“As Erdoğan has moved ever more assuredly toward dictatorship, he has also pulled Turkey—a member of nato and historically the Islamic world’s strongest secular state—away from the West.” Dexter Filkins on terrorism, Erdoğan’s latest moves, and the end of democracy in Turkey.

+ “Madelyn, it appears, is part of a vast and effective ‘keyboard army’ that Duterte and his backers have mobilized to silence dissenters and create the illusion that he enjoys widespread public support.” TNR’s Sean Williams on Rodrigo Duterte’s army of online trolls and how authoritarian regimes are winning the social media wars. (This is a major trend.)