Orac

I ordered a few electronic items from Amazon Global but must have been a year or so ago. They added in a duty/tax charge at purchase and delivered via DHL. A few weeks after delivery I got a credit from them on my card for overpayment of duty.

Obviously a much needed project....but 5 years to build 500kms of HV line....given a year for design???

60B Thb.....something like $US300mill. per year spend.....either madness or another financial budget typo!

Have you any idea how long it takes to plug that many 2m extension leads together.

Simply disgusting. Boycott it!

I somehow don't think they would notice if we did. Also, given that it has been there a while, I don't think any Thai Visa members who were patronising the place before will stop going there because of some moralising on TV unless they somehow didn't notice the Hitler link before hand.

Just chill out, people.

That entire story in Daily Mail, a sensationalist boulevard paper of lowest standards, is FABRICATED.

The photo of that supposedly "recently opened" fried chicken fast food joint in Bangkok is actually from a fried chicken restaurant in Ubon Ratchathani and at least 2 years old! Needless to say that this shop has CLOSED DOWN long, long ago (due to copyright infringement, by the way, because it had used 'Col. Sanders').

Secondly, that clothing store with the Hitler-Ronald cDonald hybrid gracing the entrance and mechanically waving its fibre glass arm used to be on the second or third floor of Terminal 21 shopping mall in Bangkok. The store was widely featured in the international press (including a report on CNN) and raised a storm in social media some TWO YEARS AGO and likewise has since CLOSED DOWN.

Given that, I very much also doubt the validity of the sources quoted in the article commenting on that non-existent "Hitler Fried Chicken" shop.

Lies, lies and more lies! Thank you once again, Daily Mail, for such outstanding, honest, impeccable and trustworthy reporting. My advice is: Fire your credited "Daily Mail Reporter" immediately.

And how ridiculous to see in this forum how many of you good people have actually fallen into this trap and took that FABRICATED story as fact.

To round off my ramblings, here are two pics from respectable British media. One served as the title page of a well-known satirical magazine, while the caricature appeared in one of the country's "better" daily newspapers. Both images date back to 2005. Enjoy these wonderful examples of biting British humour:

Anything that involves Andrew Spooner tends to be spun so far it makes me dizzy.

If you said noo you would be right but you said ngu. You would be better having a noo than a ngu.

If he got himself a ngu it might solve the noo problem.

After seeing these anti-corruption headlines for many years, I am beginning

to see the glimmer of a strategy here. For the powers that be, this strategy seems to be to steal as much money as possible, while at the same time have the media pump out these repetitive nonsensical headlines about how corruption is a serious problem that needs to be addressed. Yet for some reason nothing is ever done......

My general sense is that corruption instead of being addressed, has actually increased to mind boggling levels. The rice scam, and the proposed 2 trillion baht infrastructure project with its implied 30 percent looting levels are just fresh examples of that....

Just saw this from the post above. "......51.2% said corruption by government officials was acceptable as long as it improved their living conditions." This points to a fundamental flaw in the thinking of the average Thai. Corruption harms the public, as the money that is supposed to be for the public benefit instead is siphoned off to a Swiss bank account or a house in London. What the Thai public gets seems to be an endless series of shoddy infrastructure projects. Guess the payments to the mia nois at least stay in Thailand... :-)

You have to judge this 51.2% in the context of the red shirt supporters who benefit from corruption. It is intuitive that those that benefit from corruption are not going to oppose it because they are already accessories to the crime of corruption.

Not sure why you are singling out the red shirt supporters here - the 51.2% is taken from an article published in July 2009 under the previous government. By trying to make corruption a one sided, political issue with an 'its their fault' mentality, the endemic nature of the problem spread through all segments of Thai society will not get addressed.

Oooops.

Now how to get round this issue.

Looks simple enough to me - Kannit has even suggested it himself:

Kanit said the government could opt for legal investment methods, such as allowing private firms to jointly invest in the transport projects.

So all they need is some 'private' company to bid for the project who can then borrow the money to invest based on said contract (I am sure one of the government owned banks can assist in this) and then charge a fee for 50 years to the government.

Been going on in the UK for ages with the Public Private Partnerships and some companies are making a fortune out of it.

I think they had better station an army group with these NACC people in the provinces to protect them! Best of luck.

Better yet send the NACC into the army as well. Corruption is endemic in all areas of society and, though the government does need extra scrutiny, there are many areas where they have limited control which need cleaning up as well.

Just a matter of time until he is moved to one of the many inactive posts we often hear about .

It was reported in May that she was being moved possibly due to leaking information

Though no individual was named in association with the leaked report, Ms Supa Piyajitti was yesterday (May 27, 2013) removed from her role overseeing the debts and expenses group and placed in charge of the Office of the Permanent Secretary and the Fiscal Policy Office.

http://www.establishmentpost.com/thailand-rice-pledging-scheme-leak-sees-finance-secretary-moved/

Had a similar problem using a UK bank ATM card a couple of months ago but an SCB machine - everything looked to go through fine but no money came out. Tried again and got a contact your bank message and card was spat out. Tried in a different bank and same problem. When I rang my bank they told me because the first transaction had notified them that the withdrawl was being made it had put me up to my daily limit which is why it didn't work the second time and I would have to wait for the next day when my limit was reset. They told me to wait to see if the charge was automatically creditted which should happen if the actual debit didn't come through from the Thai bank and, if still there in 7 days to call them again. 24hrs later there was a credit on my account.

Quite impressed that they have got the cost pinned down to the nearest 1 million baht before the feasability study has been done!

Tried the Sunday carvery yesterday and was very impressed. 350 baht each with decent selection of meats - two beef, pork, chicken and ham. There was also roast lamb at an extra charge of 75 baht which was excellent as well.

nice selection of vegetables. roast and mashed potatoes, cauliflower cheese also two soups and three salads. The only thing i could be slightly critical of were the yorkshire puddings which I found a bit hard.

Service was top notch and my daughter really enjoyed herself in the play area which, as has been mentioned, is seperated from the main area so wouldn't annoy the GOM.

I used a freeplayo voucher so even with a spagetti bolognese for my daughter and drinks all I had to leave was a tip.

Will certainly be going back.

..............

"corruption is the new religion of Thailand".............(my quote)***

***copyright

Nothing new about it at all - it has been going on forever. The difference between Thailand and other more developed countries is they have seen how corrosive it can be to a society and dealt with it including stigmatising those who are involved.

I thought the bridge closed overnight. When i arrived at nakon phanom in the evening they could not pick me up so i stayed overnight in mukdahan. They did get me back to nakon phanom for late morning flight though.

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

"As the incident became more and more chaotic, voluntary police officers tried to charge the car, but they were fatally injured after the suspects drove into them."

So how many were killed - maybe because they were only volunteers they were not very important.

So with all these rallies over the weekend but no stories about violence at any of them, are we to believe that the cutting edge of Red Shirt mayhem was represented by the handful of Chiang Mai nutters involved in a scuffle the other weekend?

Either they are 'paid to cause trouble' or they are not. Either they are organized, or they are not. Can one of the knowledgeable members on this thread please let me know how we should interpret this dearth of bloodshed over the weekend? Did the money dry up? Are the red shirts not violent? Something in between?

There was a picture on twitter yesterday but, since it was by Andrew Spooner and didn't say where or when it was taken it is highly questionable, particularly since i cannot find it on any reputable news sources.

Andrew Spooner ‏@andrewspoooner 23 Jun

Violent, thug Thai fascists who've appropriated the "V Mask" attacking police in Thailand. http://twitpic.com/cyqn91

That pic was taken in 2006, someone has photo shopped the masks in

Doesn't surprise me given who put it out there.

So with all these rallies over the weekend but no stories about violence at any of them, are we to believe that the cutting edge of Red Shirt mayhem was represented by the handful of Chiang Mai nutters involved in a scuffle the other weekend?

Either they are 'paid to cause trouble' or they are not. Either they are organized, or they are not. Can one of the knowledgeable members on this thread please let me know how we should interpret this dearth of bloodshed over the weekend? Did the money dry up? Are the red shirts not violent? Something in between?

There was a picture on twitter yesterday but, since it was by Andrew Spooner and didn't say where or when it was taken it is highly questionable, particularly since i cannot find it on any reputable news sources.

Andrew Spooner ‏@andrewspoooner 23 Jun

Violent, thug Thai fascists who've appropriated the "V Mask" attacking police in Thailand. http://twitpic.com/cyqn91

Can't see what the fuss is about meds from BPH - if you don't want to pay their price just get them elsewhere. Both mine and my daughters doctors at BPH asked without prompting if we wanted them to write a prescription rather than get meds from the pharmacy there.

Where can I find a nice bungalow on the beach?

Not many around Pattaya. All I can think of is this place but it is a bit pricy and out of town.

http://www.sunsetvillage.co.th/

What a wonderful society they have there in the Kingdom. Women gets help for vicious domestic abuse by a known criminal and the Thai legal system will entertain the lawsuit against her for doing it. They say, "Thailand is for Thais". Good, they deserve themselves. And fortunately, visa requirements in most of the world's countries largely prevent them from bringing their shenanigans out of die Heimat.

The Thai system hasn't done anything on his behalf, he is only saying that he will file a suit.

But, yes . . . like the Flippies, make it difficult for them to move elsewhere

I love her so much, I sometimes beat her up, and I love her so much, that if she tells anyone I beat her up, I am going to sue her.

How come he has admitted whacking her and the police haven't done anything?

I think it has something to do with having to file police report within a certain time of the offense happening - though I could be wrong - it is six days or so.

What an amazing piece of excrement he is . . . he will probably call his buddy the Phuket police chief and charge her with making Thailand lose face

Given this families connections there would be no need to bother with a lowly provincial policeman.

I'd say the major's testimony sounds pretty plausible, at least in so far as the order that his unit received that day.

And to some of the posters here, if you real the full Khao Sod article, you'll see the guy testifying that his troops did have weapons -- armed with rubber bullets -- but that their rifles with regular bullets were stored away in their trucks.

The article clearly has the major testifying that his troops were attacked, fired on, and injured. But the article is silent on the subject of whether they returned fire with their rubber bullets, or eventually with live ammunition. The article is silent on those details.

At any rate, the PM at that time certainly didn't want a blood bath. He'd held off for weeks and did little while the Reds took over good parts of the city and refused to budge. The kind of order the major testified having received from his command would have been entirely consistent with the approach the government at the time had been taking.

Now, that's not to say no one from the Army anywhere in the city that day returned fire. Clearly, their orders allowed them to return fire with live ammo in the case of self defense. Given that the major reported that some 30+ of the 150 men in his unit were wounded by the Red Shirt attacks, that seems a pretty plausible argument for self defense.

Actually his testimony states that it was not only self defence that they were allowed to respond with live fire to:

He claimed that the order explicitly instructed the soldiers to treat the protesters as innocent civilians, and firearms would be used only for ′self-defense′ or when the protesters started attacking public properties.

Which seems a bit more vague. I am sure this does not mean they could shoot someone doing a bit of grafitti or kicking a wheely bin but it does give a lot of leeway for interpretation.

Preecha is in Ban Amphur just down the coast a few miles from Jomtien. Another good one is Poo Pen at the very end of Jomtien Beach.

"The government does not need to be paranoid about moves by anti-government groups wanting to topple it since it has majority votes in Parliament and has control over state funds," he said.

If the Democrat spokesman actually beleives this then he must have the memory of a goldfish given the number of governments toppled due to anti-government groups here be they protestors or military.

Thais should worry more about expanding their brain power. What mindless Thai would even suggest the preposterous notion that they should "breed" bigger Thais?

If you are unfortunate enough to have to watch Thai TV, there are numerous adverts making the claim that milk increases brain power as well.