samjaidee

How the <deleted> does the head of the (more-or-less) democratically-elected government not get to tell the army what to do?

Never mind... I know... TIT.

Thank you for saying it.

The Beaulieu National Motor Museum was founded in 1952 by Edward Douglas-Scott-Montagu, 3rd Baron Montagu of Beaulieu as a tribute to his father, who was one of the great pioneers of motoring in the United Kingdom, being the first person to drive a motor car into the yard of the Houses of Parliament, and having introduced King Edward VII (then the Prince of Wales) to motoring during the 1890s.

That's more than three times the diameter of the Channel Tunnel.

The Chunnel is 50km long. This one's going to be 100km long.

The Chunnel's deepest point is 75m. This one is going to be deeper than Everest is high.

The Chunnel took six years to build this one is going to be done in two.

The longest road tunnel in the World is 24.5km.

Good luck!

How do they know how many people are unemployed? If it was a welfare state then they would have the information about those claiming unemployment benefit. There must be so many people outside the tax system surely any figures quoted can only be guesses.

Very ugly news indeed, on several points.

1. Where was everyone during the 'prolonged abuse' part? How much abuse is 'ok' before a mother decides... 'maybe I'm not going to keep my precious baby son around this psychotic asshol_e loser' anymore? The mother is definitely partly at fault here, and she will no doubt be stuck with guilt from the death (whether it is denied on the surface or not) for many years. Recommend sterilization to protect future potential children from her neglect.

2. I am very askance at Chula hospital's 'referral' to Sri Nakharin Wirot. It's not like they're right around the corner. Most likely, as a non-paying (or 'poor card' paying) customer, they simply turned her away for lack of funds. The delay possibly cost the life of the child. In a civilised country there would be an investigation to see if there was criminal liability, but good luck with that here.

You may remember a group in the '30s and '40s who sterilised thousands of people because they felt they should not have children.

This group I'm referring to were called the Nazis.

You should be very careful what you wish for.

This is a quite laughable opinion piece. Let's start with the claim in the first "shock and awe" that "no country in the world would allow its second airport to be inundated like this." As if losing a major airport to shutdown might be a major security breach. The author makes this claim, despite the fact that Suvarnibhumi airport was kidnapped by a political group known as PAD and shutdown with a "sit in/camp in" from September 26 , 2008 to December 5, 2008, plus a disputed number of days to do a security check, check out equipment and cleanup. The government and the military just standing by watching. It is totally bewildering how a The Nation opinion piece could slip by the editors with this frivolous and preposterous claim.

Since The Nation doesn't publish bios of its opinion writers, one can only wonder about this one. The writer goes on to list several additional "shock and awes", a characterization that he or she probably lifted and plagiarized from the USA's use of that expression in the opening salvos of bombing Iraq during Bush II. The expression shock and awe is typically used in a military context to reflect utter military rapid dominance. For example, something like the 2 AM 2006 military coup, which abrogated the existing Thai constitution, and filled the streets with tanks, might be "stretched" into referring to it as "shock and awe", if the author was looking around for some Thai illustration. It is unfathomable that this The Nation opinion piece would refer to any, let alone all, of these ten incidents of shock and awe as such. Again, on the basis of this type of preposterous writing and utilization of expressions without understanding their meaning is bottom feeding journalism at its worst.

Spot on. To say the author plagiarised the expression "Shock and Awe" is a little unfair as it is in common usage now but it is, however, a criminal misuse of the expression. It is, overall, a lazy, insipid opinion piece.

The clean-up of BKK should have been done years ago!.

Here Here.....

Unfortunately, Preventive Maintenance is a concept that South East Asians seem to be completely unaware of. It involves common sense which is, as you all know, very rare in SE Asia.

All Westerners have common sense, to one degree or another, and that common sense tells us we must maintain things to get maximum usage from them.

Thais just don't get it!

That is a sweeping statement. I see people taking much better care of their expensive fishing gear then me and they are Thai. I kinda think it depends on the person and how much the maintenance costs.

But i think the case here is that BMA did allocate the budget but it just disappeared in someones pocket.

I used the word 'seem' in my first sentence so that it wasn't a sweeping statement. I can only comment on my own experiences of living 12 years in both Thailand and Vietnam. I'm not a great fan of hearsay. An example would be maintaining a motorbike. Most, not all, SE Asians I know, regardless of wealth will only take their motorbike to a mechanic for two reasons; an oil change or it's broken down. I have mine serviced twice a year. That's why it doesn't breakdown.

I can't comment on the BMA. That would be commenting on hearsay. What's the point in that?

The clean-up of BKK should have been done years ago!.

Here Here.....

Unfortunately, Preventive Maintenance is a concept that South East Asians seem to be completely unaware of. It involves common sense which is, as you all know, very rare in SE Asia.

All Westerners have common sense, to one degree or another, and that common sense tells us we must maintain things to get maximum usage from them.

Thais just don't get it!

You work as a teacher, yet don't know how to use 'losing' in a sentence?

Is 'loosing' even a word?

Bl**dy H*ll....The English police are on patrrol early this morning....

I think an English teacher complaining about education priority in Thailand is fair game, don't you?

The obvious error I noticed was the use of 'effected' rather than 'affected'.

Come and work in Vietnam. You'll earn double what you earn in Thailand with similar living expenses.

.

A 30 year-old man....

suffocating and murdering someone.....

over children's toys.

.

Not that I'm justifying the murder but I suspect you know as well I as do that some toys are very collectible and have the potential to become very valuable. Had she known that then she possibly would have never been in a position where he felt the need to kill her.

Remember, to get a visa on arrival in Vietnam you must apply on-line, in advance, so the visa is waiting for you at the airport. It's not like Thailand or Cambodia where you can just turn up and get a visa.

I believe the contradiction is this:

From Article 1

"The Chao Phraya River's water level in Bangkok will likely rise to 2.6 metres [above normal sea level] over the coming weekend. It's going to be higher than the embankment," Bangkok Governor MR Sukhumbhand Paribatra said yesterday.

From Article 2

The level of the sea is expected to rise to about 2.45 metres from Thursday to Monday, though the embankments along Chao Phraya are 2.5m high.

That extra 1.5 meters might make a big difference, I should think. BTW, elsewhere I've read articles on this board that claim the embankment is on average 2.5 meters high. It sure would be nice to know whether that latter number is indeed an average or a minimum.

2.6m - 2.45m = 0.15m or 15cm.

Even my Grade 4 students can do basic addition and subtraction.

Top priority for US is to get our troops and equipment out of Iraq and back home so Navy has other things to do and perhaps Thailand is being sensitive to those commitments but we would help anyway.

I hope Thailand gets through this OK. Its just a lot of polluted water. However, the solution to pollution is dilution so it won't be as bad as it otherwise would be without the massive rains.

The ships are now on their way to Japan so your argument about Iraq doesn't have any relevance. Sorry.

We should send over some FEMA guys to help out....

You are joking, aren't you? Read this.

"After being roundly criticized in a slew of media, congressional and government reports, the Federal Emergency Management Agency's internal watchdog Friday returned its own verdict on the handling of Hurricane Katrina: The criticism against FEMA is largely deserved.

In a hefty 218-page report, the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general writes that the federal government and FEMA received "widespread criticism for a slow and ineffective response to Hurricane Katrina."

"Much of the criticism is warranted," Inspector General Richard L. Skinner writes.

The report gives an account of FEMA's recent history and response to Katrina, covering ground that has been well-plowed in recent months, although adding some details.

It describes manpower problems, a decline in planning for natural disasters as attention focused on possible terrorist scenarios, and confusion over the roles and responsibilities of officials in responding to disasters."

It would seem that the Americans are no better than the Thais in circumstances like this.

1 EM ball can decontaminate 4 sq.m. At what depth? 1 meter? 5 meters? 10 meters?

To quote a figure in square meters when talking about volume would appear to have little or no relevance. Surely there must have been journalists at his news conference asking questions.

It would take 400 EM balls to decontaminate 1 rai. Using the figures quoted above they would require 1.4 trillion EM balls to decontaminate all flooded areas? How, exactly, would they evenly distribute them? They really do live in some kind of fantasy land.

well grit doesnt wash away as much as sand might...

as for it actually eroding - or the professors/team just trying to milk the new government for a job that will cost millions (but realistically just a few trucks of sand dumped and the rest put in the pockets of the new scammers... the build a new beach scam has arrived)

QUOTE: WE WILL have to add sand again every 1014 years

LOL - would you trust anyone who comments a line like that?

It's obviously a typo and should read every 10-14 years. Don't you think? Making a joke out of it just makes you look foolish.

Legal or illegal construction; it makes no difference.

The main thing causing landslides is corruption within the local administrative bodies.

Why would they enforce existing laws when they're paid not to?

Anyone who thinks otherwise is living in some sort of fantasy world.

"Belhaj was detained by the CIA in Thailand in 2004 following an MI6 tip-off, allegedly tortured, then flown to Tripoli, where he says he suffered years of abuse in one of Muammar Gaddafi's prisons," the Guardian reported.

I find the above quote from Belhaj somewhat strange. We are all well aware of what happened to the enemies of Gadaffi as the finding of a mass grave a couple of days ago shows us oh so plainly.

Yes I see no reason that Don Muang could have been a site for a covert detention and interrogation centre as it was in fact a military base first and foremost.

"MI6 had been able to tell the CIA of his whereabouts, after his associates informed British diplomats in Malaysia that he wished to claim asylum in the UK.

Now according to reports Belhaj wants to claim political asylum in the U.K. when it appears he is on the winning side in the Libyan conflict.

One is led to believe that that venerable bastion of the British press, 'The Guardian," has been sold a pup

He wanted to claim asylum in 2004, not now. Can't you read?

I find it difficult to believe the science minister could be this stupid.

The idea to make run-off from the North flow faster out to the Gulf of Thailand was suggested more than 10 years ago by the King.

Ah Buddhism, the peaceful religion, unless you are Thai

Buddhism is a peaceful philosophy regardless of where it is.

Any violence or threats of violence have nothing to do with Buddhism.

Here in Vietnam you're far less likely to be stopped if you're a foreigner than if you're Vietnamese.

i am naive about that

for what you use this exactelly?

regards richard

Richard, if you're able to read this forum then surely you're able to type "Diphenhydramine" into Google. The first page up is Wikipedia; that should tell you enough. If you want more information then there are lots of other sites that should give you the information you require.

Welcome to the world of the Interweb.

The judge obviously did not mean "katoey" in I guess what is its literal sense, "a hermaphrodite", but it in its more common usage to mean a male transvestite or transsexual.

In a court of law words can only be used in their literal sense, especially by a judge.

Canada is on the list???

TheWalkingMan

........and Vietnam's not on the list. Strange list.

I have yet to find a genuine DVD in Vietnam!

If you've been bitten by a scorpion then I'm not sure why it hurts. If you've been stung then that's a whole different ball game!