DeepInTheForest

From a strategic standpoint, doesn't seem well thought-out. One would think it would almost guarantee cracks in the monolith. Certainly everybody in the bus can't be in favor of this.

"History repeats itself, the first time as tragedy, the second as farce."

Tulsathit, I often find your opinions worthwhile. However, this piece is one of the more muddled things I have read from The Nation, and that's saying something.

What is your point here? Yes, I get that good deeds should not be done for the sake of publicity or in selfish hopes of reward. That's not what happened.

All societies that I know of occasionally recognize altruistic behavior. This is because they are concerned with preserving it. If unrecognized, it may disappear...

I'm pretty sure that homemade rifles owned by poor villagers are less of a menace to public safety than the factory-produced automatic weapons which are not uncommon in the region.

I wonder how long it will take the villagers to make some new ones...

not long ago there was a fire at a plastic recycling plant in samut prakarn and now at a tanning factory that stored paints and thinners could there be a connection do we have an arsonist on the loose or just a coincidence?

What is especially worrisome is that both plastics and leather tanning plants have substances that are, or can be, carcinogenic.

We all know that burning plastics produces dioxins, which are extremely carcinogenic.

The leather tanning process involves vast quantities of chromium, acids, natrium, and ammonium salts. Chromium, in some of its compound forms, is a known carcinogen.

http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/1651375/toxic_chemicals_used_for_leather_production_poisoning_indias_tannery_workers.html

Somewhat obviously, the force of global capital pushes these costs of production and 'collateral damage' onto the local populace, wherever the plant's location is.

Is there anyone else who harbors doubts as to whether this was an accident?

SEZs provide land, infrastructure, tax breaks and financial incentives to corporations in what is usually a tariff-free area, which means additional increased profits for corporations. So much for "free" trade and "competition".

They favor those with connections, and make it more difficult for governments to collect taxes on businesses, which have traditionally been a source of spending on social services. Another case of the rich getting richer.

They are a prime example of economic neoliberalism. When tax revenues fall, countries (that are often strapped in debt) will be forced to sell off their valuable state-owned assets-- again to private corporations.

So it goes in our world these days.

I don't believe his story, he is protecting someone, why take it across the border when there is a huge market in Thailand

Not to belabor the obvious, but this system called capitalism that we toil under, whether we are criminal or law-abiding, is based on the notion of compound growth, for which expanding markets are a temporary fix. Ultimately, of course, compound growth is an impossibility. But as yet, we seemingly cannot allow ourselves to admit that.

I didn't think this airport was too bad but their visa on arrival process is awful and I would never use again. Still waiting for them to exempt the USA from need to apply for visa.

"Still waiting for them to exempt the USA from need to apply for visa."

Because of all the USA has done for them, I presume...

After reading the posts, I'm getting worried about the humans who collect coconuts. Climbing forty or more trees a day would scare the living daylights out of me. Do they use a harness to prevent falls?

Kudos to Mr. Ubonjinda. His unselfish act was compelling, and caused me to stop and think what I would have done.

I also hope that fame is kind. Sometimes sudden fame can be difficult to navigate. May that not be true in this case.

"I don't know if I'll get back in the cage. We'll see, maybe. One step at a time," Mr. Goudie said.

Mr. Goudie, please stay out of that tiger cage!!

“The goal is reform. I don’t care about the investigation or the results that the DNP will eventually reveal,” said Thon Thamrongnawasawat, a member of the National Reform Council (NRC), who will be taking up his post in Phi Phi within the next three weeks.

Somehow I don't think anyone is going to be held responsible here...

If the park only has four officers, you would think it would be relatively straightforward to figure out who was responsible for boodling the missing money.

(sigh)

There are immense profits to be taken in these large infrastructure projects. Which is why, no matter how awful an idea they are, they keep being proposed. Large capital feels that eventually they will push something through, by hook or deception. The price of a sustainable healthy society is continuous civic vigilance.

Thai PBS (Public Broadcasting Service) is the only really independent public broadcasting system in Thailand. All the other public broadcasting stations are either controlled by the military (Channel 5) or by the government. It is financed by the governmenty with no strings attached. It has no soaps and no advertisments. It's programming is the best of all stations, really public-minded and interesting subjects with sometimes daring programs as the one with Sulak Sivaraksa about Article 112. It is the only Thai television station I ever look at.

In the past year the military has warned Thai PBS to be 'more objective'. A reporter was suspended when she asked a group of normal ('grassroot') citizens about what they thought and felt concerning the junta.

He who controls the media controls the discourse! Thanks, kareona, for reminding us of recent events in this succinct summary. Although it is difficult to draw conclusions at this stage, media are always highly contested in the modern state. It would be difficult not to believe there is some power politics involved. In more developed countries the same games go on as well with so-called "public" media, which by this point have often been thoroughly co-opted by private or state interests.

I always like it when a certifiable war criminal shakes hands with a military coup leader and then touts democracy...

... while the TPP is being bulldozed through via a secret process, and the US military is bombing hospitals without being held accountable.

this is what your governments were doing while you were celebrating gay marriage in the states and changing your facebook profile picture to a rainbow filter.

Do I smell some anti-gay bigotry?

Yes, and a stupid straw-man argument. What in the world the struggle for the right to marry has to do with the trans-Pacific trade deal is beyond me.

After five years of secret talks, the twelve countries involved in the TPP negotiations reached an agreement. The deal was written by corrupt trade ministers and hundreds of corporate lobbyists without public (or even US Congressional) input. It is much more than a trade deal-- only 5 of the 29 chapters even deal with trade. The rest of the deal is about privatizing government programs and services for corporate profits, removing government regulations, and setting protections for multinational corporations and investors rather than the health of the planet or necessities of people. The TPP is a corporate power grab that impacts every aspect of people's lives. If passed, it would take away environmental and food safety protections, increase US development of fracked gas and tar sands for export, lower wages and worker protections around the world, increase human trafficking, end what we have left of internet freedom, inhibit access to lifesaving medicine by extending patent rights to big pharmaceutical companies, spur further financial deregulation, increase land grabs of indigenous territory, and more. The TPP would destroy the BDS movement, end buy-local and buy-America provisions, nullify any UN climate agreement, and set up rigged tribunals (that supersede even the US Supreme Court) for corporations to sue governments that pass laws or regulations that hurt their bottom line. The middle/working class, poor people, women, the lgbtq community, and people of color will be most impacted. The US Trade Representative's Office should not have the ability to create binding laws that harm the public in so many ways. In fact, it is illegal. As Dr. Margaret Flowers explains, the TPP, TTIP, and TiSA are treaties, not "trade agreements." She says that "avoiding the designation of treaty means that Congress can avoid stricter requirements for oversight and passage and instead rush the agreements through Congress using a process called Fast Track." The TPP is about more than any of these "issues." The TPP, along with two other treaties being negotiated, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and the Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA), are essential tools of US empire and would be backed up by the US military. All three of these deals must be stopped so that we can begin to create the new world we so desperately need.

Definitely not saying you are wrong, but have you actually read this 29 chapter trade deal ?

Could you provide a link so we can read what it says. Thanks.

If only that were possible, Ulic.

The text of the agreement is secret, which is perhaps its most infuriating and ominous feature.

The negotiations have gone on for five years. No one except the 500 core corporate negotiators has been able to have access to the text. Even the US Congress, which passed a fast-track bill-- which means that the US Congress has only yes-or-no input on any trade agreement for the next five years -- has at this time only limited access to the text. For most of the years of negotiation, the Congress, like the rest of the world, has been entirely in the dark.

You might ask yourself what kind of trade agreement will be created by 500 corporate officials. If we think that such a body will produce a result that will be in the interests of the common person, well, we are kidding ourselves. There is no committee that represents the public in terms of protecting the environment, labor rights, or even human rights. Civil groups, civil society, the average citizen are entirely shut out. Assurances are always given. In my view, sgtsabai is entirely on target with his post. One of the most odious clauses that may be included deals with the right of corporations to sue national governments if their access to profits is impacted by legislation. You can imagine what this might lead to-- a mining company may be able to override environmental concerns of citizens, GMO foods may be foisted on a country that doesn't wish to allow them in, etc. Again, we have no real idea what the wording of the agreement says.

What we do know of the TPP comes only from leaks. Wikileaks has published several docs since 2013, including the chapter on intellectual property rights. (However, there are something like 26 chapters to the agreement, and the leaks comprise only a small portion.)

https://wikileaks.org/tpp/

Interestingly, the US's biggest ally in the TPP negotiations, as of 2013, was Australia. https://wikileaks.org/US-Australia-isolated-in-TPP.html

There is a chapter on environment, but it appears to be a fig leaf-- there are no provisions for meaningful enforcement. https://wikileaks.org/tpp-enviro/pressrelease.html

Wikileaks also provides a text of this chapter; you can find it on their website.

NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement which gutted the Mexican rural economy and is often fingered as being responsible for the rise of the drug cartels, was similarly passed under the aegis of fast-track in December 1993 and began operation on January 1, 1994.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Free_Trade_Agreement#Negotiation_and_U.S._ratification

Jane Kelsey talks about the tribunals that will rule on trade matters in the link below.

Why is there even a conscription program from a military perspective?

You make a good point. Mandatory conscription made the military vastly unpopular in many developed countries. So they jettisoned it. Other ways have been found to coerce young people to becoming willing servants, murderous pawns, and cannon fodder of the global military-industrial assemblage.

Pretend for a minute that you are in charge and are running the show. What could you do to get a more pliable pool of volunteers for the armed forces? Well, for instance, you could increase unemployment by adjusting monetary policy. That would tend to make people a little more inclined to enlist. Or you could cut social services to low-income groups, leaving young people desperate to escape their situation. You can also cut taxes on the wealthy while increasing the tax burden on the poor, again creating a vast pool of the 'precariat'. You could also gut grants and scholarships for higher education, or simply make the cost of higher ed astronomical, so that few could afford it. You could also, of course, pass laws to chop the legs off the labor movement, so that real wages fall even as productivity and profits reach new heights. You could also offshore jobs to countries where wages are much less, but the labor pool is vast, thereby increasing the number of wage workers globally by 2 billion in thirty years. You could begin military programs in the schools, to inculcate "national values" and military culture into youth at a very young age, when they cannot begin to imagine another way of viewing the world. You could also propagandize endlessly the virtues of the military as defender of the nation, using advertising, appearances at sporting events, endorsements by famous persons, etc.

Or, crazy as it sounds, you could do all of the above. And you would enjoy the added benefit of rising capital accumulation by a select few.

Of course, if a country is poor enough, and the supply of unemployed youth is large enough, things quickly become rather simple. India, for example, has never had conscription, yet its military is one of the largest in the world.

One would imagine that the Thai military could someday adopt the path of least resistance (and maximum coercion) and simply do away with compulsory service.

Read at your peril. This is fact-based, or attempts to be.

A 2012 report by researchers at the World Bank found that the "benefits far exceed the costs" concerning the Thai Village and Urban Revolving Fund (VRF), which was started in 2001. (This was during the administration of you-know-who, and it was enormously popular among working Thai people, which has accounted for a good deal of lasting popularity of you-know-who.)

Households showed the greatest rise in income when VRF loans were combined with loans from the Bank of Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives (BAAC). The paper thus recommended the continuation of both programs rather than discontinuing aid provided by the BAAC.

It was initially envisioned that the program would benefit small business almost exclusively. (The village fund is the second-largest microcredit program in the world.) Instead, small farmers also accounted for a great deal of the borrowing, partly because the short term of the loans fit their needs to purchase planting supplies for the growing season.

By 2002 village fund committees had been set up in 92% of Thai villages. The committees were allowed some discretion in setting interest rates, maximum loan amounts, and terms of loans. Some required or encouraged deposits as a prerequisite to lending. The committees process loan applications, loans are repaid with interest. The value of village fund loans remained steady from 2006-2012, even without cash infusion from the government. The report stated that the funds go disproportionately to the poor, and "do not appear to be subject to elite capture". The village committees don't actually handle the money; they pass on the loan approval to the Government Savings Bank (in urban areas) and the BAAC (rural areas). A borrower must open an account at either bank (a minimum amount of 100 baht) in order to receive the loan, which is deposited to their account. Committees were formed at meetings where at least 75% of the village was present; a committee is comprised of around 15 members, half of whom must be women.

Currently, 75% of the village funds (59,800 out of 79,200) are rated grade A or B, and qualify for additional injections of government funds. Transparency is the main criteria for grading the funds.

The remaining funds (lower than B grade) are being considered for the injections of one million baht (made in 3 installments) from the government, but a push is being made for forcing compliance to transparency rules and standards.

High household debt, a drought, global recession, and low farm prices are contributing factors to difficulties in the rural economy. The funds have 13 million members and cash flows of 200 billion baht. Delinquent loans total 2 billion baht.

A previous post in this forum pointed out that the non-poor are more highly indebted than the poor in Thailand (42% for the poor; 58% for non-poor).

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/852573-thai-opinion-the-unfortunate-link-between-purchasing-power-and-indebtedness/

(Some of the latter info comes from the Website That Shall Not Be Linked To. Most info presented here comes from the links below.)

http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2012/03/15933309/appraising-thailand-village-fund

http://www-wds.worldbank.org/servlet/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2009/07/21/000158349_20090721132749/Rendered/PDF/WPS5011.pdf

Lastly, it bears pointing out that global capital, faced with declining profit rates, has pushed a program of credit in order to boost consumption. This is no accident, and is a global phenomenon. The average UK household, for example, will exceed 10,000 pounds in debt by the end of 2016. Also, loans were sometimes used in Thailand for education and health expenses, rather than revenue-producing investment. This is perhaps unfortunate, but it is also understandable from a human perspective.

http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/mar/23/average-uk-household-owe-10000-debt-by-end-2016

This rain making is just a procedure, it results in nothing , has contributed nothing and is a waste of time and money , all because someone with great power and influence said decades ago, it would be a good idea, that folks is the reason today for cloud seeding, as we know any country that has drought problems would be using it , OZ in the 70's tried it and it was a scientific failure..

It is possible, proven fact demonstrated back in the 1950s and now done in Algeria in a project called "greening the dessert"

BUT as the technologie is rather cheap and based on Dr. Wilhelm Reich we are not supposed to know anything about it.

Google it and be amazed on what's possible with the right technology !!!

Okay, I googled it. Boy oh boy, are we ever delving into the arcane on this forum. An unkind person might say 'loopy'. You're referring to Wilhelm Reich, the Austrian psychotherapist who had a theory of "orgone energy". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Reich It would seem to be quite a long journey from psychotherapy to rainmaking, but hold on, we'll get there. Reich's idea was that this energy permeates the universe, from sub-cellular right on up to galaxies. Yep, according to Dr. Reich, galaxies are just huge clouds of orgone energy. Not surprisingly, by the way, according to the theory, this energy found its expression in the human in the form of-- you guessed it-- sex. One surmises there could be a whole lotta clouds of orgone swamping a certain SE Asian country, but I digress. Neurosis could be cured by releasing energy trapped in the body via the release of a powerful, uninhibited orgasm. Ahem.

Reich fled Germany in the 30s because of the persecution of Jewish people, and settled in the northeastern US, in Maine. http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Reich His psychoanalytic work, which he called 'character analysis' (as distinct from Freudian psychoanalysis), was done before his increasingly obsessive interest in the orgone side of things. It became hugely influential in psychotherapy circles, and indeed its influence extends to this day. According to wikipedia, schools of practice such as Gestalt therapy, bioenergetic analysis, primal therapy, and body psychotherapy owe a debt to him.

Reich believed that orgone energy could be harnessed not only in medical treatments, but also technical applications. Hence the development of cannons, called 'cloudbusters' that could supposedly fire orgone to produce rain. The idea was that the cannon would draw the orgone energy out of the clouds, producing precipitation. You couldn't make this up.

Cannons were actually produced, and Reich performed experiments using them in a research effort he referred to as "cosmic orgone engineering". The cloudbuster boasts its own wikipedia entry: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloudbuster . It's can't-miss, check it out.

His story ended unhappily. The US government prosecuted him for fraud (there were 'orgone accumulators' being sold around the country for human use), and he died in prison shortly before he was eligible for parole. For more on him and his incredible life and theories (and we haven't even mentioned the Kate Bush connection), by all means google, as brain150 suggests.

No idea whether the cloudbuster has been tried yet in Thailand, but if we gave the pride-of-the-UK GT200's a go, well... why not. If there's orgone energy anywhere, it's probably to be found here.

We humans are a wondrously varied bunch, aren't we?

Environmentalists are constantly targeted in the neoliberal world, because they often advocate for indigenous groups and threaten profits. Here is another example... He took on the mining interests, always a dangerous move. Don't know enough about him to judge the purity of his motives, but he seemed to be well-intentioned.

http://bulatlat.com/main/2011/01/24/palawan-environmentalist-and-broadcaster-shot-dead/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerry_Ortega

He also promoted 'sustainable ecotourism', whatever that phrase means.

A quote touting projects: “All of these are the projects of the community-based sustainable tourism where the support is the community and 100 percent of the profits go to the community. All of the employees, managers, and all of the workers are from the community.” The wikipedia entry cites five different eco-projects he backed-- snorkeling, a zip line, firefly watching among them.

He left five children and a wife. Condolences to them.

The fine equates to roughly the retail cost of each vehicle.....ouch.

Do you think if it were GM the punishment would have been so server...

VW $18 Billion

GM $0.9 Billion for cover up of faulty switch that have been attributed to over 100 deaths...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-34276419

18 billion dollars....I think they may consider appealing for the next 20 years instead. Has to be cheaper. And by that time, none of the cars will still be around.

VW has a HUGE assembly plant in Mexico that has been there 40-50 years

very few of the VWs on the showroom floor are German made ,

I will say that if VW figured this out , that there is a good chance that other Auto companies are also doing the same thing.

18 Billion is a crazy number , it will give the courts something to do for the few years !

$18 billion? If only.

You are all assuming the fine has been assessed. Not sure that's the case. As I read the OP, the figure quoted is the maximum possible allowed. A reasonable assumption would be that when the fine is announced and finalized, it will be nowhere near the $18 billion quoted.

Makes for a good headline, though.

A diplomat, a man of letters, an immensely prolific author, and a promoter of cultural exchange between Thailand and Vietnam. Twice was elected head of the Writers' Association of Thailand. His works have regrettably not been translated very widely into English. Perhaps the best example of his work in English is in a collection of stories about Thai women called "The Lioness in Bloom", translated by Susan Fulop Kepner. The Prabhassorn story contained therein is "Deaf Sim", an unflinching look at the difficult life of an ordinary Thai person. The story, a small gem, manages to be unsentimental yet very humane at the same time-- simply superb writing. This collection, incidentally, is a treasure; readers would do well to track it down.

His literary work included editing and writing the introduction of the Thai translation of Nguyen Nhat Anh’s ‘Cho Toi Xin Mot Ve Di Tuoi Tho’, or "Give Me a Ticket Back to Childhood". In 2013 he traveled to Vietnam to help promote the release of a collection of Thai and Vietnamese poems and short stories called "Lotus Blooms in the Stream and Literature".

Thai literature has not been translated very often into English. That is a shame. Unlike the earlier comment here suggests, there are many notable Thai authors and artists, for the most part unknown to the West. Readers may wish to look for the work of Wat Wanlayankul, Dok Mai Sot, Kampoon Boontawee, Sri Dao Ruang, Krisna Asoksin, and Ussiri Dhammachoti. There are of course many others, exploring many and varied themes of Thai life that would resonate with those who have experienced Thailand. By reading a country's fiction, we can become more deeply aware of its currents and characteristics, its quirks and its charms, and its darker sides and brighter qualities. It's worth the time and the trip. Such authors put lie to the trope often expressed here that Thai culture is moribund.

Khun Prabhassorn, thanks for your estimable contributions to human culture... and for the inspiration you provide.

So will people be given re-education classes if they criticize China now also?

Nobody has been 're-educated' for criticism. I have seen many articles criticising the Junta in the press and none of them resulted in anyone being 'taken in'. The only offence I have heard anyone be taken in for is attempting to promote division in society which may incite red-shirts to more violence. They have stated this quite openly so people are in no doubt before they do it (except tact demands they don't mention red-shirts directly).

Why do you people keep spreading this lie ?.

"... none of them resulted in anyone being 'taken in'."

In my view, you truly are either living in a bubble, or in the grips of a delusional state.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/14/thai-junta-detains-journalist-pravit-rojanaphruk

http://www.bbc.co.uk/monitoring/thai-media-under-the-junta-a-politicsfree-zone

http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-thai-junta-vs-the-press-1436918817