Turkey. Keep your eye on Turkey. As we watch the ever-changing world landscape where some see religious law as the cure-all, its important to see what Turkey will be doing.I was captivated watching the massive red sea of protesters Sunday in the capital city of Istanbul where that strategic nation sits in the balance between remaining secularists or going the way of a sectarian and officially Islamic nation. How ironic where a country whose population is reportedly 99 percent Muslim could muster such an enormous protest by as many as 750,000 people who dont want a theocratic government like Iran or Saudi Arabia or many Middle Ages lands. That is not to say Turkey doesnt already have some deeply troubling practices including political imprisonments, torture, human rights violations of minorities, repression of non-Muslims and minority religious expression. Amnesty International finds Turkish women suffer widely and that as many as half of women have been victims of domestic violence, and abuse goes widely unreported. Protesters waved their red flags in the massive gathering Sunday, and in a huge demonstration two weeks before, to put presidential candidate Abdullah Gul, current foreign minister, on notice that they wont accept a new president who does not respect the current secular way of government. Gul is the presidential candidate of the Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP) that has a large majority in parliament, which elects the president. News reports said the protesters want parliament, instead, to choose a president without theocratic designs. Despite the opposition, the AK party has insisted it will move ahead with Guls candidacy. Gul was chosen as the partys standard-bearer last week in the first step toward choosing the next president, but it is being legally challenged by opposition parties. Elections are in November. The Los Angeles Times reported that Turkeys powerful military, which considers itself keeper of the secular system, has issued its own strong warning as well.Gul, meanwhile, rejects the peoples concerns and says he only wants to pursue a conservative-democratic agenda. History is crammed with those who arrived into office as conservatives but governed as fascists. Their zeal and righteousness dont necessarily differ that much from the hard-line religionists who dont see that much difference between religious obedience and police state order.A sizable number of books have been published in recent years alerting the American nation to the havoc caused primarily by the religious rights relentless quest to install a de facto theocracy here on the claim that it is a Christian nation. One definition of theocracy is government by divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided. In many theocracies, government leaders are members of the clergy, and the state’s legal system is based on religious law. Theocratic rule was typical of early civilizations.In Turkey, the Justice and Development Party is credited with presiding over dynamic economic growth since taking power in 2002 and observers say that even if Gul were not the candidate, the party surely would field the winning candidate anyway. The Times reported that a second round of parliamentary voting will be Wednesday.Current Prime Minister Tayyip Edrogan is calling for national unity and Turkey urgently needs to protect the progress it has made in the economy and in government, which previously was beset with weak coalitions and corruption. The nation has been working toward winning acceptance into the European Union. The conservative National Reviews Michael Rubin told of the debacle of Turkeys government identity. In April 2004, then U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell called turkey a model for Iraq and a Muslim democracy living in peace with its friends and neighbors. Rubin said those words were infused with well-meaning Washington-style political correctness, but they raised hackles in Turkey. And he quoted a Turkish professor: "We are a democracy. Islam has nothing to do with it. By calling us a Muslim democracy, Powell endorsed the (ruling) AKP (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi). If I called the United States a Christian democracy, what would that say to you?"With the sea of red in Istanbul people seeing red at the prospect of a bona fide theocracy Turkish leaders hopefully are getting a strong message the one groups set of religious doctrines dont make good public law.

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