When the main-opposition CHP`s Deputy Chairman Oguz Oyan complained about "media`s role" in CHP`s March 28 local elections defeat I assumed that he meant media`s "neglect" of the CHP platform.
But Yeni Safak`s conservative commentator Fehmi Koru brought an excellent angle to the issue. I somehow failed to remember that CHP complaining about the mainstream Turkish media is like Al Gore complaining that the New York Times has neglected the Democrats in USA! Doesn`t make sense at all. Why? Because the mainstream media in Turkey is as pro-social-democrat as the mainstream media in the United States is Liberal with a capital L. (The former CBS reporter Bernard Goldberg`s books published last year about that Liberal bias in USA established the fact beyond any doubt.)
That also explains the ferocity of the attacks in the Turkish media these days on CHP. CHP was their baby and Turkey`s oldest party has let them down by losing election after election. Now a wide segment of the Turkish commentators demand that heads roll in the CHP leadership. They want a new vision, a new willingness to get in touch with the masses. A new heart to bite the bullet and start all over again by perhaps (Lord!) emulating the conservative-religious AKP`s successful grassroots-reachout strategy.
So about whom CHP captains were complaining? Probably about the conservative-religious media platforms on the right like Yeni Safak. Given, however, their limited circulation in a country where newspaper readership has dwindled down to dangerous levels over the years, that sounds more like the continuation of CHP`s denial of reality than a rational explanation of shrinking to 18% of the popular votes.