[wobbleblob]

He is the Turkish Putin.

I find it worrying. Turkey seemed to be such a success until a few years ago. A booming, increasingly western economy, seeming stability. Somehow you expect dictatorship to come with a revolution, but it seems it can slowly creep up on you. All it seems to take is a strong, popular leader.

People think they like strong, popular leaders, but I find them a threat to democracy. They tend to think they're doing everyone, the country, a favor by latching on to power and never letting go again.

[aurora72]

Putin does not take orders from America or EU, Erdogan does. Putin's got a PhD, Erdogan's got nothin and can't speak any English. So it's ridiculous comparing them two.

[tim333]

There are a lot of similarities though. Both trying to be president for life, having huge palaces, throwing reporters in jail, corrupt, somewhat popular at home and so on.

[wobbleblob]

What, do they have to be identical to make the comparison? I could refer to Putin as the Russian Erdogan, but Putin was there first.

[afsina]

Because, it was all fun and games until a hacky "arab spring" like attempt in 2013 summer and later Gulenists decided to take government down at the end of 2013. Even though Government won the battle it was a strong blow. Government went into deep paranoia and now doing things like paranoid fools.