Jim Meyer's Borderlands: Recent Comments

Comment on More Coup Talk, Media Talk in Turkey

2010-02-16T14:54:25Z

Hah, I had no idea links were being filtered. Here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6D6UylJrLUk#t=2m55s

Comment on More Coup Talk, Media Talk in Turkey

2010-02-16T14:46:34Z

I was pretty sure I'd seen the movie where that picture of Gulen came from. I found it. Here he is in his weeping glory.

I personally don't think the cemaat is evil, though I am amazed to see Americans who wouldn't dream of cooperating with their local weeping preachers attempt to lecture Turkish people on how great he and his movement is. I've seen first hand how the appearance of such stuff/conversations even on the net feeds several of the zillion versions of anti-Americanism.

Comment on More Coup Talk, Media Talk in Turkey

2010-02-05T11:15:44Z

"I should also note that Zaman, another Turkish newspaper with a very user-friendly English-language site, is also widely considered in Turkey to be a front for Gulen."

The Zaman-Gulen connection is much more out in the open than any Taraf-Gulen connection (if there is one), no? Does Zaman deny it?

Comment on More Coup Talk, Media Talk in Turkey

2010-01-27T00:16:24Z

Not that I know of.

Comment on More Coup Talk, Media Talk in Turkey

2010-01-26T21:18:26Z

does Taraf have English version?

Comment on Release of Agca a mockery of justice, trial

2010-01-26T19:11:05Z

Bulent, good point about the media being necessary. I shouldn't have phrased things so categorically. But even if media support may be necessary, I do find the idea that journalists (along with professors and folks like Turkan Saylan) would be involved in the planning of a coup to be quite a stretch, to say the least.

Comment on More Coup Talk, Media Talk in Turkey

2010-01-26T13:28:04Z

Hahaha, somebody ought to do some academic research on the Turco-American interface and show what kind of money and effort it takes for a particular point of view (and perhaps a certain kind of spin) to dominate on the American side. I imagine it won't be much. On the other hand, and especially for publications like Zaman (and certain pundits) who seem to count on being able to say different things in different languages, the aura of respectability is very fragile and seems relatively easy to shatter.

Comment on Release of Agca a mockery of justice, trial

2010-01-26T13:15:33Z

Can Dundar is talking to the people involved in the original investigation (both the police and the officers/commander involved in martial law in Istanbul at the time). You might want to check out his column in Milliyet and the online archive of NTV (Canli Gaste is his program).

On:

"since when does the Turkish military need journalists and academics in order to carry out a coup?"

I think you are wrong. A successful coup does require this kind of support (for whom is another issue). As you have pointed out elsewhere, Turkey is -- in some odd sense -- more democratic than it first seems. It was critical for the success of the coup that the ordinary people said 'there was no other way, hayirlisi olsun' on that day in September of 1980 and that was in part because of the failure of the high-circulation mainstream press to adequately go after the details of the build-up towards it. I don't know how/whether the Ipekci murder fits into this, but even then lower profile murders of journalists were common, so it isn't like they didn't have reason to be restrained. (Now that the some archives are online, I have gone back and checked the marginal extremist press. They did foresee it and what they claimed at the time about the goings on seems closer to what we now think we know, but who'd listen to weird communist-speak on publications that people were too scared to buy and carry?)

Comment on Busy times/Going to Japan

2010-01-17T11:12:56Z

LOVED the Istanbul recap! Looking forwad to Anthony Bourdain's Istanbul recap on Monday night too.

Comment on On the Kurdish and Armenian Initiatives

2010-01-04T07:12:24Z

{cont..}

And, about why AKP opted to start this initiative?

I am not sure if it was AKP that decided this; to me, it looks like a statal plan --seemingly a very half-baked one, though.

I say 'seemingly' because it was no secret that the US would withdraw from Iraq, leaving the Kurds in the custody of TR; so, Turkish government/state must have had sufficient time to think about what to do when the time comes.

If so, much of the content of this 'opening' thing and the rest of the strategies must have already been decided.

If so [again], since the Kurds in Northern Iraq will be fostered by TR (as per their and US's wishes), any noises (I mean European) about how narrow the 'opening' is can safely be ignored; which further means that there'll be no reason not to keep the 'opening' as it currently is.

BTW, since no party other AKP had any presence in the areas where DTP dominated, it was in everyone's (everyoneelse's) interest that AKP remained in the political scene. Which means, while it obviously benefited from DTP's RIP, it wasn't AKP that closed DTP down.