Recent riots in Turkey have got me thinking - is Erdgoan looking to create the Islamic version of China? I'm thinking of a few things here - his infamous [from our point of view anyway - well, unless you're Obama of course] his infamous statement that democracy was just a station along the way - in other words, a means to an end, the end being we assumed an Islamic autocracy or oligarchy [which is something of a redundancy since I at least don't believe Islam - any religion, really - is compatible with democratic principles]. And then look at the Turkish economic 'miracle', which looks a lot like the Chinese economic miracle, in sense of being top down, state run capitalism that creates growth through extensive cronyism and gov't expenditure and then uses a repressive ideology to keep the chaff, who by and large don't share in the wealth, under control - in China this being communism, in Turkey Islam - which brings us to the riots which seem to be the work of secularists who have figured out finally exactly what Erdogan is up to - apparently the construction project that gave rise to the protests will be built by a company closely related to Erdogan - which is classic Chinese styled cronyism and is a great way to consolidate power within an elite - and then use Islam as a way to placate, suppress, drown out or marginalize opposition.
Now, understand, I don't necessarily begrudge Erdogan his Islamist machinations - unlike the puppet masters in China he was at least duly elected and if that's what the people of Turkey want then that's their problem - unfortunately it's likely to become our problem too eventually [no doubt already is viz Israel] and so it's more than a little troubling how many in the West are so naive or so stupid that they don't seem to grasp what's what here - or, more troubling than that, have no problem with what Erdogan's doing - let's face it, Obama probably deeply envies the dictatorial powers the man is acquiring.
Thinking of Turkey in these terms makes sense of Muslim push to have it considered a hate crime to criticize Islam - imagine if Reagan had been considered by the global community guilty of uttering a hate crime for calling the Soviet Union the evil empire? That is the kind of power the Islamists seek - and the shockingly fatuous leadership of the West is falling for it. We are led by morons, it seems - or, to give a slightly more cynical aspect to that thought, led by people who have more in common with our enemies than they do with us, the poor souls they ostensibly serve.
