Grey11

I hope he manages to fight the charges and is set free.

Given politics however, who knows how the court case will go.

It seems if any other country in the world wanted to extradite this arms dealer except the U.S. the Europeans would be in favor of him being extradited. Many posts on here are just anti-U.S. That's what it comes down to.

The next generation of world leaders is not coming out of Malaysia - the country with one of the highest rates of homosexual rape in the world.

I just had to go in and check it out - "wanking?" Still not positve as to what "wanking" is. Does it mean "masturbation?" or is it describing "homosexual activity?" Please advise. I guess it would be nice to learn a new word.

Sorry. Should have read all the posts. I learned that "wanking" is masturbating/jacking off.

The next generation of world leaders is not coming out of Malaysia - the country with one of the highest rates of homosexual rape in the world.

I just had to go in and check it out - "wanking?" Still not positve as to what "wanking" is. Does it mean "masturbation?" or is it describing "homosexual activity?" Please advise. I guess it would be nice to learn a new word.

Hooray for the guy who escaped the clutches of these Thai cop maniacs with their idiotic war on drugs.

----------------

We're Losing the Drug War Because Prohibition Never Works

By Hodding Carter III.

There is clearly no point in beating a dead horse, whether you are a politician or a columnist, but sometimes you have to do it just the same, if only for the record. So, for the record, here's another attempt to argue that a majority of the American people and their elected representatives can be and are wrong about the way they have chosen to wage the "war against drugs." Prohibition can't work, won't work and has never worked, but it can and does have monumentally costly effects on the criminal justice system and on the integrity of government at every level.

Experience should be the best teacher, and my experience with prohibition is a little more recent than most Americans for whom the "noble experiment" ended with repeal in 1933. In my home state of Mississippi, it lasted for an additional 33 years, and for all those years it was a truism that the drinkers had their liquor, the preachers had their prohibition and the sheriffs made the money. Al Capone would have been proud of the latitude that bootleggers were able to buy with their payoffs of constables, deputies, police chiefs and sheriffs across the state.

But as a first-rate series in the New York Times made clear early last year, Mississippi's prohibition-era corruption (and Chicago's before that) was penny ante stuff compared with what is happening in the U.S. today. From Brooklyn police precincts to Miami's police stations to rural Georgia courthouses, big drug money is purchasing major breakdowns in law enforcement. Sheriffs, other policemen and now judges are being bought up by the gross. But that money, with the net profits for the drug traffickers estimated at anywhere from $40 billion to $100 billion a year, is also buying up banks, legitimate businesses and, to the south of us, entire governments. The latter becomes an increasingly likely outcome in a number of cities and states in this country as well. Cicero, Ill., during Prohibition is an instructive case in point.

The money to be made from an illegal product that has about 23 million current users in this country also explains why its sale is so attractive on the mean streets of America's big cities. A street salesman can gross about $2,500 a day in Washington, which puts him in the pay category of a local television anchor, and this in a neighborhood of dead-end job chances.

Since the courts and jails are already swamped beyond capacity by the arrests that are routinely made (44,000 drug dealers and users over a two-year period in Washington alone, for instance) and since those arrests barely skim the top of the pond, arguing that stricter enforcement is the answer begs a larger question: Who is going to pay the billions of dollars required to build the prisons, hire the judges, train the policemen and employ the prosecutors needed for the load already on hand, let alone the huge one yet to come if we ever get serious about arresting dealers and users?

Much is made of the cost of drug addiction, and it should be, but the current breakdown in the criminal justice system is not one of them. That breakdown is the result of prohibition, not addiction. Drug addiction, after all, does not come close to the far vaster problems of alcohol and tobacco addiction (as former Surgeon General Koop correctly noted, tobacco is at least as addictive as heroin). Hard drugs are estimated to kill 4,000 people a year directly and several tens of thousands a year indirectly. Alcohol kills at least 100,000 a year, addicts millions more and costs the marketplace billions of dollars. Tobacco kills over 300,000 a year, addicts tens of millions and fouls the atmosphere as well. But neither alcohol nor tobacco threaten to subvert our system of law and order, because they are treated as personal and societal problems rather than as criminal ones.

Indeed, every argument that is made for prohibiting the use of currently illegal drugs can be made even more convincingly about tobacco and alcohol. The effects on the unborn? Staggeringly direct. The effects on adolescents? Alcoholism is the addiction of choice for young Americans on a ratio of about 100 to one. Lethal effect? Tobacco's murderous results are not a matter of debate anywhere outside the Tobacco Institute.

Which leaves the lingering and legitimate fear that legalization might produce a surge in use. It probably would, although not nearly as dramatic a one as opponents usually estimate. The fact is that personal use of marijuana, whatever the local laws may say, has been virtually decriminalized for some time now, but there has been a stabilization or slight decline in use, rather than an increase, for several years. Heroin addiction has held steady at about 500,000 people for some time, though the street price of heroin is far lower now than it used to be. Use of cocaine in its old form also seems to have stopped climbing and begun to drop off among young and old alike, though there is an abundantly available supply.

That leaves crack cocaine, stalker of the inner city and terror of the suburbs. Instant and addictive in effect, easy to use and relatively cheap to buy, it is a personality-destroying substance that is a clear menace to its users. But it is hard to imagine it being any more accessible under legalization than it is in most cities today under prohibition, while the financial incentives for promoting its use would virtually disappear with legalization.

Proponents of legalization should not try to fuzz the issue, nonetheless. Addiction levels might increase, at least temporarily, if legal sanctions were removed. That happened after the repeal of Prohibition, or so at least some studies have suggested. But while that would be a personal disaster for the addicts and their families, and would involve larger costs to society as a whole, those costs would be minuscule compared with the costs of continued prohibition.

The young Capones of today own the inner cities and the wholesalers behind these young retailers are rapidly buying up the larger system which is supposed to control them. Prohibition gave us the Mafia and organized crime on a scale that has been with us ever since. The new prohibition is writing a new chapter on that old text. hel_l-bent on learning nothing from history, we are witnessing its repetition, predictably enough, as tragedy.

---

Reprinted with permission of Wall Street Journal Jul 13, 1989. Mr. Carter is a political commentator who heads a television production firm.

The above post is another way God weeds out the stupid.

End of Days - Do you have anything to add other than calling others "stupid?" A difference of opinion from your opinion does not make someone "stupid" ignorants, whatever. If you already know everything there is to know you must be from New York or Massachusetts.

I just hope that he lives to be 100 so that the punishment is a long slow death for the vermon. He knew what he was getting into so now he has reaped his reward. I know that all the other criminals and low lifes in the world will come out and say his punishment is to hard but theses types allways stick together.

I am neither a criminal or a "low life" whatever the hel_l that means and I say his punishment was far to stiff. I don't even know anyone else who posts on Thai Visa so I am absolutely not "sticking together." Think just maybe the Thai criminal justice system might just try to find the drug dealer that sold him the drugs?! I doubt it. They got their publicity nailing a farang and that's all they wanted.

Outside the court Hood told reporters he was disappointed with the life sentence.

I suppose he would have preferred the death sentence.

Can we get a petition going for a death sentence?? We could probably get 50,000,000 signatures easily.

Just wait until Taksin's back in the driver's seat. No petition will be needed. He'll just slip and hit his head in the shower!

I think Toxin had somewhere the neighborhood of 3,000 enemies - listed as drug dealers - killed. It was probably many more. As much as Thaksin hated foreigners (Westerners, not Chinese like himself) he would have probably just had this guy killed at the police station. In this case 5 years would be a fair sentence. He now faces death by the swine flu and/or tuberculosis in a filthy Thai prison.

Any proof of what the guy is saying about the flu and mask? Or just an "email"?

Just how effective are those masks? I have heard different opinions from doctors, government officials, etc. from various countries.

Could it be that those pushing the use of the masks have a personal investment in the company(ies) that are making them? Thai government officials are telling the people - through the media - that homemade masks are not safe. What company has the monopoly on the sale of these masks in Thailand? That would be interesting to know. Follow the money trail.

Wait until this gets in the Western Press !!

Very, very seldom does any thing that happens in Thailand get reported in the U.S. media outside of Los Angeles and New York City. Most Americans know almost nothing about Thailand. Probably 90% of Americans have never heard of Phuket until you say: "that's where the sunami hit." The somewhat put Thailand on the map of a few Americans. The vast majority of Americans know about and vacation in Mexico & Hawaii. Many times when I visit Thailand I wish I could meet and American or two that wasn't from the West or East Coast, just an average American.

The following makes you wonder how they came up with the name Swine Flu?

"Virologists tested samples of the virus taken from patients in the United States as well as several seasonal flu viruses on mice, ferrets, macaque monkeys and specially-bred miniature pigs.

They found that A(H1N1) caused more severe lung lesions among mice, ferrets and macaques than the seasonal flu viruses.

But it did not cause any symptoms among the mini-pigs, which could explain why there has been no evidence that pigs in Mexico fell sick with the disease before the outbreak began among humans."

Perhaps the reason for calling the disease the "swine flu" is because the first case of the flu was traced back to a rural village in Central Mexico which was near a large pig farm which consisted of many buildings housing them. The home of this first person to contact the virus was across from a waste pond of the pig operation. I saw this on television once the Mexican government traced what they still believe was the first case of the swine flu to the small village, home & pig farm.

This from another physician (the figures are little bit dated, but the letter still makes good points):

Media pigs misinforming public about so-called "epidemic"

Dear Friend,

Those filthy swine... The swine flu "epidemic" is only a few days old, and Big Pharma is already plotting to make a fortune.

European drug maker Roche announced it was scaling up production of Tamiflu, giving a boost to its stock price and sending millions into the Roche coffers. GlaxoSmithKline, which makes the anti-flu drug Relenza, is also seeing its stock price climb, as investors hope this swine flu is the biggest thing since the bubonic plague.

There's only one problem here – it's not going to happen. You read the Daily Dose because I always give you the straight scoop, and because I'm not afraid to tell you when the mainstream has it wrong.

And they have it wrong on swine flu. It won't be an epidemic – it'll barely even be a ripple. I've run medical clinics in Africa – I know what an epidemic looks like.

And this isn't it.

The media is blowing swine flu out of proportion so it can feed its 24-hour news cycle – the same media, mind you, that had us convinced that avian flu was going to destroy the planet a few years ago.

But here are the facts about swine flu – it has affected so few people in America that it's hardly worth discussing. There are 64 confirmed cases in America as I'm writing this – not 6,000 or even 600. There are 64.

Of course, the media is fixated on the 100 or so people who have died in Mexico from the swine flu. But let me clue you into something that no one seems to be discussing – health care in Mexico is ABSOLUTELY TERRIBLE. I know – I've been there more times than I can count.

Disease spreads rapidly through Mexico because large areas of the country lack clean water and basic sanitation. Seeing a doctor – let alone a qualified doctor – is a luxury unavailable to most of the population. Of course the flu is killing people in Mexico – so are a lot of other diseases that are successfully treated in America. People in Mexico still die from diarrhea, for Pete's sake!

Yes, they have apparently had some cases of bad swine flu in Mexico. They've had lots of dengue fever and chagas, too, but you don't need to stay up at night worrying about it. Beating the swine flu isn't any different from beating the regular flu. Wash your hands. Avoid large crowds if you can. Get plenty of rest and fluids if you start getting sick.

And don't be afraid to eat pork or any other meat, for that matter, as it's not the pigs who are getting sick. Of course, I'm not recommending you eat Mexican pork – or any food produced in Mexico, for that matter. Hopefully the tainted peppers outbreak of 2008 taught us that. But don't change your diet because of some so-called swine flu epidemic.

It's no epidemic. It's no public health catastrophe. It's good theatre – and nothing more.

WC Douglas, MD

Seems he agrees with Dr. Ron Paul.

Having read many things reported by this man. I am inclined to just laugh at most of them. He seems to delight in telling people he is right and everyone else is wrong. How can one man be so right and so many be so wrong? I wonder could MD actually stand for something else other than doctor of medicine?.

I am not so trusting of Big Pharma.

It sure seems like Big Pharma simply does not have our best health at the top of their priority list.

Seems more like maximizing profits supersedes our best health interests.

Since some doctors are bowing to Big Pharma, and pushing their agenda for a little extra sump'm-sump'm, is it any surprise so many have it wrong? Or at least, are misinformed and so are misinfroming us? Not to mention the media budget Big Pharma has to push their latest concoction, or ....PERHAPS .... create, through clever marketing and news hype, the next great health scare that they miraculously have the best remedy or cure for.

Lets see... we had SARS and Bird Flu a few years back. Both of which were hyped by the WHO, and we were assured, both were going to destroy all life in Earth. Both have all but disappeared, so now they're trying to sell us Swine Flu - which of course, despite the data, once again "has the potential to destroy the human race." In fact, the WHO has given swine flu the highest "pandemic" warning level in a long time. Good greif, "fool me once..."

Seems many are still buying into it. I am surprised people even give the WHO any credit anymore.

As one poster said, "the boy who cried wolf". Indeed.

In addition, I am simply not "in the market" to be health-terrorized anymore by Big Pharma, the WHO, or the media.

Who can actually believe anything coming from the United Nations much less the World Health Organisation. I guess we are better to have it than not have it but that's not saying much. The good doctor failed to mention cholera and typhus as common diseases in Mexico. If in West Texas and crossing the Texas-Mexico border the first signs you will see warn of cholera. Even poor communities could, if they wanted to, can prepare better sewer systmes than open ditches running behind homes & businesses. The politicians keep all the tax money and the people vote them back into office. Sounds like almost every country in the world doesn't it? Certainly it has become the way in the U.S. It is virtually impossible to get these liars, cheats, thiefs (white collar criminals) out of office.

Neither the USA or Mexico closed their borders.

I think that it would have a draconian effect on tourism and those who hold jobs associated with tourism,there would be no "High Season" and dramatically reduce bookings that are being made for 2010

The U.S., like Thailand, likes the cheap labor that illegally crosses the borders. Illegals, unlike legal immigrants, are not required to have physical examinations for diseases. Living in border states with Mexico such as California, Arizona, New Mexico & Texas, is the front line for diseases coming from Mexico. Tuberculosis was almost wiped out in the U.S. and is not spreading as a result of illegals from Mexico, as is the flu virus and even typhus has showed up in Texas counties with a high percentage of illegals from Mexico. Closing the borders from illegals from Third World countries can stop other diseases that spread by human contact. If Thailand continues to allow immigrants from such backward countries as Burma, it will experience the same epidemics that are just now getting a foothold in Texas and other states bordering Mexico.

I meant to write tuberculosis is now spreading throughout Texas as a result of the millions of illegals from Central & South America and especially Mexico. Living in Texas we see and read about it daily.

Neither the USA or Mexico closed their borders.

I think that it would have a draconian effect on tourism and those who hold jobs associated with tourism,there would be no "High Season" and dramatically reduce bookings that are being made for 2010

The U.S., like Thailand, likes the cheap labor that illegally crosses the borders. Illegals, unlike legal immigrants, are not required to have physical examinations for diseases. Living in border states with Mexico such as California, Arizona, New Mexico & Texas, is the front line for diseases coming from Mexico. Tuberculosis was almost wiped out in the U.S. and is not spreading as a result of illegals from Mexico, as is the flu virus and even typhus has showed up in Texas counties with a high percentage of illegals from Mexico. Closing the borders from illegals from Third World countries can stop other diseases that spread by human contact. If Thailand continues to allow immigrants from such backward countries as Burma, it will experience the same epidemics that are just now getting a foothold in Texas and other states bordering Mexico.

They should do like one of the G8 meetings. Hold the event in some castle/mansion far from the city, some place that is easy to cord off some 1km from the site in question and arrest anyone that tries to go over any fence/barricade.

Or draw a line in the sand and shoot anyone that steps over it, but same-same...

Why they need to put these meetings in a tourist-location...is just beyond me. Or actually, it is not...it's about money.

The wealthiest and most powerful men in the world meet once a year in castles throughout Europe and Canada for the Bilderberber & Trilateralist. Unknown politicians have come out of these secret meetings - some editors of major U.S. newspapers are among the elites and yet nothing is written about the secret meetings of the world's movers and shakers - such as small state governor of Georgia, Jimmy Carter, and William Jefferson Blythe Clinton, from tiny Arkansas walked out of these secret meetings and were put at the front of the crowd as candidates for their political party. they were elected President. The elite invitees are flown over the giant walls in helicopters and many armed guards stand near the walls. Many other armed guards stands miles down the road, close it to through traffic and turn back all curious people. Surely the elites from the ASEAN countries know the tricks of the Trilaterlist Group and the Bilderberg Group. No person has ever infiltrated their secret meetings. The Red Shirts will be no match for these powerfully trained armies that guard the rich & famous. Toxin would love to have been here but the military needs to make certain that it beats back the Red Shirts. These thugs of Toxin's can and must be stopped.

Perhaps some of these consulates who have very strict rules and requirements should offer the 1 year non immigrant 'O' visa in a similar manner to that offered by the Consulate in Hull, that would generate them a lot more income.

If these non cooperative consulates go out of business then in my opinion they deserve it. It's within their power to issue these year long visas to all comers but they choose not to.

My wife and I paid $175 each for a one year visa last month at the Royal Thai Consulate in Houston. We are moving permanently to Phuket the last week of July.

An old friend of mine will be coming over and stay with us in our house for a few day. Do I have to report him to the Police?

And what kind of suspicious behavior should I report?

- Not chasing girls?

- Not drinking "lao"?

- Driving politely?

- Giving a big tip?

If he talks into his shoe and speaks in foreign tongues, that would be a clue...

"Owners of hotels, guesthouses and other commercial accommodation establishments who fail to report guests are subject to fines ranging from 2,000 baht to 10,000 baht, he said."

I bet the Thai owned hotels will have great fun with this one. Similar scenario to the Thai bar owner reporting the farang bar owner to immigration for "working", just because his bar is more popular. Now you will get the same with guesthouses with the farang being reported for having guests who have not been reported to the immigration.

I feel this will be a lot of reporting and huge amount of work for the immigration, they will surely lose interest in this one very quickly.

If it does catch on it will be purely for the purpose of money (fines) and nothing else. Arrivals are down, so the immigration need to think up some other ways to get some money in the kitty !

As for the immigration looking out for foreigners behaving suspiciously, will this include the timeshare touts and Nepalese tailors ? I bet it wont !!

This includes Burmese who have slipped into the country and may be staying anywhere. Burmese workers need to be watched. Some of them actually stole and ate two of our kittens at our home in Phuket. Every country has the right control illegal immigration.

Thailand has gone soft. 25 years to easy on her what is wrong can't they afford the rope.

In this day and age we would hope to have evolved from the sentencing of the death penalty.

In the name of what ?, business, profits, etc. What will it cost the taxpayers to keep her in the Hilton for 25 years...ok, probably not much although in the states, on average it takes about 50k USD a year to 'care' for one inmate and many prisons are private companies.....

...agreed, this fool was trying to smuggle a nasty drug for profit & fee plus airfare.....she would definitely not be classified as a humanist, so let her do her time. But what about convicted murderers & rapists who claim no innocence, spend years in prison, paroled and commit the same or worse crime and it's back to the slammer @ $50,000 a year to Mr & Mrs taxpayer.....Many people in jail for minor offenses but the budget needs to be increased every year so more people need to be arrested.........this was before the financial meltdown.....the Governor of California told voters if they didn't vote for his agenda then he would have no choice but to release 30,000 convicted criminals onto the streets without funds to pay the 50,000 dollars a year per man.....that's a savings of 1.5 billion dollars that taxpayers are responsible for.........(sorry for rambling), just my 2 cents.......nothing wrong with eliminating someone who has conscientiously ended someone else s life.......most especially, re-peat offenders..........if she pays enough to the right people she won't be in jail long

Everything is expensive in California. In Texas it only costs the taxpayers around $25,000 per year to keep a convicted criminal in prison. That is half of what it costs in California. And, that includes air conditioning almost year round. In Northern Calif. I don't think one even needs air conditions because of the cold temperature. It probably costs less than $500 a year for food for Thai prisoners. Rice is cheap. Being able to pay one's way out ain't all that bad. Politicians in the U.S. have been keeping out of jail for hundreds of years by paying the right people.

Every Texan has traveled to Mexico. I spent four years attending Sul Ross State Univ. just 80 miles north of the Mexican border in Texas. I have traveled into the interior of Mexico. The Southern portion of Mexico is beautiful. But poverty in that country is unbelievable. Always has been. The elite in Mexico (5% control more than 90% of the wealth) are gald that their chief export is poor people. That way those people will not rise up because of starvation and hopelessness and overthrow the Government. I said nothing in my posts that is not true. Every country in the world has begun to seal their borders as unemployment rises and the governments are forced to take care of the unemployed - many illegal - with taxpayers money. Xenophobic? Just another word used by those who revert to name calling in order to deny one his/her freedom of speech. And for those U.S. haters, and haters of Texas and the rest of the South, we really don't give a dam_n if you hate us. We pretty much think the same of you.

My wife and I own a home in Phuket and will be retiring there in July. We have a huge problem with illegal immigration and it is one of the major reasons I am leaving the U.S. It is no longer safe here and is too expensive to live a decent life. Even then, I know the U.S. to be the most generous nation in the world regardless of what the Europeans whom we have saved in two World Wars think.

I can't stand George W. Bush who like his father George H.W. Bush was born in Connecticut. Fact is, like it or not, more than 85% of all Mexican Americans in the U.S. vote for candidates of the Democrat Party. Is wrong then to think that 85% plus of the illegals who are granted citizenship by the Obama admnistration - Bush wanted to do the same thing - will vote 85% + for the national and state Democrat Party? Is that yet another statement posters will label with the smear words "racist" and "xenophobe?" As a Texan (I can add Californians, New Mexicans, & Arizonans - we are all on the front lines bordering Mexico - I think we are in a position to know more about Mexicans than are the rest of the states in the U.S. and certainly more than Europeans, Canadians, and other foreigners. BTW I think all politicians, no matter the political party, are the No. 1 criminals in the world.

Give it a rest, if you didn't really care you wouldn't be writing a lengthy piece. You forefathers were imported too, and now you are importing yourself to Thailand. I foresee problems with the attitude you are showing. Good luck anyway.

Call someone a "racist" and then you say "give it a rest?!" My wife is Thai. Would a "racist" really marry outside his/her race? Come on. I have been traveling to Thailand for more than 25 years and have many Thai friends. Problems? I have never had problems in Thailand. My forefathers did emigrate from the U.S - Germany, Austria, Hungary, Ireland & Scotland - legally. They learned to speak English and assimilated into the American culture. I do intend to "give it a rest" now. I did not engage in calling you hateful words - someone I don't know. Smear words are easy. If you wish to debate subjects, I am willing to do that. Name calling is really a cheap shot.

Every Texan has traveled to Mexico. I spent four years attending Sul Ross State Univ. just 80 miles north of the Mexican border in Texas. I have traveled into the interior of Mexico. The Southern portion of Mexico is beautiful. But poverty in that country is unbelievable. Always has been. The elite in Mexico (5% control more than 90% of the wealth) are gald that their chief export is poor people. That way those people will not rise up because of starvation and hopelessness and overthrow the Government. I said nothing in my posts that is not true. Every country in the world has begun to seal their borders as unemployment rises and the governments are forced to take care of the unemployed - many illegal - with taxpayers money. Xenophobic? Just another word used by those who revert to name calling in order to deny one his/her freedom of speech. And for those U.S. haters, and haters of Texas and the rest of the South, we really don't give a dam_n if you hate us. We pretty much think the same of you.

My wife and I own a home in Phuket and will be retiring there in July. We have a huge problem with illegal immigration and it is one of the major reasons I am leaving the U.S. It is no longer safe here and is too expensive to live a decent life. Even then, I know the U.S. to be the most generous nation in the world regardless of what the Europeans whom we have saved in two World Wars think.

I can't stand George W. Bush who like his father George H.W. Bush was born in Connecticut. Fact is, like it or not, more than 85% of all Mexican Americans in the U.S. vote for candidates of the Democrat Party. Is wrong then to think that 85% plus of the illegals who are granted citizenship by the Obama admnistration - Bush wanted to do the same thing - will vote 85% + for the national and state Democrat Party? Is that yet another statement posters will label with the smear words "racist" and "xenophobe?" As a Texan (I can add Californians, New Mexicans, & Arizonans - we are all on the front lines bordering Mexico - I think we are in a position to know more about Mexicans than are the rest of the states in the U.S. and certainly more than Europeans, Canadians, and other foreigners. BTW I think all politicians, no matter the political party, are the No. 1 criminals in the world.

Give it a rest, if you didn't really care you wouldn't be writing a lengthy piece. You forefathers were imported too, and now you are importing yourself to Thailand. I foresee problems with the attitude you are showing. Good luck anyway.

Every Texan has traveled to Mexico. I spent four years attending Sul Ross State Univ. just 80 miles north of the Mexican border in Texas. I have traveled into the interior of Mexico. The Southern portion of Mexico is beautiful. But poverty in that country is unbelievable. Always has been. The elite in Mexico (5% control more than 90% of the wealth) are gald that their chief export is poor people. That way those people will not rise up because of starvation and hopelessness and overthrow the Government. I said nothing in my posts that is not true. Every country in the world has begun to seal their borders as unemployment rises and the governments are forced to take care of the unemployed - many illegal - with taxpayers money. Xenophobic? Just another word used by those who revert to name calling in order to deny one his/her freedom of speech. And for those U.S. haters, and haters of Texas and the rest of the South, we really don't give a dam_n if you hate us. We pretty much think the same of you.

My wife and I own a home in Phuket and will be retiring there in July. We have a huge problem with illegal immigration and it is one of the major reasons I am leaving the U.S. It is no longer safe here and is too expensive to live a decent life. Even then, I know the U.S. to be the most generous nation in the world regardless of what the Europeans whom we have saved in two World Wars think.

I can't stand George W. Bush who like his father George H.W. Bush was born in Connecticut. Fact is, like it or not, more than 85% of all Mexican Americans in the U.S. vote for candidates of the Democrat Party. Is wrong then to think that 85% plus of the illegals who are granted citizenship by the Obama admnistration - Bush wanted to do the same thing - will vote 85% + for the national and state Democrat Party? Is that yet another statement posters will label with the smear words "racist" and "xenophobe?" As a Texan (I can add Californians, New Mexicans, & Arizonans - we are all on the front lines bordering Mexico - I think we are in a position to know more about Mexicans than are the rest of the states in the U.S. and certainly more than Europeans, Canadians, and other foreigners. BTW I think all politicians, no matter the political party, are the No. 1 criminals in the world.

Give it a rest, if you didn't really care you wouldn't be writing a lengthy piece. You forefathers were imported too, and now you are importing yourself to Thailand. I foresee problems with the attitude you are showing. Good luck anyway.

Every Texan has traveled to Mexico. I spent four years attending Sul Ross State Univ. just 80 miles north of the Mexican border in Texas. I have traveled into the interior of Mexico. The Southern portion of Mexico is beautiful. But poverty in that country is unbelievable. Always has been. The elite in Mexico (5% control more than 90% of the wealth) are gald that their chief export is poor people. That way those people will not rise up because of starvation and hopelessness and overthrow the Government. I said nothing in my posts that is not true. Every country in the world has begun to seal their borders as unemployment rises and the governments are forced to take care of the unemployed - many illegal - with taxpayers money. Xenophobic? Just another word used by those who revert to name calling in order to deny one his/her freedom of speech. And for those U.S. haters, and haters of Texas and the rest of the South, we really don't give a dam_n if you hate us. We pretty much think the same of you.

My wife and I own a home in Phuket and will be retiring there in July. We have a huge problem with illegal immigration and it is one of the major reasons I am leaving the U.S. It is no longer safe here and is too expensive to live a decent life. Even then, I know the U.S. to be the most generous nation in the world regardless of what the Europeans whom we have saved in two World Wars think.

I can't stand George W. Bush who like his father George H.W. Bush was born in Connecticut. Fact is, like it or not, more than 85% of all Mexican Americans in the U.S. vote for candidates of the Democrat Party. Is wrong then to think that 85% plus of the illegals who are granted citizenship by the Obama admnistration - Bush wanted to do the same thing - will vote 85% + for the national and state Democrat Party? Is that yet another statement posters will label with the smear words "racist" and "xenophobe?" As a Texan (I can add Californians, New Mexicans, & Arizonans - we are all on the front lines bordering Mexico - I think we are in a position to know more about Mexicans than are the rest of the states in the U.S. and certainly more than Europeans, Canadians, and other foreigners. BTW I think all politicians, no matter the political party, are the No. 1 criminals in the world.

it may be spreading but the symptoms seem to be milder than the usual flu we get in the UK. The reason people died in Mexico initially was because of poor and slow access to medical treatment.

Mexicans brought the swine flu to the U.S. and it spread throughout the world. Mexico is a cesspool and its people easily travel back and forth to the U.S. bringing tuberculosis, cholera, veneral diseases as well as crime. Swine flu made its way to another cesspool, New York City, by U.S. students who traveled to Cancun, Mexico on Spring Break. Filth more than being poor and not having access to medical treatment is the major reason for swine flu in Mexico. Poor people do not necessarily have to be filthy. It is a choice.

Ugh... I smell ignorance.

I somehow doubt Grey11 has ever traveled Mexico -- which is beautiful, by the way (for those who don't know from experience).

it may be spreading but the symptoms seem to be milder than the usual flu we get in the UK. The reason people died in Mexico initially was because of poor and slow access to medical treatment.

Mexicans brought the swine flu to the U.S. and it spread throughout the world. Mexico is a cesspool and its people easily travel back and forth to the U.S. bringing tuberculosis, cholera, veneral diseases as well as crime. Swine flu made its way to another cesspool, New York City, by U.S. students who traveled to Cancun, Mexico on Spring Break. Filth more than being poor and not having access to medical treatment is the major reason for swine flu in Mexico. Poor people do not necessarily have to be filthy. It is a choice.

Ugh... I smell ignorance.

I somehow doubt Grey11 has ever traveled Mexico -- which is beautiful, by the way (for those who don't know from experience).

I've also long thought that large numbers of the population probably already have a very mild form of the disease but it's interesting that you raise that point also - do you have any sources that lead you to that belief or is it just a supposition?

Its based on reports out of Mexico. It was massively UNDERREPORTED. Flu experts have known this from the beginning. This first wave is not what most people should be worried about. Its the later waves that are really scary and nobody knows what that will bring. I am also sure it is underreported in the US. Over 50 million people don't have health care access there, they are not going to go to the doc over a mild flu, in fact, they will WORK with it, spreading it more, same thing that is happening here.

BTW, in the US it is recommended that those with a MILD CASE do not go to the doctor, at all! Going spreads the virus and taxes the health care system. Here in Thailand, the hysterical officials are suggesting the opposite, everyone go and possibly face government isolation. That is insane. What happens when 20 million people in Thailand get the first wave virus, all going to the doctor?

This is a situation that will play out over months and YEARS. It is not like a tsunami and it is easy for the sheeple squawking people to say it was nothing, it is over, when it has really just BEGUN.

Every person in the U.S. has access to health care. Free clinics exist in any city of size - population over 10,000. Emergency rooms in hospitals are full each and every day and night. If a person says they can't pay - the hospitals are full of illegal Mexican immigrants of which the U.S. has more than 30 million. The high insurance payments for those who have it are a direct result of paying for those who say they can't pay and are given free health care. There has never been any announced government - state or federal - in the U.S. that has advised sick people not to seek medical care. Thailand did not originate the swine flu, it originated in that sewer that is Mexico. It is true that the government of Mexico does not take care of its people. The government has never given a dam_n about its people that is why they are encouraged to emigrate - slip into - the United States. We as U.S. taxpayers pay for them (tens of billions of dollars per year) and our borders remain wide open. Soon the Obama administration will grant about 20 million of them amnesty. Votes for the Democrat Party.

it may be spreading but the symptoms seem to be milder than the usual flu we get in the UK. The reason people died in Mexico initially was because of poor and slow access to medical treatment.

Mexicans brought the swine flu to the U.S. and it spread throughout the world. Mexico is a cesspool and its people easily travel back and forth to the U.S. bringing tuberculosis, cholera, veneral diseases as well as crime. Swine flu made its way to another cesspool, New York City, by U.S. students who traveled to Cancun, Mexico on Spring Break. Filth more than being poor and not having access to medical treatment is the major reason for swine flu in Mexico. Poor people do not necessarily have to be filthy. It is a choice.

One of the major reasons foreigners choose not to settle in Cambodia & the Philippines and instead choose Thailand is that those countries are not as modern as Thailand. Cambodia & the Philippines are much more dangerous. Crime is rampant. For those who say that the government of Thailand is unstable, it is very stable compared to the government of Cambodia. The military keeps the governments of Cambodia & the Philippines in power even more than is the case in Thailand. Thailand is much mored sanitary than are Cambodia & the Philippines. The food is safer in Thailand. Certainly Thailand is much farther from being a Third World country than are Burma, Laos, Cambodia & the Philippines.