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After the coup, Turkey turns against America

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Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#161

Post by jbmorgado »

grandalf wrote: post #154
jbmorgado wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The comment is totally factual, except the very last sentence which is my personal logic conclusion to what is presented before. If you don't think so, perhaps you could pinpoint anything in my comment that is not true.

Do you have evidence that Erdogan is mentally ill? This is a critique commonly made toward political leaders we disagree with. Notably, Saddam was seriously considered mentally ill by many in the US, which helped Americans view him (and his people) as less than human.

Ah, ok, so that is the only part of all I said that you can pinpoint it's not accurate.

Very well, I agree that Erdogan being half mad (so mentally ill from your interpretation) is not easily proved.

His speeches and the construction of the new palace (and the reasons given for it: https://www.yahoo.com/news/cockroaches-made-want-palace-says...) indicate that he shouldn't be totally sane. But I agree it's something difficult to prove.

I'm glad you agree with the rest then. That was the important part.

Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#162

Post by manish_karan »

reitanqild wrote: post #107
shabaan wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would they (70%) not support him? - He increased their gdp - He reflects their view - He is merciful to the refugees (settled 2.2 million refugees) Why does he have to be pleasing to you? Why do you support hillary.. she killed millions.. Why do you support obama... yest 320 and today 124 (in idp school in syria) dead becasue of him Why do you support any damn politican in the west? All their pockets and morals a…

Is he merciful to the Kurds that helps fight IS or is he bombing them? Is he trying to force Germany to punish a comedian? Is he trying to reintroduce death penalty? Has he purged more than 2000 judges? Is it reasonable to think he has verified that all of them were bad judges during the two-three last days?

Did you forget to READ?

let me quote: "judges aligned with the coup had begun calling on associates to adhere to the military’s demands."

"At 1am, officials say the police chief the city of Bursa arrested the local army commander, who possessed a 6-page list that included the names of designated judges and military officials who were to be appointed to various positions in the bureaucracy in the aftermath of the coup. Other pro-coup soldiers possessed lists of secure telephone lines to receive orders."

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/18/military-coup-...

Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#163

Post by vintermann »

sebastianconcpt wrote: post #136
vintermann wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Karl Popper considered a government democratic if it could be replaced without violence, and while that's not exactly my definition, I think it's a good start - a bare minimum. A provision in the constitution for military coups doesn't excuse it. That just means the Turkish constitution is a bad one, that doesn't offer its citizens democracy. Handing over control to the people "once the situation is stable again" is…

No violence when one Castro passed power to the other nor when Maduro continued Chavez. Democracy means nothing. Republic means everything.

And was those genuine changes of government, you think? Or just a new face on the same old one?

Anyway, that's one way Popper's definition is insufficient. Democracy is not just about whether a government can be replaced, but about how different the government we replace it with can actually be. Replacing a government isn't worth much if what you can replace it with is functionally identical in every way.

Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#164

Post by pluma »

afsina wrote: post #126
reitanqild wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is he merciful to the Kurds that helps fight IS or is he bombing them? Is he trying to force Germany to punish a comedian? Is he trying to reintroduce death penalty? Has he purged more than 2000 judges? Is it reasonable to think he has verified that all of them were bad judges during the two-three last days?

Too much drama? - PKK is killing your soldiers what do you do? This has nothing to do with IS. - Ok, he has a temper and does not have a good sense of humor but please, did you find "that" poem funny? - Oh come on. You know it was not about being bad judges. Though yes, reintroduction of death penalty is a very bad idea. Also things are being done too hastily. All allegations are need to be verified.

Not the OP, but I'm German and I didn't find the poem funny. That wasn't the point of the poem. The poem wasn't the comedy. The comedy was the presentation of the poem.

Saying Erdogan has sex with goats isn't funny. It's crude and it's even potentially racist (considering that sounds more like an ethnic slur than a personal insult). But that was the entire point. The poem actually went out of its way to be so appallingly insulting to drive this point home.

I don't think the performance was particularly good and I think the same point could have been made in a more tasteful way, but it should be protected as satire and I hope the German courts will rule accordingly (as many lawyers are predicting).

The entire point of the performance was a reaction to the ridiculous complaints about the earlier satirical song about Erdogan (which btw was almost entirely factual and only "insulting" because it presented Erdogan unfavourably and ridiculed his eccentricity and blatantly autocratic behaviour). It didn't set out to insult Erdogan, it was explicitly phrased as "That wasn't an insult that is illegal under German law. The following is what an insult that would be illegal under German law would look like".

Taking the poem in isolation is intellectually lazy and dishonest. It's like showcasing a replica of Michelangelo's David's penis and saying David is obscene because it's entirely about genitalia.

Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#165

Post by mikeash »

ajmurmann wrote: post #117
emodendroket wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, you could argue that maybe the military would be better, but a military coup of an elected leader doesn't just "seem" undemocratic; it is undemocratic by any reasonable standard.

What does an elected leader have to do to warrant a coup? Dismantle the democracy? Randomly start killing people? Start death camps? Where do you draw the line or do you have non? Edit: typos

You're arguing that a coup can be justified. The comment you're replying to is arguing that a coup is undemocratic. These are separate ideas, and it's possible for both to be true at once.

Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#166

Post by manish_karan »

pluma wrote: post #89
cdash wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The people have always been supporters of this path. That is why the reset button had to keep on being pushed by the military.

This isn't entirely wrong. Turkey started out as the remnants of the Ottoman Empire, an Islamic caliphate. Atatürk created a secular republic inspired by modern Western nations and culture. He even went so far as to change the writing system. It's fairly safe to say that Atatürk's ideals have always been in strong conflict with the will of a certain part of the demographic (e.g. fundamentalists) as well as people fro…

Amazing how you give exmple of ban of "scarf" to compare the "democratic-ness"

Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#167

Post by spriggan3 »

smegel wrote: post #22

Turkey is a very dangerous country. It has a large and powerful military, it could probably take over half the middle East if it wanted, and big parts of Eastern Europe. It would also like to take a bite out of Russia if Putin didn't have thousands of nukes. Let's hope they sway back to a secular, moderate nation.

> it could probably take over half the middle East if it wanted,

As proven by USA itself, it's easy to invade countries, it's harder to effectively control them.

Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#168

Post by pluma »

grandalf wrote: post #142
shabaan wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would like to comment how biased this view is. Yes the president is religious and cares about islam, his religion. - Turkey gdp has increased unparalleled in the whole of europe under Erdogan. - Erdogan has resettled 2.2 million syrian refugees in new cities (much more than whole of europe combined) with monthly food and money .. although 2.3 million are yet to settle. - He was elected with 60% votes and current st…

This is a superb point. Americans are so quick to rally against any foreign leader that is sympathetic to Islam. In the US we've had decades of anti-Islamic propaganda, since it has helped sell various war efforts. All countries have some internal forces of pluralism and some internal voices of absolutism, for a variety of contemporary and historical reasons, and all citizens have the ability to consent and to dissen…

I'm not an American. My opinion would be no different if it were any other religion. Islam just happens to be the religion shared by a part of the world that is currently in a huge mess. I don't even see what Turkey has to do with US politics.

To be frank, prior to Erdogan I didn't even consider Turkey an "Islamic nation". It was just a Western nation with a Muslim majority -- which was the entire point of Atatürk's republic.

Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#169

Post by ivanca »

tptacek wrote: post #148
pluma wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but then it becomes a matter of contrasting the will of the "demos" with the ideals that need to be upheld to ensure the future well-being of the people. There are very few actual democracies in existence today. There is a reason most democratic countries don't put every decision to a public vote and why there are often certain laws no government is allowed to change. You can agree or disagree with the prioriti…

You can say that a coup is in the long term interest of the people or not, just as you could say that a permanent military junta might better serve the people than the AKP. What the comment you're replying to is correctly pointing out is that what you can't say about a coup is that it's democratic. It's the opposite of democratic.

It may not be democratic, but it certainly not the opposite of democratic.

Let's put it this way, let's say 60% of people vote to kill the other 40%. And then a third party enters and stops such madness. You know who is more democratic of them all? The third party, for allowing the existence of more than one party. A coup can be more democratic than any election. It's all about context.

Re: After the coup, Turkey turns against America

#170

Post by amyjess »

emodendroket wrote: post #65
pluma wrote: post #6

Although from an outside perspective a military coup seems completely undemocratic the Turkish military has historically had the role of maintaining the principles Atatürk founded the Turkish Republic on. You can think of them as a built-in correction mechanism in case the government veers too far off course -- they remove the government, reset everything to start and then hand over control back to the people once th…

I mean, you could argue that maybe the military would be better, but a military coup of an elected leader doesn't just "seem" undemocratic; it is undemocratic by any reasonable standard.

"Undemocratic" isn't a bad thing. Democracy is nothing more than two wolves and a sheep deciding what to eat for dinner.
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