mfd101

Never mind. At least now the whole world has Donald Trump, the greatest hero since George Washington crossed the Rubicon to defeat Alexander the Great.

Golda Meir said she was a Palestinian and held a Palestinian p/p until 1948 ...

Oh rilly? I had no idea.

So, where's Yasser Arafat when we need him? (if only for entertainment value). Offer him 99% of what he wants and he'll turn it down ...

Childish overreactions on both sides make finding liveable long-term compromises for peace all the more difficult.

The next 12 months on the Left Bank and the Right Bank will be fascinating. Make or break time. For all of which we can thank Yasser Arafat some 30+ years ago. The man who could never say Yes.

A step on the road to improving relations with Thailand ...

Parties vs Leaders. Interesting, particularly in the case of PP. What will PP's reaction be over time? noting the fascists' legal tightrope it always has to walk.

And the one prisoner who could conceivably lead Palestinians forward to live peacefully alongside the Israelis in a two-state solution - namely Marwan Barghouti - remains rotting away in an Israeli prison. The one Palestinian the Israeli right, including Netanyahu, truly fear. Funny that.

Expect the next 12 months taken up with campaigning for the next round.

"The war is over". Well, it's been 'over' many times since 1948. And, as many times before, a 'new' version of the '2-state solution' is to be tried. It will fail like the previous almost-attempts. It no longer seems to occur to anyone that the only possible solution is a 1-state solution with peoples of all ethnic & religious origins of the region living together in harmony in a modern democratic state with equal rights for all (as partly & imperfectly already exists in Israel). I don't expect to see that happen in my lifetime ...

Hope so. Meantime China trying to walk both sides of the road at once ... Won't work. Will have to choose sooner or later.

Yes, and I don't think any sensible person (including me) was waiting for permission. The difference in prices is too blatant to be ignored.

And he is himself a shining light of probity for us all to follow.

I wonder which dreambook the AI dug that out of ...

Yes, just like in Usofa. And many other countries as well.

Well, that's all very well. Problem is there's about 5000 or 10000 or 20000 other rich Thais who could be described in the same terms ... But nothing happens to them.

Motor vehicles used to be good. But that was way back when. I remember Kuwaiti military telling me (early 1990s) that they would always buy Aussie vehicles (Holden & Ford) rather than the Yank tanks for life under the desert sun. The Aussie cars just kept on keeping on, while the Yank tanks broke down after 5 minutes.

And, in a very different context, Little Red Bull doesn't need to be 'found' & extradited from wherever. The Thai Army has highly trained um experts in removing awkward people from - shall we say - harm's way.

Same here in Thailand. In rural areas mostly. And why is that? Because people haven't been educated about how lightning strikes anything that stands out from the surrounding area - eg a peasant working in the middle of a large paddy field, or taking shelter from the storm by standing under a tall tree at the edge of the paddy field. And their houses are not grounded ...

So it's true that English isn't your first language.

Yes, what with Africans, Arabs, Palestinians, Indians, Chinese, Mexicans and now Cambodians I don't know what the world is coming to. There were certainly none of those people about when I was a child some 70 years ago. It's just been all downhill.

With an election coming up early next year, the discovery of this young man's ineligibility to stand for election or to lead any political party will soon be announced. He's TOO YOUNG! He's TOO WELL EDUCATED! He BELIEVES IN DEMOCRACY! He's poor but HE DOESN'T WANT TO SELL HIMSELF TO BECOME RICH! HIS GRANDDAD FOUGHT ALONGSIDE THE JAPANESE! ... Any number of possibilities.

Meanwhile, looking on the bright side, I guess that, for those of us who survive The Great Flood of 2048, at least the baht will fall.

The difference between these youngsters & us oldies is that, because of modern technology, the temptations and opportunities are now way beyond anything we faced at that age.