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Samui Bodoh

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Posts posted by Samui Bodoh

  1. 4 hours ago, wwest5829 said:

    Yes, ugly but ugly is not the issue. Replacement of containers with biodegradable materials, sufficient waste containers along the beach and then the littering fines would go a long way toward helping the issue of human waste.

    Respectfully, the post above may assist in your beautifying your neighbourhood (slightly), but in terms of dealing with the issue it is woefully inadequate. The only element of value is the movement towards containers with more biodegradable materials; that is a good thing.

     

    As my user name might suggest, I am quite familiar with Koh Samui as well as being very familiar with the situation on Bali. These two islands share a common problem with regards to waste management, namely Governance. Bad, terrible Governance. Truly, really awful, Governance.

     

    The basic problem for Bali is that huge amounts of waste have been simply tossed into the sea for years and years and years (not only from Bali itself) and at certain times of the year when the currents and wind are going in the correct direction, it is "out of sight, out of mind". Unfortunately for Bali's tourism industry, not to mention the country of Indonesia and humanity itself, at other times of year the waste is pushed ashore on the different islands resulting in the vile, disgusting mess noted in the photo above. The core issue here is that waste is dumped rather than treated, and as the waste is not treated properly it simply comes back more disgusting and gross than when it left.

     

    On Koh Samui, the problem is a little different. The island actually had (has?) a good incinerator to properly deal with the huge amount of garbage generated by a mass tourism industry, but it broke down... 5 years ago? (I forget the exact time) and hasn't been repaired. The end result of that breakdown and the lack of repair(s) has meant that for the last five years or so, Koh Samui has simply been piling its ever-increasing garbage on to semi-secluded sites and... er... ahem... hoping for some kind of miracle to deal with it? Sorry, I do not know what the authorities expected to happen, so I can't really comment. BTW, it is a similar story on Koh Tao, but it seems like someone accidentally set the dump on fire; perhaps a resident of KT could expand on the story. This is not to say that nothing has happened on either Bali or Koh Samui; there actually have been some efforts and actions taken to deal with the issue, but to be blunt, not nearly enough. Both islands have made serious efforts to reduce the amount of waste generated and I think both have actually achieved some results, just not enough of them.

     

    The core issue here is one of Governance. Reduced to its most simple form, if you are going to have a mass tourism industry, that industry is going to produce huge amounts of waste and that waste needs to be dealt with.

     

    That is an issue for government.

     

    And it isn't being dealt with properly.

     

    Government(s) in Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, and elsewhere; if you want to make money off of mass tourism, build/maintain and/or upgrade facilities to deal with the effects. 

     

    Or...

     

    Suffer catastrophic environmental damage and the (eventual) loss of the industry.

     

     

    • Like 1
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  2. 1 hour ago, webfact said:

    Korntip said the public should not worry that the collaboration would let military officials off the hook. “We will definitely investigate corruption complaints even if they are related to the military,” he said. 

    Having stayed in Thailand a while, I have learned that when State employees make a point of saying that something won't happen, it almost guarantees that it will.

     

    I interpret the comment above as "We will definitely NOT investigate corruption complaints if they are related  to the military."

     

    Anyone disagree?

     

  3. 43 minutes ago, webfact said:

    "The details really matter here," said Stephen Vladeck, a professor at the University of Texas School of Law.

     

    "The real question is going to be if the president is serious about this, what kind of legal arguments do we get out of the White House and the Pentagon for such a deployment."

     

    A senior Republican aide in the U.S. House of Representatives said key lawmakers had not been briefed on the White House plan. The aide said there was no indication that a specific plan had even been formulated yet.

    One has to assume, at least for the moment, that this is another case where there is no point taking the word of the US President seriously; that is a sad commentary, but if there are no plans then this is simply more noise.

     

    Is the US going to militarize the US-Mexico border? I doubt it as I doubt whether there is support for this in Congress or the military.

     

    The US really needs to be careful here. Yes, the US is a much bigger, much more powerful nation than Mexico, but to date things have been quite easy as the Mexican President has been quite accommodating to the US.  If Obrador wins the election and rallies the Mexican people behind a policy of standing up to Trump, then the US is going to have MANY MANY problems. What happens if Mexico lets it be known that it won't try to stop anyone from crossing its territory to get to the US? Think 'surge'! Mexico, even though it is the weaker of the two countries, can cause a great deal of grief to the US, and based on how Trump has treated Mexico to date, I suspect that there would be a lot of support for a Mexican leader who says" Up Yours, Yankee!"

     

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  4. "...“It’s not about old or new generation, it’s about whether they can really work. The future relies on actual work, and the country is not a place for an internship,” Mallika Boonmeetrakool of the Democrat Party told reporters late last month. “An unblemished history comes with a lack of competence in resolving crises.,,”

     

    The first comment that comes to mind is in the last bit of the quoted piece above, "...lack of competence in resolving crises...". Judging by the success rate of the Democrat party in solving crises, then I don't think this is a valid argument; they couldn't really do worse, could they?

     

    This party is interesting, but there are several institutional hurdles that it'll have to overcome, the first being the old adage from Poly Sci people, "the Country Side Proposes and the Capital Disposes". The party has all the characteristics of a great party/movement designed to overthrow a dug-in, unpopular regime (like the Junta); think back to the Egyptian protesters in Tahrir square, Cairo of a few years past. Then remember how well those same people did in the subsequent election...

     

    However, the current faces of the party don't seem to me to be attractive to a more conservative, rural vote, and it is rural votes that decide elections. Can it get the rural vote? Yes, but it will be very difficult and will also require that the traditional parties falter a bit; the easiest way to get a vote is when another party loses it. It is speculation on my part, but it is very possible that in this up-coming election the traditional parties will falter a bit.

     

    It is too early to tell if this party is anything more than a flash in the pan, but it certainly bears watching; the slogan, in whichever particular form it takes, of "It is time for a change!" is always powerful.

     

    • Like 2
  5. Economic projections require one to make certain assumptions, and if the assumptions are not correct then the projections will not be correct. This is also known as the GIGO principle; Garbage in, Garbage out.

     

    I assume that one of the underlying assumptions is that Thailand has political stability. If the Junta does not keep its promise and allow fair elections in a timely manner, all of these projections are worth nothing.

     

    A large element of economics is confidence. If there is no political stability and democratic progress, then confidence will do a swan dive out the window.

     

    Hey Junta! Something to think about...

     

  6. 59 minutes ago, webfact said:

    Dr Phanphimon Wipulakorn a spokeswoman of the Department of Public Health said that obsessive and prolonged phone usage can lead to a sedentary lifestyle resulting in obesity.

     

    Dr Phanphimon said that some people were addicted to their phones and can't bear to be separated from them even for a minute.

    Did she really go to medical school in order to get this insight?

     

    Go to any shop and see people sit all day fiddling with their poxey phones and not moving. And getting fatter and fatter.

     

    By the way, Doc; the sun turns your skin brown and/or red. There, I just did your next research paper for you...

     

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