mfd101

I should have thought that shoppers/consumers everywhere in the world look first at price, second at quality/performance and - if at all - national origin a distant third.

2.1 is the minimal reproduction rate ie it maintains a population at its current level. But, at some 8 billion people, the world shows economic & environmental signs that this is way beyond what it can sustain. And - for a range of cultural and environmental reasons - the world's population is slowly turning towards a steady downturn throughout the second half of this century. This will create all sorts of management & economic problems but they are not insoluble (AI anyone?) and, if managed sensibly, the world should be a better place ecologically at the end of the century and beyond.

A good thing too. Thai culture & politics is unable to look after the current 70 or 80 million citizens. Perhaps they'll do better with 30 or 40 million, though the transition of the workforce will test government administrative & economic skills to the limit throughout the rest of this century. As with many other countries. My MIL here - aged around 80 or 81 - has had some 11 children in 3 marriages. Enuff orready!

Well, if I were Usofan I wouldn 't have voted for Trump, but I expect he won't be much different from the last time round - poor at diplomacy (yawn), inelegant in the extreme (oh dear!), and good at frightening people (useful). In sum, though he looks awful, he's likely to make no more appalling mistakes than most of his predecessors.

When Richard Dawkins speaks up on this subject, I pay attention. He says that the question about whether there is intelligent life elsewhere in the cosmos or multiverse isn't worth discussing. It's a certainty. If intelligent life can develop on earth after almost 3.8 billion years of earth's existence, it can certainly develop on other similar planets elsewhere in the cosmos that have the requisite chemistry (water, oxygen, hydrogen etc) & are billions of years older than Earth. To think we are alone in the cosmos is childishly self-centred. The key is long-term environmental stability on any given planet.

It was the NAB that closed down my 2 accounts & would not accept my 'Reason B'. I had to get a TIN here in Surin then wait a couple of weeks more till they were satisfied & reopened my accounts. It is possible that I may not have helped myself by pointing out to the bank that sending me threatening letters with deadlines via snail-mail to rural Thailand was not a sign of an efficient & effective organisation ... There have been others here on AN who say they have had the same experience.

Given the choices available at the time, the Isaan boys - from poverty-stricken backgrounds - made a perfectly sensible choice.

"Mr Hart stresses that Thai financial laws have not changed and states that “most” foreigners who are tax residents are ill-advised to request a TIN number from their local TRD. Although the video does not elaborate on “most”, it appears to include those resident in Thailand for at least 180 days in 2024 who are dependent on pensions pre-taxed in their first country. It is this large, mainly retiree group which has attracted the greatest attention." What Mr Hart appears not to know or understand is that at least some expats (eg Australians) have been forced by their home banks - under threat of having their bank accounts closed - to get and record in Oz their TIN. All based on the perfectly legitimate & sensible international agreements on sharing financial/taxation information with the aim of reducing international tax evasion.

Worth a try. What might make a real difference would be appropriate education & training for conscripts and junior soldiers (Corporals, Sergeants, Lieutenants) ie the cannon fodder required for a coup to be effective. I remember my b/f saying that, when he was a conscript a few years ago (c2010), the officers came around telling the conscripts how to vote in a national election "but we Isaan boys weren't fools, we all voted for Thaksin."

If hydrogen takes off, EVs may prove a losing gambit. Both for car owners & for Thailand.

Well, given a choice between Yingluck and the Prayut/Prawit band of pseudo-military thugs with their cooked Constitution & tied-up rules, I think I would prefer Yingluck any day - both as a human being and as a political leader. Fascinating how obsessive some Shinawat haters here are.

Noone knows, least of all the RTP.

China forcing The West to lift its productivity game ... And soon Elon Musk will have the US government humming along, perhaps even GM & Ford as well!

Making rude & defiant gestures with their near-naked and tatooed bodies. Good grief! what's next? How am I going to cope in my old age?

The thing about government employees is that (mostly) they have 'permanency' which means they can't be sacked short of criminal activity. So you have to either BRIBE them to take early retirement or COMPENSATE them for the abolition of their position in the bureaucracy. All of which costs a LOT more money to achieve. Only a year or 3 later do your costs start to come down. And if there's a strong union movement and relevant affiliations (ie not in Usofa), then it's even harder & even more expensive ...

That sounds like CCP bull.

The problem with the 'Surrender Immediately' guys above is that, on that basis the Russians could go all the way to Portugal without anyone lifting a finger to stop them. All Putin has to do is growl loudly and everyone surrenders. Then Xi could walk in to Taiwan, not to mention Laos, Vietnam , Cambodia & Thailand ...

Everywhere in democracies people get to vote for or against other people aspiring to become members of the Parliament. And everywhere people complain in wildly exaggerated terms about the results of their own free votes ...

Turkey is moving steadily up the economic & technology ladders.

At 75 I'm hoping to see it before I make it to 105.

One of the (extremely few) benefits of Brexit is that the UK can now wriggle its own way through the US & EU & Chinese swamps. Will be fascinating to watch.

When you put a whole lot of colourful people in a room together, there's bound to be splash marks on the walls afterwards.

2 vaxes, both before the first occurrence of infection.

Never mind, the Peruvians probably thought she was just one of the flunkies ...

My experience of having had it twice (first in the middle of the worldwide flood, second as it was diminishing) was that the first time was 48 hours of not much, 2nd time was 2 weeks of flu-like symptoms and 6 months of lethargy afterwards. I think others have had similar experience. Like dengue, it gets worse not less each time you catch it.