When you live in the place where Europe and Asia meet, you are just bound to be strategically important, and so it is for Turkey, so it was for Turkey’s antecedents Anatolia and Ionia in times past, and so it will be long into the future.

When you’re that strategically important and your Supreme Court is going to hear a case that could result in your President and Prime Minister—and the Nation’s majority political party—being banned from politics, it’s big news.

.Republican radio's Charles Sykes has stepped in it big time, calling the hateful work above "pure genius."

Milwaukee's ecumenical Interfaith Council begs to differ.

Jim Rowen summarizes thoughtfully on the national Daily Kos blog, and Mike Plaistad weighs in with, "Sykes bravely fights coexistence."

A Note from the Politech mailing list yesterday.

Based on preliminary reports, this is what seems to have happened on Tuesday evening: Mostafa Tabatabainejad, a UCLA student, was quietly studying in the campus library around 11:30pm. Campus police asked him for his ID, a usual procedure. Mostafa didn't have it with him and walked toward the exit.
While en route, one of the police officers laid a hand on Mostafa (which may well be simple battery) and he reacted by saying "Get off of me." That's when he was hit with a blast from a Taser, which can render someone unable to walk for 5 to 15 minutes.

But the cops, through malice or ignorance, kept demanding that Mostafa immediately stand up and walk to the door. He was screaming at this point and said he could not, at which point they Tased him again and again.

The cops also threatened to Taser bystanders as well if they persisted in asking for badge numbers. This, too, is on videotape and is in fact a crime. (Think that cop will go to jail? Right.)