Erdogan appears ready to place the crown on his own head:
Tayyip Erdogan’s shock announcement of snap elections in June has caught Turkey’s troubled opposition off guard and brought him within reach of his cherished goal, a powerful presidency with sweeping executive powers.
The European Union is already experiencing heartburn with eastern European states emphasizing nationalism and allegedly undermining democracy and rule of law. Considering my suspicion of those making the charge, I doubt the allegations are more than a small part true.
But those worries really will be true with Turkey. And Erdogan doesn't care (tip to Instapundit):
Turkey has told a European rights body "to mind its own business" after it voiced concern on Tuesday over the freedom and fairness of Turkish snap elections and recommended they be postponed.
Will the EU want to admit the already democracy deficient Turkey that is making itself more alien from European culture and norms when it has enough problems within the existing EU keeping nations in line?
And does Turkey even want to enter the EU, preferring to rail against Europe to rally Turks around Erdogan's power grab with a new foreign policy focus south and east?
