Erdogan's litigious defense against his discontents in Turkey

"Call the Prime Minister a Turkey, Get Sued Turkish Leader Erdogan Is the Litigious Sort; to Him, Booing's a Tort"

"...Mr. Guler had just accused the students, who couldn't all fit into the tiny courtroom, of "booing" the prime minister and calling him a "street vendor." Some of the students giggled.

We keep hearing from much of the left and even some of the right how 'European' Turkey is, but records of court matters aren't even generally public, so it's a guess how many people PM Erdogan has sued for things like booing him. Being in Eurovision doesn't make a country European. Is it that this doesn't bother the promoters of including Turkey in Europe because that's what they'd like our countries to move to?

If Turkey wasn’t on the brink of being yet another failed islamic state (cf. Spengler’s columns over at atimes.com), Erdogan could be a real danger. Perhaps he is so anyway. Hard to forecast the future for that geographic region.

What is fairly clear, though, is that he’s trying as hard as he can to bring his jihad to western Europe. And the EU is sticking its collective heads in the sand. Not good. Appeasement, yeah, that’ll work out just fine like it has in the past...

It’s a strategic area, which is part of the reason the Turks seized it from Greek control not too long ago. Byzantium was then the capital of the Roman Empire, as it was, and they considered it gave them the right to the rest of the Roman Empire - during this time their navy attempted to take southern Italy as well because of this thinking, with less success.

Europeans with a sense of history, especially those that remember the Turkish attempt on Vienna, are aware.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5eP2BDfL-s

Have a look at the video at the link. It’s a member of the Austrian parliament reacting to the kinds of things you’ve mentioned. Some of the subtitles use graphic language, but it’s in describing actual events people need to know about. Plus he introduces a phrase that I think sums it up well, ‘tolerance romantics’, and does it in what’s considered the most cultured German accent, that of Vienna, once considered the Paris of the German speaking world.

Thanks, an entertaining rant that I've seen a number of times. Question: what became of it? Did actions follow words?

and does it in what’s considered the most cultured German accent, that of Vienna, once considered the Paris of the German speaking world.

ROTFLMAO. OK, this reminds me of a visit to Vienna in the early '90s - my Viennese friends and I got talking to - or rather, were accosted by - some guy in a restaurant (I think it was the Schnitzelwirt) who absolutely, positively claimed that the true High German (Hochdeutsch) is spoken in Vienna. OK, whatever dude, revel in your delusion (that guy, not you, OldNewYork). See, there's a reason it's called 'German' and not 'Austrian' (notwithstanding the confusion of a certain US president).

I thought you might have seen it, and have some familiarity with the region, with a screen name like Moltke. I don’t know what happened to the speaker; if memory serves he was censured for it, but I might be confusing him with Nicholas Farange in the European Parliament. Truth being spoken in public can astound, and I think he was being truthful in pointing out that the majority of regular Austrians agreed with what he was saying, in the face of elitist left-wing sneers from in chamber.

I know there are similarities between Austrian German and Bavarian, but Viennese German I think is a particular case. According to what I remember from German 101, Hochdeutsch and Plattdeutsch are the two major varieties of German, and are named for the elevation of the speakers, literally, not metaphorically as in the case of High Anglican versus others variants of the religion. In that sense he might have been right. Vienna, as the capital of a universalist variant of German culture (although they would probably prefer the term ‘Central European’ or ‘Germanic’) for such a long time, can sometimes act as much like the ‘true’ center of the universe as New York, Paris, London, Rome, probably a few others. It’s a fairly pleasant variety of German to these American ears, anyway. Although I think the r-rolling comes from an aristocratic French influence and sounds a little odd.

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