The Hiatus Ends Today

I've been on the road a lot and so haven't been posting here. Over the last week I settled down, my mind full of things I wanted to talk about, discuss, and write about, but for some reason I delayed coming here. Feels good now, though - it always does, once you get started.

Much has happened in the world in the last two weeks, and yet it is relatively unchanged. I'll get to some of it later. One thing I did want to comment on was the vibrancy of Turkish democracy.

Yes, Turkey has finally, after every sort of political intrigue, including thinly veiled threats
from the army to once again snatch the reins of power, elected Abdullah Gul President.

For those who haven't been following, Turkey's AK party, known as "Justice and Development" in English, is perhaps the most progressive party to emerge in Turkey since Mustafa Kemal founded the republic. PM Erdogan has pursued a steady path of bringing Turkey towards economic development and social justice, exploring EU accession with more enthusiasm than any of his "secularist" predecessors, and opening up restrictions on Kurdish cultural and political activities.

His foreign minister, who capably kept Turkey out of the Iraq debacle, is, we are told to believe, objectionable. Why? His wife wears a hijab. He is an "Islamist." And so, a scrap of women's clothing and a meaningless political smear are used by the West's genuine Islamophobes to explain to us why an authoritarian, oppressive, bloodthirsty Turkish secularism is preferably to a democracy whose parliament handed the reigns to an "Islamist," whatever that is supposed to mean.

The Turkish press didn't seem so hysterical. Zaman, an English daily, was ardently Pro-Gul. Even those who were not thrilled by his election, however, were more confident in Turkish democracy than they were afraid of Gul's supposed top-secret Shari'ah agenda. A good sampling of Turkish press can be found here from the Beeb.

Over here in the West, however, legions of self-appointed policy gurus have lined up to tell us, once again, that Muslims eat mazzohs made with the blood of gentile childr. . .. oh wait, wrong libel. . . oh yeah . . . that a core tenet of Islam is world domination through bloody conquest and forced conversion.

Mubarak Turkey, Mubarak! You are an example to the entire world.