In Turkey, a fire inside a coal mine near the Aegean town of Soma trapped and killed 301 workers. Five Turkish labor unions called for a strike to protest the deterioration of safety conditions following the privatization of state-run mines a decade ago, and prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan delivered a speech to the relatives of dead and injured workers in which he described mining accidents as “ordinary things” and listed similar occurrences in other countries, starting with Victorian England. Four executives of Soma Coal Mining Company were arrested, an aide to the prime minister kicked a protester who was being held down by security forces, and Erdogan was recorded threatening a demonstrator. “What happened, happened,” he said. “If you boo the country’s prime minister, you get slapped.”

I thought that needed to be read. Some background -- from Time, for irony's sake.