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I'm amazed this news attracted just 2 comments so far.

Where's the anti-Thaksin brigade ?

LaoPo

Because news like this usually make no sense. And lo and behold - this one doesn't either.

The original story was discussed months ago, there's nothing new apart from EC postponing the report.

Oh, and this article is about EC rulings, why is it a "double standard OF Democrats"? I can't find any reason in the article for the thread title.

Where does it say that those 44 MPs are even Democrats?

If there is one thing that would be good for the country, it would be that the entire population submit a statement that they will not tolerate any more military coups and that they have been proven to not be the answer to delivering the systems or prosperity that the country needs.

Ahh, but this has nothing to do with coups and it's not the generals who stand in the way of country's prosperity (but it's human nature to look for scapegoats).

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For prosperity the country needs a strong and long lasting government, able to put all the factions in line, effectively shut down all the opposition and create an image of selfless dedication.

"Democracy" simply wouldn't work at this stage, only in the long run, when people are finally united by common understanding, common values and common ideals. Don't see that happening in Thailand any time soon.

To bring "prosperity" the coup makers were far too gentle to succede and Thaksin was too selfish to last.

Spoken like a true 30's facist.

Or you could find more recent examples, from Chili under Pinochet, to Singapore or China, or post-Soviet Russia.

There's no prosperity without strong and stable government, and democracy takes a longer time to produce that than a dictatorship.

And yes, that's what Thaksin was trying to create - strong government, steamrolling over any opposition.

That explains your avatar, h90.

If there is one thing that would be good for the country, it would be that the entire population submit a statement that they will not tolerate any more military coups and that they have been proven to not be the answer to delivering the systems or prosperity that the country needs.

Ahh, but this has nothing to do with coups and it's not the generals who stand in the way of country's prosperity (but it's human nature to look for scapegoats).

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For prosperity the country needs a strong and long lasting government, able to put all the factions in line, effectively shut down all the opposition and create an image of selfless dedication.

"Democracy" simply wouldn't work at this stage, only in the long run, when people are finally united by common understanding, common values and common ideals. Don't see that happening in Thailand any time soon.

To bring "prosperity" the coup makers were far too gentle to succede and Thaksin was too selfish to last.

Abhisit might spend a day or two delibirating what could possibly happen, come up with nothing, and simply forward the petition to the nearest recycling shop. Reds knew very fuc_king well that if the petitition ends with government they stand no chance.

Abhisit is not going to score any brownies with them by disposing the petition via proper legal channels either.

So why bother?

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Ok, he might request Justice Ministry to set some official committee, start confirming the signatures to find if any of Thaksin's relatives signed it, spend two months on it, then come up with some other explanation - like Thaksin should be serving his sentence to be eligible for pardon. They might even take it to the court, or Council of State or whatever.

Reds apparently had no plan B whatsoever.

Nation reports they postponed the submission to exactly match delayed reading of rubber verdict. Maybe reds were hoping for blue shirts to start some trouble. Nothing happened. And they were left there like total morons who arrived too late and had no purpose for hanging around.

It seems people are more interested in discussing the mechanism of how thaivisa brings the news.

Not at all, we are interested in how much credibility we should lend John Le Fevre. We don't spend so much time [anymore] discussing credibility of The Nation or any other sources, but John is different - he is new and his articles are posted under Thaivisa News banner, which is an unknown entity yet.

We are not asking him to disclose his sources, just show how he obtained his information. His partial reply wasn't fully satisfactory, at least to me.

Lao Po, do you mean to say there isn't really an outbreak in this prison because it hasn't been reported anywhere outside this single article?

The "author" says that two people died already - how many people must be infected for two fatalities? Two hundred, judging by average death rate?

It all comes down to the credibility of the source. It's a bloody headache trying to figure out which part of the story could be true, which has some ground in reality and which is total <deleted>. Not with my six year old intellegence anyway. The story has changed many hands before it reached the board, too. Inmates aren't allowed to send e-mails, are they? Somebody did it for him. Not to mention the gossip nature of inside prison communication, it could have been corrupted beyond recognition even before it reached the "author".

..majority of posters on this thread who, in my opinion, not liking what has been said, have sought to sling mud and discredit him to attempt to divert the conversation away from what is actually being said.

I don't think "we" are slinging mud. Forgive us of being sceptical regarding news sources and media in general at this point in Thai development, and it's actually author's job to establish his credibility.

I think I know where the problem lies here.

Normally we assign some sort of "credibility index" to any news or source we come across and it depends on many factors. Friends and personal acquaintances, professional media outlets, rumors, government announcements, previous history - it all matters and we usually process this in milliseconds and unconsciously.

If the news has official appearance we tend to put it into "official" category, and that's where the main problem with John lies - his article is presented here at a level normally associated with "official" sources. It's not entirely his fault, btw.

So now we have this credibility gap between what we personally ascribe to John and how it appears on TV, this gap creates tensions as both sides tends to pull the others closer to their level and meet with resistance.

Nothing to worry, eventually we will negotiate a common understanding - either by agreeing on a common credibility level for John Le Fevre articles, or leaving the argument altogether as unproductive - like fighting over which color media is better.

Pandemic (H1N1) or pandemic A(H1N1) is the official name for the virus as ascribed to it by the worlds peak medical body, the World Health Organization - not influenza, not flu 2009, not swine flu or anything else.

Generally speaking "pandemic" is a status level, not a name of a virus, but what do we, six year olds, know?

What's the status inside the prison? Is there really an "outbreak" or is it just a couple of isolated cases? Is the virus simply "active", or has it really "hit"?

The headline goes for the maximum impact.

This thread is about petition being thrown out if it reaches the government.

FIDF land, background of AEC members, or junta issued laws does not belong here and there's no connection whatsoever.

Well actually there is a common thread here, however much you protest.

What is the connection then? Why don't you mention it so I don't have to ask for clarifications?

Injustice towards Thaksin is mentioned only briefly in the patition, and the King has no constitutional power to overrule court verdicts, so Thaksin will never be declared not-guilty. What's the point of arguing his innocence here?

The govt will throw the petition out for totally different reasons anyway.

And yes, I sense that people will continue to try and divert the topic regardless of my protests.

Newin is not afraid of spending sometime in jail, if it earns him a lot of political capital. That would also mean he burned all the bridges with Thaksin and throws him a challenge.

That might soudn impossible - but he really has no choice, has he?

He might also get a pardon for TRT dissolution case. Then he might call for elections, with Somkid at his side.

This thread is about petition being thrown out if it reaches the government.

FIDF land, background of AEC members, or junta issued laws does not belong here and there's no connection whatsoever.

It's all confusing.

Gary Jones' site claims that masks were handed out as a reaction to the story but the story claims there was a policy to provide masks already, with farangs being charged 100 baht.

More importantly - is there pandemic at Bang Kwang prison or not? The article title "Pandemic A(H1N1) active.." is ambiguius - is pandemic a description of the virus or description of what's going on inside the prison?

Any real news organisation would have editors and sub-editors to double check the wording. Is it on oversight by Thai Visa News or by John? Or is it intentional?

What's this FIDF thing doing in this thread?

Anyway, the court ruled 6-3 that Thaksin had authority over FIDF.

THe rest could be continued in appropriate threads where these arguments were raised ages ago.

How many replies do you get when you demand CNN or even websites such as TMZ reveal their sources or explain how they got a story?

You can't possibly compare CNN to john Le Fevre.

So far we have no clue as to John professional history, standards, journalistic ethics or integrity. Members have been feeling gaps with their own suggestions, like he's getting info from tweets. I, personally, think he's got a lot of friends who supply him with "facts". When nothing else is coming he simply rephrases news reports from other sources, like almost word for word sentences in a story about possible coup that I've seen in the Nation. It would be interesting if John's version appeared first!

Orac,

Yes, this is indeed what John said on the first page of this thread:

"The information on people being intimidated and told to meet signature quotas came from talking to civil servants employed in the north and northeast of Thailand. Other events are reported from having spoken to and in some cases obtained written accounts of events from eyewitnesses to those events."

Later I asked how many civil servants he really interviewed. In the article itself there's a phrase "most notably" - implying that people were interviewed in other parts of the country as well but it's North and Norht East that were worthy of note.

My point is - did he really interview enough civil servants nationwide to make generalisations like that? For a one man project it seems like a lot footwork done in a very short time, as he contributes new article almost every day. It would be acceptable while commenting on a result of some polling agency survey, but one man effort? I seriously doubt it.

My other question was about "reports are filtering out" - does he really employ professional people in various parts of the country that report back to him on whatever happens? I understand having friends in Chayaphoom that post on his tweeter page, but that doesn't qualify as "reports".

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I don't know what Thaivisa News really is. Is it a licensed body? Member of any professional media organisation? Does it have enough credibility itself to present John as a journalist? Outside Thaivisa news, is John a real journalist?

Can I also call myself a doctor and go practice medicine and administer aspirin and sensual massages and check for information on the Internet?

You seem to have taken the position that, because of his political beliefs/affiliations...

No, not at all, I'm not arguing the content, just presentation methods. Next time we might be confronted with a completely made up story (even this one hasn't been corraborated yet).

Moreover - I welcome an insight into the red angle. It is under reported in English language media and most of the time we have only general idea what they are talking about. Koo sometimes tells us what's going on there but it's still not enough.

The Petition date was chosen because it is a lucky day in the Buddhist calendar, it is only coincidence Mr newin and co..

Yeah, right.

They pushed the date back several times.

At one point it coincided with anniversary of Communist party kicking off armed strauggle against Thai state.

Well, if the Office of His Majesty's Principal Private Secretary indeed needs governemnt's endorsement of this petition - what do you expect the govt will say?

Wow, the twisting of what's actually been said is unbelievable.

The government or anybody else has NOT said that the petition "needs the government's support"

The government in fact has no other option that to follow the appropriate laws on this matter which are very clear and very specific.

Here's a quote from the OP again:

"Abhisit said Thaksin himself or his family must be the petitioners. He said normally the Office of His Majesty's Principal Private Secretary would seek the government's opinion about the petition and if the government believed the petition did not conform to the criteria, it could dismiss it on the grounds of legality."

What exactly have I twisted? I said "if indeed it needs govt endorsement". Abhisit says "normally" the Office "would seek" govt opinion, and he said what the govt would do in this particular case.

What do you think would be the outcome of govt following appropriate laws other than dismissal?

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Another poster said the petition is perfectly legal without any support for this claim. Consitution says "The King can grant a pardon" but it does not give people the right to petition the King directly and if the petition does not reach the King, there's nothing they can do. It would be perfectly legal for any of the responsible agencies to turn it down on any of the procedural steps.

There's a chance that it would be passed straight through. That would also be legal, I suppose, but I don't think it would really happen. That would be a real "coup", a real big surprise.

We shall see tomorrow.

Well, if the Office of His Majesty's Principal Private Secretary indeed needs governemnt's endorsement of this petition - what do you expect the govt will say?

Good point. John doesn't post his articles himself.

George posts them just as he does with any other news. In those case he is not endorising content in any way.

I guess it means we should judge John's articles on their own merit and on his own history, just as with any other news source.

There's no point in asking him - where did you get this? Or what does "reports are filtering out" mean?

That's just how he operates. His friends of red political persuasion send him tweets and e-mails and he regurgitates them into news articles, trying to fool the public into believing that they have any factual basis or reliability.

I'm sure he trusts his sources, as any other poster who starts with "I heard from my friends at the bar...". It's just in John's presentation it comes as "face to face interviews", and tweets come as "reports are filtering out".

Farc IS a terrorist organisation, in the US and most of the West. But in Thailand? I don't think there is that kind of official list the court can refer to.

The court han'ts been asked to rule on whether dealing with Farc would consitutite terrorist activity, Farc was not on trial there.

Surely the contract between the public and the media in this case is Thai Visa members (public) and Thai Visa management (media). If Thai Visa is now choosing to portray itself as a news provider then it must take responsibilty for what is being posted in its name as this article is clearly posted as 'news' as opposed to an opinion piece.

The only contract between us, users, and Thaivisa is the service agreement. We sign for (free) discussion board, not for news services. The unwritten contract between media and the public is backed up by things like laws (media can be sued for misinformation), peer reviews (professional associations might take notice of public dissatisfaction), and the fact that we pay for the services and can withdraw out patronage.

With a backup and accountability like that the traditional media can claim some status, some credibility. Can it be equally extended to John Le Fever and Thaivisa without any provisions or obligations on their part as a news provider? So far we don't even have gentleman's word as far as this new venture is concerned. Has this John character been properly introduced by Thaivisa management?

What should we make of him?

Should we take his articles as news and facts? Or is he just one of the seventy thousands of members posting his opinions and unverified rumors, but with the privilege to masquerade it as truth?

Mario has reminded us several times:

- post facts, not rumours and try to substantiate the facts that you present

Can't we, users, expect the same from John, the news provider?

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John doesn't owe us anything, btw, but he doesn't post in vacuum, there IS a relationship between the writer and the readers. I hope it's important to him.

It seems that the people looking to squash this story as unfounded aren't bothering to read the posts.

No, not at all. We just want to know what the story is founded on exactly.

We want to know what professional standards does this journalist follow? Is he a member of any accredited journalist organization, or is he self-proclaimed "journalist"? Who among real, professional journalists can vouch for his credibility? Who will take responsibility if he goes off the rails?

There's a contract between the public and the media - we put certain amount of trust in the media, and the media is accountable for what it reports to us. Where does John Le Fevre fit in this? Is he accountable in any way?

Until all that can be settled to OUR satisfaction, we will treat his "news" on their own merit - someone somewhere has probably said something, or it could have been a hoax from the start.