Turkish police use tear gas, injure dozens in break up of protests

[DGuller]

Btw, didn't he announce recently he won't be posting his bullshit in this forum any more? I knew that was too good to be true.

Yeah, those rage quits never stick.

[Tamas]

I would rather side with the tea party then a dictatorship.  I Guess you don't feel the same way.

didn't that "dicatorship" lost to the present government IN AN ELECTION?

[Martinus]

I would rather side with the tea party then a dictatorship.  I Guess you don't feel the same way.

didn't that "dicatorship" lost to the present government IN AN ELECTION?

"lose" 

[Camerus]

What is Erdogan doing specifically that makes some posters here characterize him as on the verge of instituting a theocracy? 

And in particular, egregious enough to justify a dictatorship?

[Martinus]

What is Erdogan doing specifically that makes some posters here characterize him as on the verge of instituting a theocracy? 

And in particular, egregious enough to justify a dictatorship?

www.google.com

[Camerus]

What is Erdogan doing specifically that makes some posters here characterize him as on the verge of instituting a theocracy? 

And in particular, egregious enough to justify a dictatorship?

www.google.com

Good one, but actually you took my question too literally.  What I meant was, I'm afraid the onus is on the people who insist dictatorship is better than democracy to justify their arguments rather than anything else.

[Tamas]

Who is advocating that? It was a strawman by Raz, of all people.

[Camerus]

Who is advocating that? It was a strawman by Raz, of all people.

When the alternative is a democracy self-devolving into theocracy, military dictatorship doesn't seem like a half-bad alternative.  It's a vicious circle, you don't teach people to defend democratic institutions by instituting dictatorship, but theocracy doesn't quite do that either.

Better a secular despot than an elected Islamist.

Granted, the caveat in both those posts is that there needs to be a theocracy on the verge of coming into being before despotism is justified...which is why I was interested in compelling proof this is realistically going to happen in Turkey, since that is after all the context of this discussion.

[Neil]

Tamas, stop responding to Raz. He is an obstinate, obnoxious and deliberately obtuse moron - there is no point arguing against him. Btw, didn't he announce recently he won't be posting his bullshit in this forum any more? I knew that was too good to be true.

No, he took a week off.  You're the one who has 'quit' seven or eight times.

[Sheilbh]

Also, I saw mentioned, a supposedly announced AKP plan to move toward a Presidential system with widespread powers for the future President (hmmm, wonder who might that be). Is that legit?

Yes. I've mentioned it several times, in this thread. Erdogan couldn't get the votes. It caused disagreements with the current (AKP) President, Abdullah Gul, and there was a rump of AKP MPs voting against it. Erdogan then tried to convince the MHP (ultra-nationalists) to support it, they got some concessions and then pulled out. Then the same happened with the Kurds.

As I say I think some divisions seem to be appearing:

Turkey protests: 'message received', says President Abdullah Gul
Abdullah Gul, the president of Turkey, has called for calm after days of violence clashes between police and protesters, promising that their message has been "received".
By AFP2:44PM BST 03 Jun 2013

"Democracy does not only mean elections," Mr Gul was quoted by the Anatolia news agency as saying on the fourth day of nationwide anti-government protests. "The messages delivered with good intentions have been received."

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has repeatedly said that protesters were manipulated by extremist groups and should show their discontent "at the ballot box", urging them to end their demonstrations immediately.

"I am calling on all my citizens to abide by the rules and state their objections and views in a peaceful way, as they have already done," Mr Gul added.

His comments came amid reports of a 20-year-old Turkish man dying when a taxi drove into a group of demonstrators on an Istanbul highway during an anti-government protest,

Turkish doctors' association TBB said on Monday, the first known death related to the demonstrations.

The protester was named as Mehmet Ayvalitas, and TBB board member Huseyin Demirduzen said four other people were also injured, one of them seriously.

The president said the protesters should watch out for "illegal organisations" infiltrating their demonstrations.
He warned against actions that would tarnish Turkey's image.

The protests started out as a local environment campaign and quickly turned into one of the biggest demonstrations against Erdogan's government since it took power a year ago.

Earlier, Mr Erdogan dismissed the street protests as being organised by extremists, described them as a temporary blip and angrily rejected comparisons with the Arab Spring uprisings.

Appearing defensive and angry, he lashed out at reporters who asked whether the government had understood "the message" by protesters or whether he would soften his tone.

"What is the message? I want to hear it from you," he retorted.

"What can a softened tone be like? Can you tell me?" he said ahead of leaving for a trip to Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia.
He also lashed out at Twitter, used by many of the protesters.

"There is a troublemaker called Twitter, the worst of lies are in there," he told the Haberturk television channel on Sunday, citing false tweets about attacks against protesters and fatalities.

[Valmy]

Sounds fine to me.  I have no particular love of Erdogan, I just wanted to see a democratic government survive a religious conservative in office.

Few Democratic governments have been destroyed by public protests.  This is about AKP over-reaching not a yearning for the bad old days.

[Sheilbh]

Surely depends what you mean. A few democratic governments in Europe certainly have been brought down by public unrest.

[Valmy]

Surely depends what you mean. A few democratic governments in Europe certainly have been brought down by public unrest.

Ooops.  I meant to type 'peaceful' when I typed 'public'

[MadBurgerMaker]

I've noticed in other threads about this series of protests (most recently the current SA thread), along with others in various places, that people seem to want closeup photos of the spent tear gas canisters.  Anyone know why this is?

[Ed Anger]

I've noticed in other threads about this series of protests (most recently the current SA thread), along with others in various places, that people seem to want closeup photos of the spent tear gas canisters.  Anyone know why this is?

You can tell where they were made. During the Egypt protests against Mubarak, there was a stink (GET IT?) about the American markings on the tear gas grenades.