, will be on the shortlist.