15Peter20

"Very much like most internal political impasses and divisions, it's not something that foreigners can come in and magically fix, said the U.S. authorities."

Yeah, cos the US never does that do they?

Sure to be a big hit at Tops and Villa.

There is no shortage of cheap food in Thailand. There is however an over abundance of cheap people.

And I'm sure all those cheap people (there are millions) love you just as much as you love them.

Absolutely nothing the government does will please the 80/20* on this forum. Once a person's mind is made up there is no room for the possibility of anything running contrary to their beliefs and posting on TV just becomes an exercise in reinforcing their own views. Surely once they are convinced, nothing can contradict that, right?

The government has doubtless screwed up on some policies - don't they all? - but does that mean it is impossible for them to get the odd thing right now and then? Balance and objectivity are indeed scarce in this forum.

* 80% of posts made by 20% of posters

Good to see the government can still carry out some business despite the current problems. Not completely crippled, then.

This obviously will hurt the Red Shirts propping up Pea Thai, but lets not forget that the main thing the Red Shirts want is the elected party to stay in power, not so much the Prime Minister in particular. After all, during the last successfully held election, people were voting along party lines more than along traditionally held 'cult of personality' lines. People who despised the Dems for their links with the army and its meddling in Thai politics voted PT even if they weren't fully paid up (!?) members of the Shin fan club.

So Yingluck's out. A body blow for PT and the Reds but they will not see this as the tipping point for a 'call to arms' because as anti-Thaksinistas will shortly find out, uppermost in their minds was not the retention of the Shinawatra clan in power, but the retention of an elected government. The sh&t will not hit the fan as far as they are concerned until the actual legally elected government is kicked out. Then there will be a violent backlash, and it would be understandable.

Hang on, I hear the rabid anti-Thaksinistas cry, if the reds just supported the retention of an elected government, would they kick up (or at least threaten to kick up) such a fuss if the elected government was of a Dem persuasion? The facile answer would be 'why not wait and see?'. But that could take a long time. The more salient answer would be 'No, but they wouldn't question the outcome of an election'. Think I'm wrong? Why? They never have before.

I don't think YL will be convicted tomorrow either. The CC would not dare, even if guilty. The Red Shirts will cry foul and step things up quite a lot.

The NACC will not find her guilty either.

This is not to stay that she is not guilty. I just find it hard to believe that she will be allowed fall and the country will be plunged into deeper chaos.

Don't you worry about the red shirts, the anti-gov side and the army are well prepared for anything coming from that rabble.

You seem to think there are millions of red shirt activists.... No way, maybe 200 to 300 at best and they will be crushed within days if they even as much as attempt any violent backlash against the courts.

The UDD will not call an uprising either, that is all just bluff and bluster, they know they will all be rounded up and this time they will be lucky if they ever see freedom ever again.

It lacks sophistication as spin, but is nevertheless a cracking good bit of old fashioned propaganda. Well done!

Celebrating failure. How odd.

Any thoughts/ideas, apart from those above, on places to go in Northern Thailand that are cooler than Chiang Mai at this time of year, and fun to visit/stay?

I understand that temps generally reduce by 0.7C for every 100 metres above sea level which may be one reason why Mae Hong Son has been suggested but if the city is in the valley maybe it is no cooler than Chiang mai, even though the surrounding peaks will be cooler.

All ideas welcome, especially if based on recent personal experience....

Well, you said all ideas welcome....at the back of Huay Tung Tao not far from the golden statue of the snake with loads of heads at the foot of the mountain, walk down the road around the lake clockwise for about 50-100 metres and turn left onto a narrow trail. It is fairly flat as it runs parallel to the road for a short while but then take a left turn and head up the side of the mountain in a generally west-northwesterly direction. Jump over an artificial water channel and maybe one or two small dried up streams until you hit a noticeably larger stream (not sure but probably dried up too now), then stick to the path that runs beside it up the mountain. Entire journey would take about an hour if you're fit. Longer with breaks. You will eventually hit a kind of mini valley. Usually there is a waterfall there the sound of which usually helps you find it, but maybe not right now if its dried up.

Anyway, at that place it is always AT LEAST 10 degrees cooler than the surrounding areas. When I was last there, covered in sweat from my exertions, I couldn't even stay too long. It was like being in a massive fridge. A fridge with exotic trees, not much sky and a waterfall.

I was driving on the superhighway eastwards a couple of weeks ago and just before Lanna Hospital on the same side I spotted a small clinic so parked up on an impulse and went in to get a health certificate (for driving license renewal).

Sitting at the front desk were two old boys - one looking inebriated - and a young girl. No one else was in view. I told the girl what I wanted. She got out a rather crude photocopied standard health certificate form, copied my name from my passport onto it, got one of the old boys to sign it, and put a stamp on it. The cost was 50Bt, it took less than five minutes. Nothing else happened.

It's so hilarious to read opinion of some TV poster... When is the "other" side, they are violent assassins, when it could be "their" side, is just a cover up of the "other" side.

Hilarious, and pathetic.

Yeah, I love the way seajae invents a 'probable' scenario from thin air that just happens to reinforce his own hatred of the reds. To wit:

"Someone was probably playing with his pistol out the front and it went off so they decided to make it look like an attack, these idiots are pathetic..."

Classic fanatical behavior. There must be a name for this technique - so many frothers from both sides use it. Anyone know what its called?

This lot sound even more stupid than the PTP.

This is no more than a red shirt splinter group.

There will never be an elimination of disparity between the poor and the normal.

social polarization will always produce political polarization and the very fact that there will never be a Thailand that is fully educated to a suitable standard, then this will never be cured. The northerners have proved that they adapt to education and mental stability a human adapting to life on Mars.

Thaksin wants to keep the northern masses uneducated and ignorant.

Even if a government came to power that forced everyone in the north to take on board a free and high quality education, they would waste it with their ignorant northern 'Thainess' ways.... Thainess and intelligent row different boats in different directions.... period.

It would take about 100 years to educate the Thainess out of the people so that intelligence and logic can reign in this country and only then there will still be political polarization.... same as the UK.

It is what it is.

"There will never be an elimination of disparity between the poor and the normal."

I think this sentence tells the casual reader all they need to know about you and your approach to humanity. I would normally attribute such a comment to a total scumbag so would respectfully ask you to reconsider it and rephrase in case it was typed in haste. Otherwise, your credibility as a serious poster has been shot once and for all as far as I'm concerned.

PS - In case you're wondering, I'm referring to your contrast between 'poor' and 'normal'.

Shows how easily private militia can be assembled in the absence of a strong police force.

With 42 parties I'm wondering if we'll see the Thai equivalent of Screaming Lord Sutch bring a bit of colour to the proceedings.

You see how all things even themselves out in the end? If the track wasn't so crap the engine may not have derailed on the bend and could have gone on to cause far worse damage, and potentially death. Chalk one up for the negligence of the SRT!

What with it suddenly being open season in the courts against the government and its supporters, I can entirely understand this shyster's actions.

I'm currently thinking about suing the government myself - for just 10 million, mind, I'm not that greedy - as I fell down an uncovered manhole the other day. Reckon I got a chance.

i think he's in a better place than in front of a monitor, commenting on things he knows little about. RIP Hellodolly.

I thought the role of the EC focused on the validity and organization of elections. The clue is in the name - ELECTION Commission. But so far we've had them weighing in on issues having nothing to do with elections and now they're setting up meetings with the army. 'Mission creep' would be putting it very politely. They are clearly a bunch of tools but the question is, who is using them?

Suthip

An Individual that is offering free food and drink to a band of Prozac driven individuals who enjoy Music.....A likeness to the The Pied Piper of Hamelin. This guy is systematically ruining Thailand and his supporters are somewhat brainwashed. His organisation is somewhat like a cult that needs to be disbanded. His comments earlier in the Bangkok Post regarding seizing people's assets and getting people to report to him bare a striking resemblance to Hitlers speech at the start of World War II

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Agree - that is scary, but this evening I came across something even more chilling - on Blue Sky TV last night we could witness that (quite fit, admittedly) heiress to the Beer Chang (and others) Empire reading out on stage letters from children who had decided that enough was enough with Thaksin and his ilk. One prepubescent child had apparently donated about 500 baht and wondered why 'the red shirts can't see the truth'. I sh!t you not.

Ahh, a new holder of the perception management playbook.

It's all been said a million times before and refuted a million times before. Get a new play book with some new lines.

By the way, why / how have the one million poor unpaid farmers been silenced?

By the way, what has the paymaster or the fake pm ever said (in 10 plus years) in terms of policies, or actions, which would gain a much better quality of life for a very large % of ALL Thais through their own productivity.

By the way, I've asked G'kid the same questions many times. He never responds, I guess that means he has no answers.

Reform before elections.

What question have you asked? You have 3 "by the ways" in your statement such that whatever it is you are asking, it is difficult to comprehend.

The forum has argued the programs of the former PM Thaksin ad nauseum. Do we really need a rehash? You and your friends refuse to acknowledge any of the positive programs or policies of the former Thaksin government. You will focus on the current handful of farmer suicides, but won't acknowledge that the largest decrease in farmer suicides occurred during the Thaksin period and that the current rate is consistent with that of the past 5 years. You raise the issue of corruption. No one has ever denied that there was corruption during the Thaksin period. However, you and your friends refuse to acknowledge that it was a continuation of a behaviour one saw in the previous dictatorships, and was repeated by the military junta and the Abhisit regime. It is a reflection of Thai social customs and behaviour. Under the Thaksin model, the people benefiting were more likely to be outside the junta and democrat party strongholds of the southern triangle of corruption and this has rubbed the former beneficiaries the wrong way.

You are all for the current judiciary and its rulings, but you refuse to even acknowledge that the people making the decisions were appointed by the former military dictatorship and/or Abhisit regime. The judiciary's independence is questionable. All of the above contribute to the presence of the UDD.

How can one have an intelligent discussion if you and others wish to assign two colours to everything; Black and white, when we all know that Thailand is distinguished by a broad range of shades of grey? You still don't understand that the UDD was an umbrella group that represented multiple views. There are factions in the UDD that loathe Thaksin and if the opportunity arose, would shove him under the proverbial bus. The relationship between the UDD and the PTP is one of political convenience, and is far less close than the relationship was between PAD and the democrat party at the height of PAD activity. The PDRC organizers and financial backers are for the most part lifted out of Suthep's former political organization back when he was the key organizer and fundraiser for the party. No one in the UDD has either that potent influence or power

Despite what you claim, the UDD operates in large part by consensus and reflects the social divisions that exist between the people of Surin, Ubon, Udon, Chiang Mai etc. You and others see the UDD as a homogeneous group, but it is not. Because of the UDD characteristics, the leader isn't so much as a leader as a consensus builder who must then shout above the regional voices to let everyone know where they are going.

You fall back on the insulting of Jatuporn because it is the easiest thing to do. Never under estimate the man as he is street smart, and has a good sense of what's in the minds and hearts of the UDD support base. The same applies to Suthep, These are guys who have built support and organizations from the ground up. Jatuporn is far more in tune with the people than is Thaksin. The same for Suthep in comparison to Abhisit. Yet both are used by the political parties to which they are affiliated. Jatuporn scares and intimidates many TVFers. They have never met him. Jatuporn is quick with a warm smile and a handshake like a vice grip. Unlike many Thais, he's mastered the art of looking a foreigner in the eye and talking in manner that is to the point, and that conveys determination. Perhaps some TVFers don't like him because he's not willing to play the role of the effeminate subservient bar boy or service trade worker forced to kiss people's buttocks in order to keep a minimum wage job.

You and others in TVF make the assumption of many foreigners that Thailand's political "leaders" are omnipotent. They are not. When the time or circumstances are right, Thaksin will be abandoned by his people. He is being used, just as Jatuporn and the UDD are being used, just as the PDRC is being used and just as Abhisit's continued presence is tolerated by the backroom of the party. This is why Thaksin relies so heavily on family. In Thailand, loyalties change on a baht, and only a family member can bring "loyalty", which even then can waver. This is how it works in Asia, and how it has always worked. Power relies on family, then village connection & long time friendships s and their relatives. It is why the PTP has such staying power, and why Suthep has it too. One could argue that the Suthep power base structure shares many of the same characteristics of the Thaksin powerbase structure. The Abhisit Bangkok urban power model does not. It relies on force by the military and by appointments of backers and beneficiaries into key societal managerial roles like the judiciary. The future of Thailand is more of Suthep and Thaksin style "leaders" until such time as the quasi feudal style of life changes.

GK - thanks so much for this. Totally agree. Hope the extent to which you share you views is not limited to this yellow ghetto, where they are pretty much wasted.