
Turkey's president says all he wants is same powers as Hitler - obi1kenobi
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/turkey/12077703/Turkeys-president-says-all-he-wants-is-same-powers-as-Hitler.html
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bakattack
I don't understand why people are surprised that Erdogan is pushing an Islamic
agenda. He was voted in because of his appeal to the religious people.

I think all the people who are surprised at this are the ones outside of
Turkey. This should not be a surprise at all. People living in the rural areas
are very conservative and they are the ones who brought him to power once
again.

Even to this day I hear nothing but praise for Erdogan in my social circle (of
_very_ well educated upper-middle class people).

Reading articles from the US & UK makes it look like we are talking about two
different people. There is not a lot of hate for Ergodan at the grass-roots
level. Almost as if there is an agenda to push by the international community

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elcapitan
Thanks for creating an account for telling us this.

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yxhuvud
While the guy (or whatever) hasn't commented a lot,

> created: 464 days ago

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falsestprophet
This is the only comment. So no he hasn't commented _a lot_.

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bakattack
Hey guys - yea, I'm a lurker, I guess.

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diminish
A lot of us Turks here are totally at the opposite side of Erdogan but come
on. That type of blunt propaganda is really not needed. We need to stand on
the side of democracy, and oppose this party in democratic ways. I'm truely
ashamed how several UK/US media outlets stood on the side of the coup faction.

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adrianratnapala
The trouble is this encourages a tendency to assume that whoever is has
executive power today is the legitimate representative of democracy so long as
they once won an election.

Now from what little I know of Turkey, I think Erdogan does have a good
democratic case behind him, since he seem popular and won a recent election.
But it also really does count against him if he roughshod of the machinery
(such as a free press) that makes democracy work.

I don't know enough about Turkey to balance those two things, so I am not
willing to stand on any side in this dispute.

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toyg
_> he seem popular and won a recent election._

The trend is not rising though. He's twice failed to break the numbers
required to legally change the constitution, and now even his majority is not
very solid. He survives on a steady diet of fairly suspicious shocks, like
this coup attempt and a string of terrorist attacks that conveniently targeted
his enemies rather than his friends.

He's also played the old "Putin switcheroo" between premiership and presidency
to work around constitutional limits, which is why he's trying to strengthen
his new role.

The democratic case for Erdogan is the same as for Putin, really; and that
says it all.

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mustaflex
I'am a big anti-erdogan turk but he never ever said that in the past it was a
'mistranslation' done on purpose and now that the coup has failed they use
basic propaganda to corner him. Yes he is authoritarian fuck, yes he wants
more power and lots of people hate him for that but it doesn't change what
happened on July 15th, A coup orchestrated by an Imam and his group sheltered
by U.S.A. They used planes that took of from Incirlik(nato base from where
isis operation is lead) to refuel f-16s in Ankara.

The anti-american sentiment is at an all-time high in every part of the
population and if they refuse to give Gulen to Turkey, it will be a breaking
point and there will be no turning back. I think darker days are ahead of for
Turkey and the middle-east.

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at-fates-hands
>> The anti-american sentiment is at an all-time high

This is interesting considering the US keeps touting how important allies
Turkey is to us for the fight against ISIS. Why is there so much anti-American
sentiment right now?

I honestly haven't been able to read that much on the coup so I'm probably
missing something - I know you mentioned the US supported Imam, but what else
is going on? I seriously would like to know more.

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toyg
Turkey is like Pakistan: a strategic US ally who doesn't exactly see eye-to-
eye with the US on all problems.

In particular, Erdogan bet big on ISIS to rid himself of both Assad (strategic
rival to Turkish influence in the region) and Kurds, so he's not in love with
a US policy that arms Kurd troops against ISIS and Al-Nusra.

Also, Turkey is a big country. Daesh is obviously unpopular in "westernized"
Istanbul, but out in the sticks where people listen to imams and maybe make
the odd cross-border illegal transactions with ISIS fighters, they're likely
loved a bit more, especially considering their anti-Kurd role. Coincidentally,
rural provinces have also been Erdogan's primary constituencies ever since he
failed to attain UE membership.

And well, of course there's Israel.

Edit: downvoted why? I don't think any of this is particularly contentious.

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yxhuvud
Note: The article is from January.

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neilellis
Can you put (Jan 2016) at the end so people realise it's nothing new :-)

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infodroid
Feature request: Before you can flag a discussion, you have to give your
reasons for doing so, which will be published.

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obi1kenobi
OP here -- I would also love to know why this post got flagged. I posted this
because I was interested in the HN community's thoughts on the article as I
try to decide what to think of it, and not because I was agreeing or
disagreeing with it, or to push some agenda or other.

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neilellis
He replied: "Yes. There is nothing saying that you can't have a presidential
system in a unitary state. There are already some examples in the world today,
and also some from the past. You see it when you look at Hitler's Germany.
Later you see the example again in various other countries. What is important
is that a presidential system should not disturb the people in its
implementation. If you provide justice, there will be no problem because what
people want and expect is justice. We cannot at the moment say that
presidential systems are entirely free from problems. There are places
governed by a presidential system and still goes through problems, but in
comparison we see that presidential systems are relatively better than
parlementarian[sic] systems.”[1]

I think invoking comparison with Hitler's Germany as an example of good system
is still pretty awful!

[1]: [http://factcheckingturkey.com/authoritarianism/claim-
erdogan...](http://factcheckingturkey.com/authoritarianism/claim-erdogan-
cites-hitler-s-germany-example-effective-government-66)

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thesehands
How much oversight/transparency do we think we will see over the presumed
coming trials of the 6000 arrested following the failed coup?

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andrewclunn
Brilliant, now whenever I criticize him online I will instantly lose as per
Godwin's law. Well played, well played.

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philtar
No one is asking who are the Turks looking for someone like Hitler.

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Cypher
But Hitler died... perhaps something is lost in translation?

