mfd101

The next 9 months will be fascinating. Make or break time for Thailand.

No, this is PTP policy not Anutin's.

The same way they do in every poor country - continuing to work long after Westerners have 'retired' on pension or super, and sharing within the large extended family. In my b/f's village - some 5000 people - just about everyone is 'cousin of Yong' (my MIL 5 yrs older than me). The peasants don't have a concept of 'work' and struggling up the ladder and retiring ... They just have a way of life that hasn't changed much for a hundred years since the (pseudo-)ending of slavery & serfdom here. But modern technology (TV & mobile) is opening their eyes, as demonstrated by the way the votes went in May ...

He may be 'known' to the masses for his fairly one-eyed political activism & social criticism, but he will be remembered in history for his linguistic theories, from his 1956 start thru to the constant zigging & zagging by the 1990s as his theories at last received the serious criticisms they merited. Meanwhile Linguistics has moved on to other things, along with semiotics.

Chomskyan linguistics does seem to have faded away in to the twilight over the last 20 or 30 years.

But for now PTP is allied with the dinosaurs ...

Unlikely. You'll have to wait for MFP to come to power, which is anything from 9 months to 4 years away.

Given his state of health as reported (assuming it's not exaggerated for convenience), it's not impossible that his days are numbered & he just wanted to come home to die on the Bosom of the Sacred Mother.

Will be interesting to see how the Constitutional Court & the Electoral Commission behave - over time - under (so to speak) new management ... I wonder how many opportunities are coming along over, say, the next 2 years for new appointments to either.

Change your will to read 'XYZ, also known as ABC'? (or whatever your UK and/or Thai lawyers suggest).

No, it's a Shakespearean tragedy dressed out (typically) with comic interludes. There has to be 5 acts.

That's (probably) why there'll be either an early election or (perhaps more likely) another military coup.

We shall see. This morning he certainly looked like master of the situation: police saluting him, homage to the King, hugs and waves for his followers ... The news clips could scarcely have been bettered. The Big Man returns. Even if it takes 2 weeks before he's out of clink, he still makes the dinosaurs look like the very little men they really are.

In Usofa life expectancy is falling ...

Well, as for the poor people (Khmer peasants) amongst whom I live, there is no retirement (though thanks to Thaksin there is now a very modest old age monthly income from the government). That's of course the reason why poor people have so many children, to look after them once they're too old to fend for themselves.

You've missed my point but not appropriate to discuss further.

Which was rather my point.

That doesn't explain why higher prices are a threat to farmers.

His words aren't all he'll have to eat in the coming days and weeks and months.

He's supposed to be arriving at 0900, so by the time you need to head out to the airport he'll either be ensconced in the PM's residence or in prison. Either way you'll be safe to leave. Though perhaps not to return.

Not the same. Far from it, but depending on circumstances.

You'll be delighted when you see Thaksin get the vote for PM. Followed by a triumphant procession to The Palace for the benediction. ????

And what's the drill for Yingluck? Is she arriving too? Will she too get a luxury suite at the Hilton?

There's no reconciliation between mafias. Just convenience.

Hope you're right on the first item, but the record so far is that the EC & the CC will between them find some ridiculous excuse to do the dirty on MFP. They don't need either logic or good legal argument ... Fingers crossed. On the second item, just as MFP is the largest single party in the HofR but still in a minority, so in government the PTP will be the largest single party but in a minority both in the HofR and - I'm guessing - maybe in the Cabinet room too. Not sure how that latter point would pan out. In a Western nation the Cabinet generally works by consensus and not by actual vote, and - while the PM is greatly influential - he or she is not a dictator within the Party room or Cabinet. But in Thailand ...