We know the result: Even prestigious papers like the NYT and the WP were duped by the US military's PR machine.

Judith Miller was a senior NYT news analyst. She wrote many articles before the war which led her readership to believe that Iraq had Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD). The information she used was mainly attributed to unnamed sources. This sloppy attitude on her part and her negligence to abide by journalistic standards, which call for checking the credibility of sources, cost her dearly: She lost all credibility and had to leave the NYT.Trust me and take my advice: When reading a newspaper, don't believe every news item and analytical piece you come across that lacks proper attribution to a credible source. I did not go by this rule of mine recently when I read a column in the Milliyet daily relating the opinion of a prominent politician whose name was withdrawn by the columnist. The politician, who spoke with Milliyet's Ankara Bureau Chief anonymously, accepted the Justice and Development Party's (AK Party) responsibility in the process that ended up as a judicial case at the Constitutional Court. He also suggested some remedies to rectify the shattered image of the AK Party in the eyes of the secularist elite. This politician said ministers who are not liked by the secularist elite would be forced to resign and that decrees or laws would be issued to contain the freedom to wear headscarves at universities.

I have my opinion about the identity of the minister, who the columnist presented as a veteran politician from the AK Party occupying a seat in the present Council of Ministers. Rather than disclosing who he might be, I will keep my opinion to myself. There aren't many within the AK Party who would speak freely and get away with what he said. I know many prominent ministers and when they speak with journalists, they never utter a single sentence -- even as unimportant and obvious as "the world is round" -- without making sure that the interview will be "background," i.e., that it will not be attributed to the minister.

There are those who are after the AK Party and they will never be satisfied unless the AK Party ceases to exist. For the sake of brevity, let us call them "powers that be." The idea of bargaining with the "powers that be" is very popular in AK Party circles -- especially in the upper echelons of the party. How can we understand what happened during May Day celebrations in İstanbul and Ankara without a proper understanding of the AK Party's eagerness to please the "powers that be"? The clubbing of demonstrators and hosing them down with red-dyed water at celebrations cannot solely be a product of police brutality. We can easily understand its meaning if we start seeing it as the AK Party's intention of bargaining with the "powers that be."

I expected the AK Party to get closer to the people who overwhelmingly supported it in the latest elections by answering their rightful demands. Since the AK Party received half the votes in the latest election, we can easily surmise that at least half of the workers, if not more, had cast their votes for it. The workers didn't deserve what they received during the celebrations. The government might have serious intelligence indicating a real possibility of provocative actions during celebrations and the people in responsible positions may have acted with this intelligence in mind, nevertheless this would never justify denying all the wishes of the labor force. For instance, the government could have announced its intention to call May Day a holiday from next year on.

The government tended to use "proportionate force" instead.

The desire to bargain is there, but as it takes two to tango, bargaining also calls for two parties to be present. With whom is the AK Party going to negotiate?

Although traditionally the military officers are usual suspects in circumstances similar to what we face today, the army is nowhere to be seen. The Constitutional Court comes to mind when we discuss bargaining in the party closure context, but the judges insist they are behaving within the acceptable boundaries of law and reject claims that they are acting under pressure from outside. So the court is also not open to bargaining. Who else? Republican People's Party (CHP) leader Deniz Baykal? Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli? They are not in a position to deliver even if they bargain.That is the reason why the suggestions of the minister -- who still remains anonymous -- have not received any tangible feedback after he showed his party's willingness to bargain.

Did the AK Party understand, as I did, that the "powers that be" will never rest until they see it closed down?

A politician who is very prominent in party ranks disclosed to me secretly that they have discovered the real culprits behind the party closure case. What they are doing now is testing to see if their diagnosis is correct. They sound as if they still have suspicions as to the identity of their real adversary, although they are sure of who that may be. They have no intention of bargaining. They made their move to show people that they were ready to accommodate, without expecting any serious feedback.