roquefort

Oh yes it is.

.....and produce some loaves and fishes while you're at it.

RFK Jr.

Utter nonsense. That's equivalent to saying no-one should ever be able to sell inherited property.

Be careful with Emirates. They bumped me off a pre-booked business class seat down to economy in DBX, due to 'overbooking'. Vowed never to fly with them again.

That's exactly what we're talking about and why western democracy is a sham. We're allowed a meaningless vote every 4 or 5 years to lull us into thinking we have some choice over how the country is run. The technocracy then completely ignores our wishes and carries on with its own agenda, regardless of the people's vote. Did anyone vote for Net Zero or half a million net immigration every year? Re Singapore, an example of marginal freedoms is freedom of the press. This used to exist in the UK, even though the mainstream media (including the BBC) was largely controlled by a small elite, all shades of opinion were tolerated and editorial freedom was sacrosanct. Now alternative views are suppressed by both MSM and social media platforms under the guise of 'disinformation'. Singapore has never made any secret of what can be published and what can't, there is a red line and everyone understands where it is and accepts it as a trade-off for the other benefits the government provides - prosperity, security and institutions that work,

Totally agree. The UK, like other western 'democracies', is becoming more authoritarian by the day. Witness the debanking scandal (which is much wider than Nigel Farage by the way), where faceless bank bureaucrats can make someone a non-person just because they don't like their opinions, or the censorship of any views which contradict the official narrative on Covid 1984, climate change, Ukraine etc etc. A benign dictatorship like Singapore, where the people give up marginal freedoms in exchange for prosperity, no corruption and a well-managed economy is preferable to a pseudo democracy like Thailand, where corruption is rampant and most of the country's wealth is controlled by an all-powerful elite.

Potential shock......? The only person shocked by this seems to be Mr O'Connor of the Thai Examiner. This outcome has been obvious since the election results were announced.

For once I completely agree with you. If you read Jon Krakauer's 'Into Thin Air', a great account of the 1996 disaster when a dozen climbers died, you'll see that one woman was totally unsuited to take on such a challenge but the expedition company took her money anyway. Another was on his third attempt and because his guide (Rob Hall) knew that the client had set his heart on reaching the summit, he went on against his better judgement instead of turning back when conditions got too rough. They both died. Money distorts everything. If someone wants to put their own life on the line, that's up to them. But endangering the lives of guides and sherpas who accompany them for financial reasons is another matter.

Not to mention Barra International (!) at No.2 - landing on a beach in the Hebrides, and Lukla at No.5 - landing on a 100yd strip hacked out of the side of a mountain at 8,000 ft up in the Himalayas! By comparison Don Mueang is a walk in the park.

What a sad life some people must lead if that's their main concern.

Collar up on Polo Shirt - Why? Why not?

Seems like a sensible policy. Play one side off against the other and keep some leverage over both. Why should Thailand be forced to align itself with one side or the other? It should do what is in its own best interests.

Or obsession.

That's a good point. You can find evidence for almost any conclusion you want to come to. Science itself is not settled, as some would have you believe. At the end of the day you have to sift through all the evidence and make up your own mind. That will be your version of the truth.

No-one decides, you have to make up your own mind. The truth is out there, we have more information available to us than at any time in history. Seek and ye shall find.

Isn't that an oxymoron?

10.8. What's yours?

Thanks for the recommendation. The book is from 1998, the year I first came to Thailand, but I'm sure most of its content still applies. Very little seems to have changed in the intervening 25 years.

If you know anything about golf you'll know LIV is entertainment, not sport.

Tech behemoths and moral responsibility. An oxymoron if ever I heard one.

The UN has no power to change the laws of a member country. It can't even fulfill it's principal mandate which is to prevent wars.

They couldn't know, although the article suggests the allied governments knew the risk and were prepared to sacrifice those men to the war effort.

There were many instances of POW transports, known as hellships, being sunk by allied forces. The ships were not marked as carrying prisoners, no red crosses or other identification so were considered legitimate targets. https://www.warhistoryonline.com/instant-articles/allies-killed-20000-countrymen-sank-japanese-hell-ships-transported-m.html?chrome=1

As the OP said, it's all over her passport. Do you think they're not going to notice?