14 minutes ago, TKDfella said:

If he has been convicted and served jail for a drugs related charge shouldn't that automatically disqualify him? Anyone here know the rules related to this?

The legibility is spelled out distinctively in the Constitution Section 101. Convicted felony is illegible. in his defence, he said he was acquitted twice for his drug case in Australia and murder of a gay man in Thailand and thus not convicted technically. Still he should not be appointed on ethical reasons. He was in the blacklist of influential people drawn up by the junta not long ago. It is a big bad mistake for Prayut to appoint him. It just smear and damage the image of the already battered cabinet as he is a bad bad character. 

A shaky coalition no doubt. Frictions will come from the 12 small and micro small parties that were squeezed out of the ministerial positions. Only 6 medium size parties and former NCPO ministers have positions. The government will be busy dispensing money for the populist policies that they campaigned. With the economy facing enormous headwinds, revenues will be hard to come by and support these policies. They will have to tax and that will affect the middle income segment that supported the junta and they will not be too happy with increasing tax. 

The Dem will not be happy that they didn’t secure the Finance portfolio which they need to activate their economic package to win back support for next election. They practically end up pretty bad to agreeing to the coalition. BJT will be relatively pleased and so is CTP who will be happy to pick up scraps. 

11 minutes ago, marcusarelus said:

I didn't know that the government was responsible for finding new markets.  All those Thai folks selling rice must be dumber than I thought.  

The Commerce Ministry through the Department of Foreign Trade organized trade delegation from both the public and private sectors to conduct trade negotiations, expand and find new markets. This is a normal and standard practice of ministries to help the private sector in all countries.

Lots to blame on the loss 5 years of incompetency governance and lack of efforts by the commerce and agriculture ministries to find new markets for rice. Too much dependent on our traditional markets while India expanded their markets in the middle east, Africa and into Europe. The previous junta has been seating on their hinds for too long and it has now come back to haunt their lack of marketing efforts.  

7 hours ago, webfact said:

Prayut will also double as Defence Minister,

Approval and procurement process for military toys smoothed out and will continue unabated. How appropriate for misappropriation.     

7 minutes ago, hotchilli said:

More cries from the north... shame they didn't have the sense to vote Prayut out !

Som nam na

With the Agriculture ministry under the Dem's hand, the rubber farmers will be their main focus as they shored up their support base in the South. Som nam na indeed.  

Thailand’s deputy PM Prawit Wongsuwon flies 100km in US$37 million police jet,

South China Morning Post

Another day of shame for Thailand international image. 

5 hours ago, webfact said:

"It's all about enforcement," he said. 

What exactly are the rules regarding zebra crossing? What about pedestrians who don't use zebra crossing? What are those rules. Anyone? 

2 hours ago, Bluespunk said:

Didn’t they try this five years ago?

 

https://amp.ft.com/content/cfe67f78-1885-11e4-933e-00144feabdc0

 

Doesn't seem to have been successful in maintaining rubber prices then, any reason it will now?

 

 

Wouldn't move the dial a bit in rubber price considering 20,000 tons out of 4.56 million tons of latex produced a year. Less than 1% of the total mix. Rather the government should negotiate with China to buy more rubber products. China used to buy more in the past but have switch to Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia. The government can also provide better incentives for more tire manufacturers to have their plants here. Many thing the government can do. Rubber for roads is miniscule effort to lift prices. 

2 hours ago, Duck J Butters said:

If your implication is that electing Trump was 2 steps backwards for the USA then you are grossly mistaken and do not understand why the American people put Trump in office. America currently suffers from the sickness of “cultural identity”. Everyone wants to be seen as special. Every group has to be “equal” to or preferably better than its neighbors and fights for their “special” rights. If anyone has something that someone else wants, this person is painted as a racist, sexist, elitist or worse. This divisive “me first” attitude is tearing the fabric of American culture apart and is causing it to self-destruct in a fireball of competing ideologies. Diversity has led, inexorably, to anarchy.

 

Enter mankind’s savior, the most useful idiot of all, Donald J. Trump. Not the sharpest tool in the shed but definitely:  right place, right time. The American people see that their country is collapsing, they see corrupt warmongering politicians with false promises and nothing ever changing, they understand that something drastic must be done to stop the liberal elites and Lugenpresse that are trying to globalize America and the world. 

 

People are sick of the media’s subservience to political correctness and the safe space culture that is further being enforced upon us by Silicon Valley’s “thought police” and social media juggernauts such as Mark Zuckerburg’s evil creation called Facebook. People see an America which has become dangerously totalitarian and not a whole lot different than Thailand or China. Freedom of thought is close to dead in America. It’s either "get in line" with the liberal agenda or be ostracized and out of a job. The future looks very Orwellian.

 

Trump was essential and it is imperative that he is elected again in 2020 or America, and likely the world, are all doomed. All empires eventually collapse but not without a fight. There is still hope for America and that is because of The Donald.

 

Sadly, a lot of people just don’t get it as they have been brainwashed by a lifetime of liberal indoctrination and soy-boyification. Donald J. Trump is one of the greatest things to have ever accidentally happened to the American people and he will go down in history as one of America’s greatest presidents. Perhaps even the savior of humanity. I genuinely believe this. Not trolling.

As a non American, I can’t fairly comment on your assessment of Donald Trump. However from an outsider view, perhaps you can help me understand why you think he is the greatest president when he ignore climate change, prefer the alliance of dictators rather than allies, decide on a personal trade crusade against China and throwing the world economic into a tailspin and tore the Iran agreement when other signatories see progress on the nuclear curtailment. He is promiscuous, lies a lot and make racist remarks which is how I see him. Am I wrong to make my assessment of him. 

2 ministers out even before the cabinet is royal endorsed. Looks like vacancy for tourism and labour ministers up for grabs again. Talk about a quick turnover for cabinet positions. More to come for sure. 

I am for raising wage but the timing can’t be worse when the economy is bad. You wouldn’t get productivity when the production output is curtailed by slowing revenues and rising costs. Policies will have to be included to medicate these issues. Grants and training for automation, reducing corporate tax, financial packages to encourage companies to seek more international markets and government equal efforts to negotiate more trade with non traditional markets. 

The increase in wage will not only assist the poor, it will also benefit domestic consumption. 

The Interior ministry is flushed with tax payer money in the budget; second only to education. Another dodgy procurement approval by Anupong among his other dodgy purchases like the GT200 and the airbus when he was army chief. I am sure he want the best for his Eastern Tiger's buddy. 

Don't expect much originality in their economy policies. Just copy from previous administration.  

Stimulus spending is fine but short term. The government should look at structural policies like reducing personal and corporate tax and also adjusting its budget especially reducing the defense expenditure. Start with selling Prawit's luxury 1.1 B Baht plane. Buy a Cessnar instead for about 60 M Baht.   

Even pro coup and former NLA member Somkid has no confidence in this government will last. Shocking but not unexpected. Rats are abandoning the sinking ship. 

My plead to the junta. Please don't beat him up like Ja New? ????

3 hours ago, TKDfella said:

What a ridiculous but dangerous, lot they are. The police should be protecting as part of their job and bringing the perpetrators to justice which is also part of their job.

And to think that last week I had to reply to a post (snoop1130) this way;

'...Expats cannot be in the front line because if they were you and all other expats would pay for that...'

If this is what happens to a Thai activist imagine what would happen to a foreigner? 

According to news source, it was alleged that Prawit asked Ja New to stop his activism activities if he want protection. Meanwhile the RTP visited 10 activists and told them to stop their activities if they want protection. This almost an admission that they staged the attack on Ja New and now threatening other activists with warning of impending attacks.  Thailand government ia using mafia tactics to stop dissent if this is true. 

1 hour ago, Baerboxer said:

he was recently released from a prison sentence he can't be elected as an MP. Mind, he doesn't need worry about elections in the UDD or Red shirt movement!

Recommended reading for you; the  constitution section 101 part 2 chapter 6. 

36 minutes ago, marcusarelus said:

Don't you all want the baht to drop in value?  Bad economy is the way.  

Tell you the truth. I don’t want baht to drop as I am an importer. And I also reduce my fuel costs. 

1 hour ago, bannork said:

They've got some new bogeymen and women now, the three leading lights of Future Forward Party.

They shouldn't need bogeymen or women to help their cause if they have good records of working for the people. They should be able to stand on their own on good policies alone. In fact, they need not cheat at the polls to have the people mandate. FFP has shown the way to in their first election to be a serious contender by just talking on good policies. 

5 minutes ago, Isaan sailor said:

So you now admit the the Thai Baht is under attack?  BoT holds high interest rates—and China dumps the $$ in...

No, the Baht is not under attack like in 1997 when we have a very low foreign reserves and a peg dollar.

BOT interest is lower than most ASEAN countries.

China will not dump USD treasuries as it will hurt them more from declining value.