Erdogan's Saturday Night Massacre

In a growing scandal that now threatens the stability of the government Erdogan seems to have pulled a maneuver reminiscent of our own imperial president who also attempted to avoid an investigation by firing the prosecutor overseeing the inquiry.  Erdogan is apparently feeling the heat after having family members of his prominent Economy Minster Zafer Caglayan, Interior Minister Muammer Guler and Environment and Urbanization Minister Erdogan Bayraktar arrested for bid rigging and bribery.

In what appears to be an unrelenting march toward authoritarianism the Turkish regime of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has now unilaterally fired the prosecutor that filed charges of corruption and graft against three family members of sitting ministers of the increasingly dictatorial administration. This latest effort to shield himself from potential criminal charges comes after Erdogan has already fired in the last week the Istanbul Police Chief Huseyin Capkin, the head of the organized crime unit Nazmi Ardic and hundreds of other police officers involved in investigating the allegations.

It certainly seems Erdogan may have some degree of culpability as he resorts to mass firings of "gangs" within the police department investigating the charges.  His taking up such questionable activities clearly demonstrates his fear of being charged.  And why may he feel this way? Perhaps he knows the same information as his former Environment and Urbanization Minister Bayraktar:

saying that a majority of the construction plans involved in the corruption investigation had been approved by the prime minister, Turkish news reports said.

"I believe that the prime minister should step down as well in order to relieve the Turkish public," Bayraktar said, according to the newspaper Today's Zaman.

Fearing the consequences of firing the prosecutor less than the results of the prosecution Erdogan has demonstrated to me his own guilt as he now attempts to crush legal proceedings much like he did journalists (the regime has jailed the largest number of correspondents in theworld) as well as the earlier street demonstrations.