Powerline: On Sunday, a narrow majority of Turkish voters agreed to grant sweeping powers to their president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The referendum that accomplishes this was approved by slightly more than 51 percent of the electorate, amidst allegations of fraud by Erdogan and his backers.
Voters in Istanbul, Ankara, and other major cities rejected the constitutional changes proposed by Erdogan. Approval was due to voters in the countryside where, says David Pryce-Jones, illiteracy, gender inequality, and electoral fraud flourish
Erdogan’s constitutional changes follow a failed coup against him. Mass arrests ensued. According to Pryce-Jones, somewhere in the order of 140,000 people have been “pursued and purged.” Freedom of expression has vigorously been curbed.
Pryce-Jones views the constitutional changes as institutionalizing these conditions:
Parliamentary government is to be replaced by presidential government. The office of prime minister becomes superfluous, and is to be suppressed. The president remains in office as long as he wants, until 2029 is the rumor about Erdogan.
The president also gained greater latitude in appointing judges and prosecutors.
To obtain the extraordinary powers of the Turkish presidency, however, Erdogan will have to win the 2019 election.
It means Turkey is following that weird political curve where the people decide to cede power to a ruler instead of a deliberative body. We actually seem to be doing the same thing here, although in a slower manner. We allowed President Obama to side step Congress and ignore laws he disagreed with, and we are becoming used to unelected Federal judges establishing policy and usurping the functions of both the legislative and executive branches.
Obama claimed he could accomplish what he wanted because he had a pen and a telephone. Although Trump has accomplished many things, I would like to see him carry through on his intent to again involve Congress in a more active role. Yes, I know that Congress frequently acts slowly and painfully, but power ceded to an individual ruler is usually not regained.
It means, If you kill or imprison all opposition, you can become dictator pretty easily, even with the slimmest of margins. It’s working for Venezuela too.
“Looks like meat is back on the menu, boys!”
Enjoy your orcfest, Turkey.
@Wyatt
That would mean that congress would have to get off their ass and start sending legislation to Trump for him to sign. Eighty something days and congress hasn’t done jack shit with their majority.
It means the Crusades were never really over.
It means that the tens of thousands of young, western Turks that hit the bricks in support of Ergodan during that so-called “Coup” just realized they’re now in a pot with the water temperature slowly rising and that they helped destroy the only way out. Hey girls, better get busy resewing all those short skirts and pantsuits into Najibs and Burqa’s and boys better get those beards going.
Vote for a Caliphate get a Caliphate.
Put the country in reverse.
Next stop, 3rd century hell hole.
@Wyatt
Good description.
However, involving Congress is no longer what it used to be. Maxine Waters, et al. ‘We the People’ can handle this a little more effectively and efficiently.
A long time ago one heard stories about places where the media got attacked and some even got killed. ‘How horrible’. What kind of third world craphole must that be to live in. One might even have felt bad for the journolistos.
Then Time and Space happen. Ways of the World experienced.
See firsthand the Lying, Dishonesty, Trickery and Hypocrisy of the media.
From Dan Rather to Brian Williams to Andrea Mitchell to Rachel Maddow.
These ‘Reporters’ are Typer-warriors.
And they choose sides. You see it now, As Seen on TV.
Feel nothing for everything that happens to them.
The answer to the question in the title is: the Ottoman Empire will be resurrected. It was the seventh kingdom and will be the eighth when Erdogan resurrects it.
Rev 17:10
and they are seven kings; five have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come; and when he comes, he must remain a little while.
Rev 17:11
“The beast which was and is not, is himself also an eighth and is one of the seven, and he goes to destruction.
WHY OH WHY did Trump call and congratulate this thug?
Turkey … Anatolia … Ionia … Byzantium … Seljuk Sultanate … hmm … let’s see … ruled by dictators, strongmen, emirs, sultans, caliphs, viziers, satraps … well, autocrats of one description or another for what? 3000 years? Just going home, is all …
izlamo delenda est …