Toolong

9 hours ago, damian said:

I hear you Toolong.

 

This was hatched and sanctioned in the darkened back corridors of gold guilded citadels, negotiated via zoom and various face to face clandistine meetings in foreign countries to be finally initiated at the Leicester football match in the UK at the end of May. 

 

Tony has two wants: to be part of the elite and to come home. The elite has one; to remain in power. Both have sold their souls to satisfy their greed. For Tony, PT were nothing but a vehicle and are expendable as are the PT minions and his family. For the elite, Tony is the vehicle for them and is also expendable after they get what they want. Part of the deal will be for Tony to retire and stay out of politics when he gets home.

 

I also hope the progressive media will keep this utterly dispicable travisty alive in exposing these tyrants for what they are. What I fear most though with this unholy alliance, is the installation of strengthened mechanisms to prevent domocrtaic parties from ever governing again. This is where the progressive media plays a vital role and must be vigilant to continually expose the wrong-doing and encourage the populace to step up to block such moves.   

???? ????

All the points you make are, I believe, incontestably true......or at least as likely as likely can get. The dots you join make very sound & simple sense out of an almost infinite number of speculative guesses at exactly why?, who?, how?, when & what's next?, etc..

Recall something someone once said: 'The truth always lies within a narrow and certain compass, but error is immense.'

Tony's almost certainly hustling his way, as we speak, on the fringe or* slap bang in the middle, of that narrow & certain compass. 

But he....and they.... can't hustle through what will inexorably come....and that's the next election (if things are not interrupted & changed by coups of the left or right). If MFP can keep their mojo alive till then......game over. 

* no 'or' really, I was kidding. He's slap banging.....right now. 

13 minutes ago, BangkokReady said:

It's tricky, becuase there isn't actually any corrupt wrong-doing now. It all happened years ago when the system was put in place.

 

It's quite clever really, as it kind of fractures the causal chain and muddies the waters.

 

Case in point, people are actually discussing the decisions of the senators much more than the legitimacy of their position. Realistically, they should have been protesting their power and appointment since day one.

Ha! Very good point. And well made. Your 2nd paragraph is particularly spot on and perfectly put. ????

That notwithstanding, your 3rd gets my approval too! Yes, you're bang on right about that. The point you make about people's/media focus being on senators' decisions & not on fact they've really no darned right to make those decisions at all in the first place, is so evidently the case when properly considered.

And that's what - imo - is so insidious about the way things have been plotted & implemented by 'the establishment' since the coup in 2014 and after the sham election in 2017. The 'normalizing' (the wilful forgetting, the sleight-of-hand 'moving on' acceptance, etc) of Prayuth & Prawit, from military junta chiefs in green, to politicians in suits & silk, was masterfully done. As you so neatly put it, re their MO, it all cleverly 'fractures the causal chain and muddies the waters'.  ????

10 hours ago, thefarangteacher said:

I did not pay a dowry either; I refused on principle. I also have not given any money to the family (I think I mentioned it in a previous comment but my wife keeps most of these money requests from me, though each one she has shared with me I have declined). My wife, however, has given money to her family. A lot of it. And what makes me mad is all of that money she has given already counts for nothing; the only thing that matters now is that she is not giving anything anymore. That tells me that no matter how much money I might give to the family, it won’t matter in the slightest the first time I say no. So why not start by saying no? 

Agreed. As I said, your situation is one I recognize quite well, and your stance on the matter is one I too adopted and think is most sensible. And it did turn out to be so.

Once went through period long ago, just after marrying my Thai wife, when I experienced circumstances very, very similar to your own (& your wife's) current 'predicament', shall we say.

30 years on and having gone through it and dealing with it in the way I did, and my wife did (I hesitate to say 'we did', as we had compatible views on it on the whole, but with critical differences of cultural background, etc).

Anyway....long story short : only advice I feel is worth saying without risk of influencing you towards a potentially negative outcome is that it helped me (& thus us) greatly to maintain a calm, non-confrontational resolve to resist all pressure to start being the foreign benefactor of deep pockets (they were NOT deep....still not????). 

Here's a thing though.......did you, when you married, pay any kind of dowry?

I did NOT.

So my rascally but likeable Thai father-in-law (now deceased) asked to 'borrow' 30k (a lot in 1991). I figured ok.....he'll pay it back. ???? Of course, he didn't. Me no happy, long time......until eventually realised, with some amused respect & appreciation, that the old canny devil had got his dowry alright. 

From that point on, began an eventual,  considerable liking for each other. 

Don't despair. You can get through it. ????

I can boast of very few distinctions in life and count myself a modest enough bloke, but one boast for which I think I may be excused, is being the very best at swearing & cursing. I really have no equal and could swear & curse for England at the Olympic Games, bagging at least one gold, possibly eight.

However, the injustice of what has been done to Pita and MFP - and the country - has me, for once, unable to summon any swear word or curse that is up to the task.......even though, yes, it had become obvious it would happen. Just eff**g speechless now it has. 

(But if one squints in this dark eclipsing of hope, then u can just make it out: that in the establishment's vile act, a martyr has been made who - with the party & its supporters behind him - will one day settle the account. ????

Comforting to consider...but for now, who comes off the sub's bench to be PM....and makes any happy difference at all to the whole elite-run, status-quo mess?)

13 hours ago, h90 said:

usurp from an illegal expired caretaker government which refused to go.....

After the failed election that government had expired. They did not do a coup against a regular normal government

We shall just have to disagree, h90, and leave it there.  

15 hours ago, madmitch said:

Thailand is unusual in that the truth is no defence. Loss of face trumps the truth in Thailand! These laws need urgent revision if free speech is ever properly allowed in Thailand.

So true, yes. 

16 hours ago, brommers said:

This is a naive and stupid reaction taken in anger. It will certainly not proceed to enactment but will harden the already strong case against MFP in the minds of the military back elements that control matters. MFP will not exist in a very short time because the Con Court will ensure it is dissolved, just like Future Forward.

Gotta disagree, brommers. There's 'the long game' (going along with conventional Thai political & cultural norms that may or may not offer opportunities for change - but never does) that has its merits, but then there's the moment to ride a good tide, and this is it. 

There is only one way to go here and MFP know it, not just to benefit themselves but for the country to do what its own party name conveys: move forward. So, in some ways, yes, to benefit themselves but only to allow them the chance to (by one day leading a govt) ......finally see that their way of governing & reforming the system can make the country realize its....cliche alert....potential.

In fact, in doing this, they are playing the long game imo (even though it may be the only 'game' they can play right now, I admit.)

Brommers, I respect your view but beg to differ in my own. 

On 7/13/2023 at 3:02 PM, PJ71 said:

Yeah, i did it last wednesday, good afternoon out although a bit chilly.

I like good wit, PJ71. Yours ticks the boxes. Nice. ????

(Be funnier still if you actually did do it last Wednesday and are reading my comment with a puzzled look.) 

28 minutes ago, bannork said:

They hammered Thanathorn down and Pita emerged. Hammer Pita down and another intelligent, articulate leader will emerge.

There's plenty of them in MF, it's the only party to belong to if you believe in progress rather than clan politics.

 

Yep. Agree.

Got a feeling Pita's got more 'bounce' in him than Thanathorn. Unfortunately for Thanathorn (whom I think will in time be back in the game, and should be), the 'fight-back' mood wasn't as palpable as it appears to be in Pita's case......imo.

There's a Japanese saying, 'the nail that sticks out must be hammered down' . 

Guess it's used in context where they who don't conform to norms get put in their place.

In this, the Thai context, the hammer blows came, as expected, but I don't think this nail will go down. Bend, but not go down. 

8 hours ago, champers said:

Nobody on here will be manning the barricades. Anyone tempted to should desist; photo recognition seems to work here.

I did make it clear enough (I hope) that anyone 'manning the barricades' (I'd rather say 'peacefully protesting') would be & should be Thais, naturally. 

25 minutes ago, Otter3737 said:

I agree but does not need to be violence      a General strke

In an ideal situation, yes, Otter, and if such a thing did happen, with a successful outcome, then I should know what true contentment is. 

But you are right, in a way, I don't dispute that. Just a little naive, perhaps (????).

'No, I CAN'T simplify....' ????????  

Look, I get where you're coming from with this post and the apparent sense of frustration behind it, and I'm on your side with that...????.....but you probably CAN simplify, right? If you really wanted to. To the extent any of us are 'dependent' on our gadgets, we mostly choose to be....me included.  

A mostly fair & spot-on assessment of what is and what might be. 

As much as the author rightly points towards how various schemes by certain parties ('schemes' as in 'scheming', imo....with rather negative connotations), are going on, in active & continuous flux, even as I type this.....I find something conspicuously evident & worth noting and that is how the MFP 'appear' to be, in any substantial way,  beyond the range of its opponents sniper rifles when it comes to accusations of disingenuous, underhand political hustle.....ie, ruthless, unprincipled scheming. I don't see this with MFP.

There are tectonic plates shifting around under Thailand's old rocks that are inexorably and irrestistably about to reformat themselves. 

And the old bully boys know it. 

'Faces five years in prison', in Thailand - as reported by the Thai media - generally means it's possible, according to what the law can potentially deal out (and thus is more attention-grabbing for news consumers), but if any actual penalties are imposed at all in cases like this (bearing in mind he only, in effect, made a bit of an <deleted> of himself, without malicious intent to offend or cause physical harm), they tend to fit the 'crime' with a more humane degree of good sense applied.*

The guy seems genuinely contrite, and wtf did he really do that was that wrong, anyway?

*Unless the person charged is a member of a progressive Thai political party, in which case, regarding any minor dismeanor of any nature (ie, picking one's nose), the right to the application of good sense  may be voided. 

Applying the logic (though it's rather hard) that only from having hit 'ROCK BOTTOM' can a real upward ascent towards some kind of lasting, positive development occur in a society, then I wonder if the senators & all the MPs should not just forget about the PM vote altogether and put the sleepy toad in the PM's seat, without any delay. 

Makes sense: get the toad in there, experience the inevitable consequences, then things genuinely turn towards the light. Hopefully in my lifetime. Right now: total eclipse.