Erdogan’s Turkey would never have received an answer if it came knocking at NATO’s door

 

There was a time when Turkey’s current president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, fooled people into believing he was a “reformer” while in the post of prime minister after his so-called Justice and Development Party (AKP) won a plurality of votes in 2002. Erdogan supported labor reforms that limited work weeks to 45 hours, and overtime to 270 hours a year. This was obviously an effort to gain to popular support, because at heart he was what he has always been—and Islamist with delusions of being “Caliph” of the Islamic World, as in the old Ottoman Empire.

But supporters of a secular society in Turkey knew all about Erdogan before he became first prime minister and then president of Turkey. He was a member of a number of banned parties that supported the creation of an anti-secular Islamic state. In 1999 he was arrested and imprisoned four months for “inciting violence and religious or racial hatred” in a public reading of a “poem” that called mosques “barracks,” the domes of mosques “our helmets,” and minarets “our bayonets,” and the faithful “our soldiers.” Erdogan has since toned down the Islamist rhetoric, although that doesn’t necessarily mean he has abandoned those beliefs.

Erdogan’s current effort to make major changes in the country’s constitution (numerous “small” changes have already taken place during his tenure as president) is also suspected of being an effort by himself and his Islamist party not just to undermine secular principles, but—much like Vladimir Putin has done—to insure the continuation of his authoritarian dictatorship. His current unpopularity because of his mishandling of the economy during the pandemic threatens both his party and himself in the next general elections, and Erdogan is clearly seeking to change certain parts of the current constitution to prevent his “premature” exit from office.

Erdogan was always seen as a threat to democracy in Turkey. In 2007, three hundred thousand people marched in Ankara to oppose his candidacy for president, and over 1 million protested in Istanbul. Nevertheless, the AKP received a large plurality of the vote—so large that the chief prosecutor of Turkey called on the Constitutional Court to ban the party for being an imminent threat to secular democracy. The attempt failed, and since then Turkey has slowly, but surely become what it is today—and country that can no longer be called a “democracy” in the Western sense.

After the 2013 corruption scandal involving AKP members and Erdogan’s own son, there was a wave of retaliatory arrests of police and prosecutors who apparently “overstepped” their authority.  The Stockholm Center for Freedom released a report in 2017 that accused the remarkably incompetent 2016 coup attempt to be yet another “false flag” event orchestrated by Erdogan as an excuse to impose a “state of emergency” and arrest political opponents and whatever remained of the opposition media. The report notes that the “details” of the alleged coup attempt have come from Erdogan and his supporters, which have been “inconsistent” and appear to be contrived. The report also noted that Turkey’s security apparatus went about their daily routine during the “coup” as if nothing was happening. Only a relative handful of Turkey’s armed forces were supposedly involved in the “coup,” far too few to have been effective; many who were involved claimed that it had all been a “set-up.” But the “coup” did achieve the desired results, however:

More than 150,000 government employees were dismissed from their positions on the basis of their critical views without effective judicial and administrative probes. The purges in the military, judiciary and foreign service have reached to alarming levels. 51,889 people were put behind bars, without any evidence, a trial or conviction, mostly housewives, teachers, students, doctors, merchants and journalists who were affiliated with the Hizmet movement.

Erdogan’s actions against the Hizmet or Gulen movement is that of a “jilted” lover. The Hizmet movement was once a political ally, but he blamed the movement’s “infiltration” of the police and judiciary for initiating the corruption investigation of AKP members. Further disagreements on what “Islam” meant in Turkey led to Hizmet adherents being blamed for the alleged coup attempt and then subsequently labeled a “terrorist” organization, when  in fact the movement is supposedly pacifist in outlook and supports a “reformation” version of Islam for the modern world. As evidence that Erdogan opposes this, recall the recent reconversion of the Hagia Sophia into a mosque, its Christian iconography covered up.

But Erdogan and the AKP’s attempts to flout democracy and turn Turkey into a de facto authoritarian state like Putin’s Russia--apparently for the purpose of creating an Islamic state with the pretensions of “empire”—may not even be the most “troubling” issue concerning its continued membership in NATO, although it certainly is the reason why it has been refused entry into the European Union. Turkey appears to be becoming a virtual client state of both Russia and China—mainly because of its current economic crisis, but also because its erstwhile allies in the West no longer trusts Turkey to be a reliable partner in advancing its interests, with its “attentions” now firmly east-leaning rather than west-leaning.

After years of being a haven for China’s persecuted Muslim Uighur minority—even calling them the victims of “genocide” by the Chinese government—in 2016 Erdogan inexplicably switched “sides.” According to Foreign Policy, “Turkey and China signed an agreement allowing extradition even if the purported offense is only illegal in one of the two countries. Since 2019, Turkey has arrested hundreds of Uighurs and sent them to deportation centers.” Because of the lack of an independent media that is not controlled by Erdogan and his party, there has been no internal debate about this change of direction supporting China’s human rights abuses.

But the reasons are simple enough: Turkey’s economy is in “crisis” and it is willing to become a Chinese economic “client” state since international financial institutions in the West are demanding political, judicial and media reform before it lends financial assistance.  Of course Turkey also sees commonality with China’s Uighur “problem,” given its own belief that its oppressed Kurd and Armenian populations are harboring “terrorists.” This suggests that Turkey will cooperate with China against western and NATO interests if it means billions in financial aid to Turkey while allowing the country to continue on its downward spiral toward dictatorship.

Already, this “cooperation” involves, according to FP, “deepening bilateral military and security ties, including in intelligence and cyberwarfare.” Given that China has been accused of committing cyberwarfare and technology theft in the U.S., this brazen “alliance” clearly has “troubling” implications. Furthermore, if Turkey is supposed to be a member of NATO, why would it be allowing Chinese military to participate in military exercises on its territory as it did in 2018, under the “watch” of Donald Trump—who along with William Barr offered to help Erdogan in preventing the investigation into massive fraud and money-laundering by the state-owned bank Halkbank. Trump’s interest in help Erdogan goes beyond just being “friendly.” Like Putin and Trump, Erdogan appears to wish to establish a state along the lines of the “cult of personality”—mainly, his. What direction this ultimately will go is not yet clear; it could go toward “Trumpism” or “Putinism,” or toward a country like Iran, given Erdogan Islamist past that he currently is trying to conceal.

And then of course there is Russia. Erdogan has also angered its NATO partners by purchasing weapons from Russia, including the S-400 missile defense system, which could be secretly used by Russia to reconfigure its advanced radar system to help it to overcome anti-missile defense counter-measures used by NATO weapons. The U.S. refusal to sell Turkey advanced F-35 fighters is simple enough to understand: Turkey simply cannot be trusted. Like China, Russia sees Turkey as a way to gain a foothold and cause disruption that harms Western interests. Russia has signed many economic and security “cooperation” agreements with Turkey, unheard of by a NATO country when Russia is still presenting an adversarial posture. Its investments in Turkey’s energy infrastructure can potentially be used to pressure Turkey to act against Western and NATO interests.

So why is Turkey still allowed to be in NATO? The U.S. still maintains a military airfield in Turkey which is used for NATO operations, and there is the fear that kicking Turkey out would mean there would no longer be a means to influence or control its turn towards the East and becoming a dangerous foe to Western interests. Better a “frenemy” than a full-blown “enemy.”

On the other hand, the Council on Foreign Relations notes that U.S. and Turkish interests under Erdogan have diverged “radically,” and the U.S. should begin withdrawing its tactical nuclear weapons from the country, reduce its military reliance on Turkey, and relocate its airbase to Jordan or other Gulf states. The Cold War ended 30 years ago, writes the Council, and unlike former Soviet-controlled countries, Erdogan doesn’t see Russia and China for what they are: using Turkey as a gullible pawn for their own geopolitical aims, mainly to harm NATO and Western interests.

White women and their media enablers just have to learn to make room for the "feelings" of everyone else who thinks that they are "victims" too

 

Last week the Bay Area San Jose Mercury News informed us that

KTVU news anchor Frank Somerville again has been removed from the air, but this time a newsroom spat…According to station sources, Somerville, 63, has been “suspended indefinitely” by Channel 2 management after a disagreement with news director Amber Eikel over coverage of the Gabby Petito homicide case. The disagreement, said sources, occurred earlier in the week after the body of Petito was discovered in Wyoming…KTVU was prepared to air a news report detailing the latest developments in the case.

Somerville wanted to add a brief tagline at the end of the report that questioned the extraordinary level of media coverage devoted to the story. Sources said he wanted to point out that the U.S. media often disproportionately covers tragedies involving young white women, while largely ignoring similar cases involving women of color and indigenous people. Somerville is the adoptive father of a black teen daughter. The veteran anchor was told that the tagline was inappropriate and he apparently pushed back on it. There was no word on how heated the discussions got. Sources say that Somerville was informed by station management the next day he was being suspended.

First off, let’s point out that it would seem “odd” for a California television station to treat a case like it was “local” when the victim’s body was found in Wyoming, and her home was in Florida, not California. Why was the news director so fanatical about treating this like headline news locally? And why was she so upset about the frankly true observation that white women—especially attractive blonde ones—are treated more “special” than other people who are victims of crime? It should be pointed out that white women are the demographic least likely to be a victim of violent crime by population rate, but it just seems like a lot more because, because the national media treats every one they can get their hands as “national” news. Black men are 23 times more likely to be the victim of homicide than white women, although there are “reasons” why people avoid the “whys” of that issue.

Of course in this gender victim-obsessed society we live in, where white women control how their news is reported, and complain loudly and often if it suggests any variation on the victim theme (except with embarrassing far-right racist politicians); arrogance and ego always justifies personalized outrage. Film and television also feeds into the white woman victim narrative; I always have disliked shows like Law & Order because the only time police and prosecutors didn’t get the "right" man—literally—was because of a “technicality” or a dumb jury. But with its “Special Victims Unit” shows, it just became a sandbox for white female victim mythology, because the only thing required to be a “special victim” was to be both white and female. This permits them to avoid examining their own failings as human beings.

Of course, the Black Lives Movement also has similar pretensions, but it generally focuses on one individual (like George Floyd) and makes him or her the “face” on a recurring theme of police abuse—although this also avoids the subject that the vast majority of black homicides are committed by other black people (by the way, a truck advertising Snoop Dogg’s “19 Crimes”  wine just passed by; why do these “role models”  have to “celebrate” crime?). White female victim advocates don’t seem to understand or care that other people have their own problems, even white men. With all these paranoid, racist “Karens” around—including politicians like Marjorie Taylor Greene and media figures like Laura Ingraham, both of them blondes—why shouldn’t minorities also see self-absorbed white women as a part of the victimizer class, when in this society they are frankly “1B” to white men’s “1A”?  

Meanwhile, Bolden Day, the father of then still missing Illinois State graduate student Jelani Day, who is black, spoke out against the lackadaisical treatment of his son’s disappearance by police and the media compared to that of Petito. In an NPR report Day noted that “Petitio’s face was ‘plastered everywhere’ and the FBI got involved after she had been missing for two days,” but his son “didn’t get that same attention after being missing for longer.” Jelani Day was identified earlier this month as the remains found in the Illinois River.

NPR also noted the case of Daniel Robinson, a 24-year-old geologist who is also black. Robinson went missing during a field expedition in the Arizona desert. His wrecked vehicle was found but not himself or his body. In contrast to efforts to locate Petito, Robinson’s father claims that has done more than the police (the FBI, of course, is not involved) to find his son. He claims the police are simply working on assumptions that justify “non-action” on their part.

To the point that minority women are missing without the interest of the media: that is quite true, although most (like most “missing” white females) are so because they want to be. Native American women are frequently stated as being “missing,” with the strong suggestion of “foul play.” The reality is that contrary to popular belief, Native Americans (unless retired or disabled) do not receive a monthly check from the federal government; unless there is a profitable casino on the reservation, joblessness, poverty and homelessness are seemingly insurmountable problems. Thus it should come as no surprise than many Native Americans—both men and women—go “missing.” Take the recent case of Reatha Finkbonner of the Lummi Nation in Washington; she was “found” in Las Vegas, determined by police not to be in “danger” and apparently there to have a good time, without telling anyone back home.

Why does the media ignore complaints about its coverage displaying absolute devotion to white female victims when they are the demographic least likely to be the victim of violent crime? Why is it “inappropriate” to even mention it, as seen in the Mercury News story? Because it “sells.” Many white female viewers feel a “vicarious” connection with other “victims,” and that draws them in waiting for the next updates, which of course helps ratings—and CNN, which has been treating the Petito case as expected, is in desperate need of a ratings boost.  It is the “feeling good about feeling bad” syndrome, nobody else matters; the problem, of course, is that all crime victims think they “matter,” and white women (and blacks and LGBTQ as well) just have to learn to make room for the “feelings” of everyone else.

It was always “OK” to use horses and “whips” on Hispanic migrants—and still is, given Biden’s forbidding their use only against Haitians in Del Rio

 

We have been presented with scenes of Border Patrol agents on horseback and “whips” rounding up people as if they were cattle in Del Rio, Texas. News commentators and black activists were outraged. President Joe Biden was so embarrassed by the “optics” that he forbade Border Patrol activities on horseback in Del Rio. We read stories like this:

One agent still on horseback commanded Mr. (name redacted) to re-join the group. While Mr. (name redacted) was walking with his hands on his head the Border Patrol agent while on his horse, was hitting him on the head with his lasso. After warning the agent several times to stop hitting him, Mr. (name redacted) could no longer stand the pain from the lasso hitting his scalp and ran. The agent still on his horse, again chased Mr. (name redacted) down and bumped Mr. (name redacted) with the horse. Mr. (name redacted) fell to the ground on his stomach and face down. That is when Mr. (name redacted) felt a “warm” feeling on his back after hearing a single gunshot. He had been shot the agent. The agent then yelled “oh fuck, oh fuck” and left the scene.

Well, actually you probably never read about this, and no, this wasn’t one of those Haitian migrants you saw being “rounded-up” by Border Patrol agents. The victim was Jesus Castro Romo, and the incident occurred in 2010. The above was a statement from a document in a court case which never would have been heard save for the embarrassing revelation that the border agent who claimed that he shot Castro Romo for throwing a rock at him was later charged and convicted of taking payoffs from drug smugglers. This kind of thing has been going on for a long, long time; in 1924 when the Border Patrol was first established, agents on horseback were used to “round-up” Chinese migrants crossing the border in enforcement of the “exclusion” laws. In a 2017 The Atlantic article, we saw this; note the caption:

 

In a 2018 report in The Guardian, from 2005 to 2017 the Treasury Department paid out $47 million in 1,300 cases to victims of “reckless driving” by Border Patrol agents; perhaps “reckless riding” could be added to that. In the 40 court cases that the Guardian was able to review that involved these activities, six were fatal incidents, and 18 involved “amputations and disabilities.” The report noted that the Treasury Department was “cutting a check” to cover a claim against the Border Patrol every 32 hours, to the amount of $177 million. But these payments only constituted payouts from a “poverty fund” that the Border Patrol accessed because it didn’t have enough funds to cover the cost of its malfeasance from its own budget. Cases and payments are generally kept “secret” by the courts, and this means, as an ACLU spokesman noted, this allowed not just a cloak of silence around the issue, but hid cases—particularly those involving unjustified homicide—that were never heard.

Yet one cannot ignore the hypocrisy of the national news media on this issue.  Haitians have received largely sympathetic treatment outside the usual far-right suspects because they are black, and thus apparently deserve “special consideration” more than what the merely "brown-skinned" migrants receive on the national level; the use of horses and “whips” can still be used against Hispanic migrants because, well, who cares about them. They probably “deserve” the abuse anyways.  It is up to local news outlets whose reporting is generally ignored by the national media that has to fill in the gaps of people’s awareness. The Arizona Republic published a “special report” in 2014 concerning the “cloak of silence” involving fatal encounters with Border Patrol agents, including that of a teenager named Jose Antonia Elena Rodriguez, who was shot at least 10 times in the back and in the head by at least one border agent while he was on the Mexican side of the border.

The later Guardian story offered a follow-up, noting that agent Lonnie Swartz, who was found to have fired 16 bullets at Rodriguez, was found “innocent” of murder. The Guardian also noted the similar case of Sergio Adrian Hernandez Guereca. His case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which refused to rule on whether persons killed by U.S. government agents specifically during  a border incident  had any constitutional right to redress. Sent back to a lower court, the case was dismissed. Despite the seemingly high number of cases that do reach the “settlement” phase, the difficulty in getting such cases heard means that those that are in simply a drop in the bucket.

The Republic report noted that Border Patrol agents faced few repercussions even when they “mistakenly” killed U.S. citizens they assumed were “illegal.” In the nine-year period it examined, the Border Patrol acted with such impunity that even killing 13 U.S. citizens by on-duty agents failed to make a dent on the national conscious. According to the Republic, at the Border Patrol, “internal discipline is a black hole.” Confirming what was said in The Guardian report, the Republic notes that “There have been no publicly disclosed repercussions—even when, as has happened at least three times, agents shot unarmed teenagers in the back. That appearance of a lack of accountability has been fed by a culture of secrecy about the agents’ use of deadly force.” Furthermore, while most agents act with restraint and do not have itchy trigger fingers, most agents nevertheless appear to be under the impression that they were protected by the "handcuffs off” policy on the use of deadly force long before it was made “official” by the Trump administration:

CBP leaders refuse to release their policies, calling them law-enforcement sensitive. They won’t disclose the names of agents who use deadly force. They won’t say, in any instance, whether deadly force was justified. The lack of transparency goes against the “best practices” that national police organizations recommend for dealing with deadly-force incidents.

The Republic noted that most of the deadly incidents involving Border Patrol agents were similar to other cases where agents did not feel the need to resort to deadly force, suggesting that the problem was individual agents themselves—and who believed their actions were “protected” by Border Patrol policies. Further, it was determined that agents do not know of any policy limiting their use of lethal force; whether one uses it or not is entirely dependent upon the character of the border agent. The ones that have no “character” are apparently the ones that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott says that he has a “job” waiting for them if any are fired over the Del Rio caper.

Of course there are precedents for this kind of thing; after Bellevue, WA police officer Mike Hetle was allowed to “quit” the department after the killing of an unarmed Hispanic man in 2001, he found a job with the Department of Homeland Security; obviously he was of the right “temperament.” Hetle was then hired as a “security expert” by NASA; apparently no one bothered to look into his past, or thought it was very important, which became clear when he was charged with murder last year in the killing of his black neighbor over an argument about trash. A year later, the case still awaits trial. That is if anyone cares, the national news media for example; and it all began because someone didn’t think that the life of a Hispanic man didn’t matter enough to care about, and which is the reality on the border.

Packers get 49ers monkey off their backs with win on Crosby's game-ending field goal

Last Tuesday Packer fans had to endure another update on what is going on in Mr. Rodgers’ Neighborhood, courtesy of the Pat McAfee show, which mostly exists inside his own head. Aaron Rodgers, of course, was bitching and moaning about people bitching and moaning about him, and frankly he only has himself to blame.  The media constantly showers upon him such fawning accolades that he has a hard time taking the heat from fans when he isn’t always living up to the hyperbole. Anyways, After the Bucks won the NBA title and the Brewers winning their division, Wisconsin football fans needed some good news after another disastrous performance by Badgers quarterback Graham Mertz, who was the highest rated quarterback recruit in the school’s history.

Although not in the top-ten of his class of 2019, Mertz was rated as its best pocket passer/pro-style quarterback. So overrated was Mertz by the scouts that the Badgers last season were a preseason favorite for the final-four playoffs; instead, what we have seen is performances like Saturday’s against Notre Dame. The Badgers defense can’t be blamed for the 41-13 thrashing, allowing only 248 total yards. The Badgers took a 13-10 lead into the fourth quarter, and then the following occurred: a kick return for a touchdown, a Mertz fumble and a touchdown, a missed field goal, a Mertz interception and a field goal, a Mertz interception returned for a touchdown, and another Mertz interception returned for a touchdown. Notre Dame scored 31 points in the fourth quarter while only advancing the ball exactly 50 yards on offense.

So, how did the Packers do against their nemesis of the last few years, the 49ers? Rodgers and the Packers seemed to start off where they ended against the Lions last week, opening up a 17-0 lead until the 49ers managed to score on the last play of the half with the help of a long kickoff return and a third down penalty. Rodgers completed 16 of 18 for 184 yards in the half. But the 49ers scored on a long drive to open the second half to narrow the margin to 3 points and things started to look less promising. Rodgers once more had one of his frustrating long slow stretches at inopportune times, allowing the other team to either get back in the game or extend leads. For the first 29:30 minutes of the second half, Rodgers completed just 5 of 10 passes for 35 yards, and this allowed the 49ers to take the lead 28-27 with just 35 seconds to play.

Fortunately for the Packers, the 49ers defense does what often happens when the offense makes a big score and everyone is so “excited” that they forget the game isn’t over yet. Rodgers slung the ball to a wide open Davante Adams twice with 49ers playing the “prevents you from winning” prevent defense with only a token pass rush, eventually leading to Mason Crosby’s 51-yard game-winning field goal as time expired. Hooray. The Packers managed to escape a result that could have just as easily opened up that can of worms about how the Packers rarely being able to play two halves of good football on both sides of the ball, let alone on one side. But hey, a win’s a win, and the Packers got that 49ers monkey off their backs.

Stats of the day: six of Rodgers 8 incompletions that were not spikes targeted Adams. That guy that Rodgers lobbied the Packers to get, Randall Cobb? No catches on one target. The offensive line did better, allowing “just” one sack and 3 tackles for losses. Third down pass interference penalties kept two Packer drives alive that ended in touchdowns.

Next week it is at home against the Steelers, a team that seems to be running on whatever Ben Roethlisberger has got left in the tank, which doesn’t seem to be much these days.