Toolong

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?)

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

From soldier who helps direct criminal military operation to usurp power from elected civilian govt, to smiling, avuncular, apparently 'enigmatic' political player : quite the makeover, eh Prawit? But so quickly do you bring to mind the expression, 'You can't polish a turd.'

So true, yes.

Can't decide whether your approach is ridiculous......or shows a certain, admirably cocky degree of flair & panache in your disregard of such tedious bureaucracy! But whatever works for you, Celsius. ????

The use (or misuse) of defamation law in Thailand has done - imo - far more harm than any good it may have been designed to do. It appears - at least in my unlearned view - to be rather like a civil version of the lese majeste law, about which I perhaps should not say any more. (But as I said, I am no expert in matters of law and do concede that many other countries do have defamation laws. I wonder if it then depends on how the laws are applied & executed.)

Best little media opinion piece & nutshelling of the situation I've read so far. Somewhat naively idealistic in places but has, overall, an uncompromising tone that is refreshingly unequivocal. But as a foreigner based here who's long seen the dark goings-on here over the years but never himself - of course - been in a position to actually put his life or principles on the line in any way in support of those opposing those 'dark goings-on', I wonder grimly how many Thais will once again suffer death or injury or persecution in any likely fight-back against the ever-prevailing conservative fat-cats & big guns system.

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.

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.)

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.

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.

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 (????).

If it is against aseannow policy to allow posts that appear to encourage acts of civil disobedience that may include acts of violence that result in physical harm to parties involved or not involved in such acts, then I suppose it's more than likely moderators my disallow my comments and perhaps rightly so, but it's impossible for me to resist sincerely declaring that I think, sadly, that the only option for all those Thais justifiably outraged at the establishment's barefaced disregard of proper principles.....is an unprecedentedly large uprising against it. United in the single imperative of doing what is right, including they who wear red, yellow, orange or any darned colour, but all Thais of reason who may have become more enlightened by the whole ugly mess. And boy, is it ugly. Ugly, wrong, unacceptable. ????

How can he end a 'political career' that never started? He never WAS a politician. He was a soldier in a suit, with only a soldier's ill-fitting mentality to apply to the role of leading a gov't of a nation who didn't elect him in a free & fair, unrigged election. An arrogant, incompetent man-child who deserves to be chronicled in any modern Thai historical record as exactly that, without a single thing of merit to mitigate that record. If I didn't despise him so much I might even pity him for being the way he is/ was. (And for all that......I fear he won't actually be out of the scene at all, anyway, not by a long shot)

The strategy to repeatedly put forward Pita as PM candidate until term of junta lackey's...sorry, I meant senators.....authority ends, would be unprecedented, unlikely to happen, very problematic no doubt, frustratingly drawn out, do no good to economic stability and so on & so on.......but by golly, if successful would be SUCH a deliciously marvelous payback & lesson to the establishment. One can dream, no? Otherwise.....????????

'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.

If I typed what I would really like to say about these senators, in fact all of the junta-appointed senator-hustlers, then a moderator would simply remove/block it. So I apologise for the utterly pointless post.

I stopped reading your post after the remark about you self-cleaning your ears....in the way you describe. My friend, I have a long personal history of ear trouble. Very good ear specialist at a hospital in Bangkok told me, after a life-changing session of removing impacted wax, to 'never put anything in your ear smaller than your elbow.' How was it impacted? Years of pushing in ear plugs to sleep soundly. Same with cotton buds. ANYTHING being inserted into your ear by yourself WILL only result in an outcome opposite to the one you hoped for: wax impaction. Sounds like you need to a) get your ears cleaned by a specialist, and b) never put ANYTHING in your ears again, cotton buds, ear plugs, drops....you name it.

'Macroprudential policy'.....? Me: "Listen dear, I think we need to be more careful about our macroprudential policy." Wife: "So you wanna buy it or not?" Me: "Well......, yeah.....but....."

No. Just no. But maybe you're being witty in a cynical, rather sarcastic way. ????????