AZBill

Sorry to say it, but you will find corruption in any government, anywhere in the World. Only more so in third world country's, where the law isn't enforced fairly and correctly.

jb1

What you say is true, but the issue is whether there is public tolerance for it. We have it in the US but it is not tolerated by the public and actively prosecuted when found. Tolerance of such corruption by the public is truly third world and is a big reason the Western world doesn't take Thailand seriously and sees it only as a country for cheap, easy sex. This is what the tourists take away from their visits and export back to their own country. Ask anyone in the US about Thailand and child prostitution and ladyboys are what most frequently comes up. What a legacy!

Game, set match for Thailand. If this is true then reform is not possible. The heart of a democracy is a government that serves the will of the people and those who serve are guardians of the public trust. If corruption is permitted and tolerated then all chances at democracy are lost. You get the government you deserve!

I guess the rest of the region just doesn't understand how important these "small willy" contests are to these two countries. Sooooooo much at stake! Sometimes losing face means gaining face. Of course try to explain that to a Thai - you make hurt head!!!!l

As I have said many times - LOS is just another third world country whose institutions survive on bribery and corruption - Mexico without the work ethic! Travel at your own risk ladies!

All this noise over 4 sq. kilometers! Negotiation is clearly a lost art.

The Great Democracy! Seems like Thailand's government doesn't understand how bad this makes Thailand look in the eyes of the civilized world. They just keep taking steps backward into thrid world status. I compare them to Mexico in countries that just dont get it.

This is so easy I'm not even going to bother!

If corruption was a reason for a coupe in Thailand there would be one every day! The truth is that Thais do not care about how corrupt their politicians are as they are culturized to accept it as business as usual. It doesn't matter who their leaders are or what party they are from they will all steal from the public coffers. This is a country where a successful campaign slogan would be: VOTE FOR ME! I NOT STEAL SO MUCH!

The only reason Obama is giving SE Asia the time of day is that he lived in Indonesia for a while and feels some connection to that area. The same is not true with respect to Thailand. He is notorious at cancelling these so called visits so I wouldn't get my hopes up. If he has a golf game or a basketball game come up Thailand will be off the itinerary. The bottom line is that Thailand does not have much to offer the US. We don't eat much rice and he has no affinity for the region here. The US has nothing against Thailand and sees it as a friend but only in the platonic sense. We learned our lesson from Vietnam so don't look for us to get involved in influencing any little pissing matches between Thailand and its neighbors or make any sort ofn major investment in Thailand's future unless the LOS can come up with some pretty big tea for the US to drink!. Farang not ting tong!

An expansionist power??? You're kidding right? Thailand is not a power of any kind in the view of the world. It's military spends more time using whatever power it has internally to preserve corruption and conducting coupes against elected governments they don't like. As for the pissing match with Cambodia, it's Lilliput vs. Blefusca! Petty petty petty!

Its interesting that complains were about young girls, not about being STILL open at 8am with loud music

I drive past there every morning 7.30-8.30 to take my dogs for a walk and they all still open.

So if i was a house owner next door or neighbor living next to them, i would be complaining of the all night noise rather then the young girls

You totally missed the plot.

its the drugs keeping them awake and oblivious of the time, take away the drugs they will all be in by midnite.

Hey we're talking Thai bar girls here! They wouldn't even wake up to get to the bar in the first place!

But this is the great democracy of SE Asia! A shining example to all those other corrupt and oppressive governments over here! Of course any of us that have actually lived in a democracy know that we view their claim to democracy as a very bad joke. Only the Thais are under the dilusion - not the rest of the civilized world. Of course no decent government operating on democratic ideals treats any part of their population like this. The Thai government is cronyism at its worst and I put it in the lowest tier of 3rd world backward governments. Until the Thai people demand better, they will never get better. We in the US fought a revolution for our democracy. I doubt such boldness will ever happen here. The only fights here occur between waring factions of the corrupt elite so same same! BTW - its so sweet the Thai government allows its own citizens to buy land and that some on this board compare these people to dogs. In a true democracy everyone has an equal opportunity - even us lowly farangs!. That is precisely why Thai claims to democracy are a complete joke to the rest of the world and we view their so-called elite as another joke where by our western standards even a middle class American has far more wealth than they pretend to have here in their "elite" class - farang all rich right? RIGHT!!!!!! And why is that? Because we come from a true democracy where we are rewarded for our efforts and not on how white our skin is! That kind of idiotic prejudice alone says it all! Note - the sun is actually good for you!

They're back. Oh joy.

Good luck but I think you are wasting your money - this is not an OJ Simpson deal - this is Thailand and Farang against Thai 'systems' won't work.

Well there is one system that works very well in Thailand for both Thai and foreigners and for the kind of money the friends are putting out they could inflict a high degree of permamnent justice on Kunh Fon and family, and probably the dirty cops who let her off! Would serve them all right and send a message to all these gold digging sluts and their worthless families that their sword indeed has a double edge!

How did they get past immigration? Seems a serious breach of security.

How does anybody get anything from the Thai government? Tea time in Phuket! Going to tick the mafia guys off who make their living selling fake passports if the security guys can be bought off so easily. I wonder what happens on the other end when they arrive wherever they are going? If not as corrupt as Thailand then could have some problems!

Wow, Thai complaining about working on a farm with low pay or no pay. I can see the no pay being a crime, but low pay that's standard for any migrant laborer in any country.

I never once seen Hmong or Vietnamese complain about low wages as they picked strawberries in California fields.

Next thing you know, Juan Valdez will be bitching about him getting low pay and extreme working conditions to pick each individual coffee bean for you and I to savior.

Mexican labors don't sue for low wages for picking grapes for your wine or Oranges, apples, vegetables, etc.

Just tell Thai. If you don't like it there, then point to the ocean and say, Thailand is that way, enjoy your swim.

A little harsh, but funny.

Very harsh and off point. Mexicans don't sue because they are typically illegally there and have no status to sue. There have been many Hispanic groups in the past that have brought many lawsuits on their behalf in California and elsewhere. It's also not the low wages, it's the entire fraud of luring them on false promises and the subsequent treatment here and not just the wages. It was a total scam to get these people to work for virtually nothing knowing they had no power to do much. Oooops! Wrong! Falang go jail now!. I've seen too much of this in AZ with the human smugglers and it's not pretty and no one deserves to be treated like that. I remember a few years ago the same kind of scam lured a bunch of Thai teachers to Lousiana where a similar treatment was awaiting them. Dispicable on any level. My father in law is a Thai farmer and I can't imagine allowing him to be treated like that.

Two points to make here.

First, it`s not the girl's fault, the blame and responsibility lays with the parents.

I know of 2 farangs that live near in my area who let their under aged children drive cars. One a girl aged 14 and another a girl aged 14. I once asked the Dad, why do you let your 14 year old daughter drive his car. He replied, oh, she is a good driver; I have no problems with that.

These parents are irresponsible and not taking into consideration of other peoples lives. They should be prosecuted regardless if the child has been involved in an accident or not.

Second, anyone who publishes their details and information about they're personal lives on social networking sites are idiots, pure and simple. They have brought on whatever abuse received on the Internet because they become addicted to social networking sites. The solution is simple, don't use them.

Not their fault??? You got to be kidding me? How do you know these parents are irresponsible? Have you ever raised a teenage girl? They can be the most vile little creatures on earth to one another no matter what a parent tries to do. The biggest problem in the US is that no one wants to place responsibility where it belongs - on the stupid girls! Always looking for an excuse for behavior these girls are quite old enough to understand. Having raised a daughter I can attest to this. Serves the little beeatches right. Same crap going on with this nut that just shot my congresswomean in Arizona! It's talk radio's fault iyt's Palin's fault, blah blah blah. It's the nut's fault plain and simple. But no! We are always looking to absolve the perp of responsibility. We have an entire generation of kids that don't feel any responsibility for anything because our society says they shouldn't and it's their parent's fault and not theirs. That is a big reason why we are going down the drain as a country and why I'm learning Chinese. Thai is too freakin hard!

Well if you want to kill tourism just start cracking down on the availability of Cialis and Viagra! Mai di ma di

We have two similar hate groups in America as well. We call them Congress and the media!

Just goes to show that there are some races that aren't worth winning.

I have no statistics on this, but doubt criminal cases against 17-or-less old children committed by farang are only a very minor part of all crimes against children. Most is 'Thai only' business. Mind you the new curfew is also meant to combat crimes by children.

PS to be sure, in no way do I want to defend 'sick-minded' farang, neither sick-minded Thai.

I hate it when I make a mistake like this. I hope all understand 'doubt ... are only a very minor part' should be 'doubt ... are more than a very minor part'

Sexual crime against minors by Caucasian men be it in Thailand or in western countries is widely documented. It is not very difficult to find the information to validate my statement. Anyone can simply google it on the internet, e.g, the recent case in the UK: http://www.bbc.co.uk...hester-12143586 It is no wonder that kids in the west are scared to venture out on their own be it during the day or in the evening. If these men were not so perverted they would not spend their money travelling all over the world to abuse minors. The notoriety of male farangs in Thailand is widely discussed and there is nothing you people can do to alter the locals' negative perception. I don't doubt that there are some Thai men who are sick-minded, yet I don't see them going abroad like a lot of their Caucasian counterparts do - to carry out these heinous acts against children. And if they did, they would be punished severely. I find it utterly hypocritical of farangs to keep lecturing the locals about their sexual morality when they seem to have no problem breaching their own code of ethics.

Where is this" widely documented?" Yes there is abuse all over the world. As there are far more people who live in the "West" than in Thailand there will certainly be a larger number of incidences worldwide involving westerners. You dont see Thai men coming to the west to commit these acts because most cannot afford to travel and most cannot even obtain visas to countries like the US, UK and Australia without great difficulty. Anyway, why should they travel when they can get what they want at home without threat of any meaningful enforcement. You site one case in the west. I'll cite one to you then - my wife was raped by a Thai man in her village when she was 14. Unfortunately I cant give you a court citation because the man was never prosecuted despite everyone knowing who he was and what he did. So why would Thai men go abroad and face meaningful prosecution when they can get away with rape with impunity right at home. I dare say farang do not get away with such behavior even in Thailand, nor should they. The difference between the west and Thailand (and Asia in general) is that in the west there is usually meaningful enforcement against a rapist or abuser. In Thailand enforcement against a local is a farce and used primarily against foriegners. So it would only make sense that in a country where women are viewed as second class citizens whose main role is to take care of their male counterparts, and sexual abuse is not prosecuted, they would suffer more abuse from the local men as there are simply more of them. While sexual abuse cannot be condoned by anyone, it is not the farangs who created a society that fosters and tolerates this kind of abuse.But you must blame the west because as we all know, face saving is far more important than facing the truth in the LOS.

Going to be very quiet on Nana and Cowboy

This is going to be very interesting. My bet is that absolutely nothing will change and these bars will be permitted to continue their sexual exploitation of young children as they have always done. I hope I am wrong and I would be thrilled if I were. On its face, this is the kind of law that needed to be passed, but more importantly enforced! Would be a nice change but I tend to live in the real world.

There is nothing wrong with counterfeit goods. It's good competition for the real goods, helping force the legitimate goods' prices lower.

Exactly! Police should go after real crooks, the violent kind.

Like the Police!

Has this writer paid any attention to how his government is run???? When you have one of the most blatantly corrupt political systems in the world and everyone knows it, how can you be suprised it's such a risk? Why you all allow it? I have no idea! This stuff isn't tolerated in the modern world!

It's Christmas for the wives, kids and girlfriends of these cops