allan michaud

They certainly took a big risk in such uncertain times now they can line up at the barber shop and take a haircut.

Incredible the world is in such terrible shape and the stock markets keeps chugging along with only a couple minor hiccups.

That's because the financial markets are not based on any kind of reality. If they ever linked to the real world they will implode.

It's a basic rule of thumb that you need a 50k+ monthly salary in order to buy a new car on credit and run it. Many financial problems in low income Isaan are self inflicted. One hardly sees any red plates in the area now though.

My maid got a new truck with a very small downpayment. And we pay her WAY less than 50k/month! LOL

You don't need 50k a month, however there are plenty of Issan people who are simply too dumb to even understand they have to pay back loans.

My ex-wife's mother borrowed Baht 240,000 more than 20 years ago, they paid only the interest of 5,750 per month for 20 years before the loan shark finally came knocking on the door and demanded the principal be paid. They lost their house to pay the principal despite having paid over 1.5million in interest payments. They also borrowed a further 60,000 at 10% per month as the the house didn't cover all of the outstanding debt. Plenty of people bought cars etc they simply could not afford to pay for.

Dumber than a box of hammers. Sadly this is not an isolated case. It's hard to have sympathy when people are this stupid.

If true, shame in the US for this, he should be sent back to Thailand and locked up. Assuming of course that the Thai's have requested his extradition.

I can't believe NG funded them. I make documentaries and work with many others who do, too. When I work anywhere I get a media pass/visa. Yes, it costs a tidy little sum and makes you jump through extra hoops, but once you have it, it actually benefits you. Because it gets you access and cuts through red tape when filming. These people sound like amateurs. Whatever they're doing, they're making life difficult for the rest of us who are legitimate.

I too make doco's and could not agree more. I have also had dealings with this company and they should know better. I was asked to look at doing a doco in Indonesia a couple of years back and am all too aware how risky it would have been to do this. You are supposed to have a govt minder follow you everywhere and you have to pay for their travel, food etc (or you can pay a 'fee' to have them stay at home). If they needed to work under the radar then the would have been aware of the risks involved. Difficult for me to have much sympathy to be honest as they knew what they were doing was illegal. I am guessing the reason it's such a draconian penalty is they have trodden on some important toes.

Why is it I would suspect that any games offered to punters may be rigged to give the house more of a advantage,

Talk about playing cards with the devil. I do not see much chance of this man attaining a better /higher status in his next life nor many others involved in the BIB. A position lower than whale dodo may be more fitting.

Do you honestly think the average casino gives you a fair chance to win? A fool and his money are soon parted, which is why I will never gamble. It's for stupid people or the mega rich who can afford to lose.

I knew they would somehow run a BETA testing today,.... has anyone been experiencing any snail a**** connection problems, with Microsoft Outlook not working, Social Media down, and even Thaivisa not loading, from 12.00 pm to 1.45 pm?

Does anyone have any problems Facebook loading not corrrectly?

yes... they are making the changes now. many Thai forums very slow to load. just like what they do in China for external website. Makes it next to impossible to use.

TV has been slow for days. Unusable last night from within Thailand.

No everything works just fine.

Seems the most daunting task is to just figure out what the heck the group is there for....

Yes, having read that article I still have no idea what they are supposed to do. Still, it should result in paid holidays to some exotic locations for some lucky Thai representatives.

The train conductor definitely need an attitude adjustment at Army boot camp!

A testicular readjustment with a pair of steel toe-capped boots more like. Poor girl will probably never dare to travel on a train again.

:::looks out front window:::

2030, huh? Not sure that's quite long enough to fix all this. It's a nice thought, though.

15 years is way more than necessary, TIT, 6 months should be more than enough, in fact I think most Thai politicians would claim they could do it in 3.

"They discovered illegal materials including two bags of fertilizer, gunpowder, bolts, remote-controlled toys, electric bulbs and digital watches, according to Prawuth."

Since when are any of those items illegal? Gunpower is easily available from fireworks which seem to be available to the public, everything else is common and on sale anywhere in the world.

Making a pipe bomb is so simple, but it's the trigger mechanism that really needs some skill. As a 12-13 year old in the 70's in the UK me and friends messed about with fireworks and fertiliser and made a small pipe bomb, just to make a bloody loud bang. I won't go into details but is was the simplest thing to make (took about 5 minutes) and nothing used was illegal. We had no idea about fuses though and detonated it on a fire. It put a hole in a metal wheelbarrow we placed a meter away from the fire and that was just a small pipe 3 or 4 inches long. It was so loud it scared the crap out of us and we stopped messing about with fertiliser and pipes after that and stuck to fireworks.

They have this guy for a few days now and early this morning the headlines are:

Police say Bangkok bombing suspect is not cooperating

Then just over 6 hours later...

Thai army chief says Bangkok bomb suspect revealed three other accomplices

Once again the army proving to be better than the police.

Maybe the people involved in the CIA rendition program have been employed to use some their expertise in being especially nice to prisoners.

It's entirely possible that no Thai's were involved in the explosives. Most investigations into such events these days seem to identify the explosives involved, in this case nothing definitive has been announced, except to say it may be TNT. I am not prepared to start googling bomb making stuff for obvious reasons but I am pretty sure TNT is a fairly generic term. Also as the police mentioned "a plastic tank with chemicals, box of sodium carbonate" that would seem to indicate this guy was making his own explosives.

I have to laugh at people saying it must have taken months to organise. As long as you know what you are doing regarding making a bomb, just a few weeks is surely enough. None of the parts are uncommon and the chemicals required to make some explosives are also very common items, like fertilisers. As for the rest, 5 minutes googling tourist sites would have thrown up plenty of targets; 1 or 2 visits to see the situation; Spend a couple of evenings looking at escape routes, what's so hard? I do think it is probable Thai's are involved somewhere along the line but equally it could be a handful of foreigners, some of which know Thailand well. None of it is rocket science, the hardest bit is having a bomb making expert.

It's going to be interesting to see if they can find out who he really is.

“I don’t believe Thai people are the perpetrators … because the incident is a behavior that is too cruel for Thai people with Thai hearts to do to their fellow Thais,” Deputy Police Chief Chaktip Chaijinda said yesterday.

Yeah, right....

Fishermen throwing slaves off ships to die, murdering hundreds (probably thousands) of Rohinga and other refugees, back in the 70's they burnt communist rebels alive in oil barrels. Lovely people the Thai's.

Just looking at the pic on his tablet facial recognition would recognise this guy instantly if they have ID, Immigration photo.

all they have is a sketch to go on so I would have thought it would only narrow it down a bit, hardly definitive evidence.

There are going to be a lot of class action lawsuits filed over the failure to label that seafood products had been harvested using slave labor. I've been monitoring this as part of my work. This is just the tip of the iceberg. I'm not sure they can prevail on this claim for unfair and deceptive advertising. They're basically arguing that if the customers had known through labeling that slave labor was used to catch the fish, the customers would not have purchased the food products. This consumer protection law has never been used in this manner - to prosecute for failing to disclose something (other than a safety risk associated with use of the product).

In deciding whether it is an unfair and deceptive trade practice, the courts consider whether it violates some established concept of fairness, whether it is immoral or unethical, whether it is likely to cause substantial harm to consumers and whether it is dishonest and/or violates the general notion of fair dealing between sellers and buyers. The buyer does not have to intend to act unfairly. There is no intent requirement. If the conduct is conduct that most people would consider unfair, it is illegal whether or not the seller meant to act unfairly.

It's not like failing to disclose that your candy factory also makes candies using peanut products, an act that could endanger people allergic to peanuts. Or, labeling a product organic, which isn't organic.

So, the class action is quite speculative. However, there's going to be a lot of them filed, until some of the federal appellate courts make rulings.

I wonder if the fact that Nestle lists protection of human rights as one of its Corporate Business Principles could have any impact on a ruling?

For me that's the big issue here, they claim to be a responsible entity, yet it appears that is nothing more than hot air. If a corporation is going to make such a claim then surely they need to provide evidence that they have investigated people and businesses they are dealing with.

It's always the same here, the first thought is always to minimize the impact on tourism.

The bigger problem that effects Thailand from to to bottom is that few if any people get promoted due to competence, so you end up with people who have no idea what they are doing at the top making the decisions. Kid's in school don't bother to work or cheat because they know that it's a waste of time, the good positions in any job will go to the bosses friends or family, not to the most competent person.

I am amazed that no one has been publicly ridiculing the police chief for his statement the other day asking for software to sharpen images, as seen in TV series CSI. It is only found in Hollywood, yet it seems no one in Thailand is even aware of just how unbelievably dumb this comment was.

First and foremost Thailand needs to promote people based on merit not nepotism.

"Fugitive former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra was the first defendant in this case, but his case was suspended..."

Another drive-by shooting of Thaksin...

One knows immediately this was written by someone beholden to one side of the political divide. They cannot resist the urge to precede his name with 'fugitive'...That is always a dead give-away as to the author's orientation. That method is a mainstay of their campaign to malign their political nemesis who defeated them electorally. Hoping the politically motivated judicial thing and his self-imposed exile can be interpreted according to their spin.

Thaksin was Prime Minister at the time of this bank loan, and the courts, given their political predilections, can be predictably expected to link him where there was no evidence to do so. Insinuations is enough for them, which is good enough for Thaksin haters.

There is some question whether the witch hunt associated with this case has political motivations and undertones. It would be too much to expect our beloved, independent and politically non-aligned media to ferret out the realities.

Thaksin used his power to force the bank to give out a loan even though this company was on the non performing debtors list of that bank. So in essence he is as guilty as the rest and would have been convicted for a similar jail term.

Always nice of the red shirt supporters to try to rewrite history.

Bank - We dont want to give them a loan they don't even pay back the other loans

Thaksin - give the loan or else I am the PM and can make life real hard for your bank

Loan receivers pay their comission to Thaksin

Bank looses 10 billion

Not had to understand.. only for those with red glasses its a bit hard to see how their hero is one of the most corrupt people walking this earth.

Yep, not unlike the huge loan Thailand made to Burma for telecoms, which, surprise surprise went to Thaksin's company.

How can you issue a warrant for someone when you have no idea who they are?

I don't understand why we have heard nothing more about the Red shirt guy who posted the warning days before the bombing? He was quoted in the other newspaper as saying he got the info from the Facebook account of a political group.

Dreadful experience for the family.

Dreadful experience for the elephant too (on a daily basis), taken from it's mother, beaten into submission and miss treated on a daily basis. I feel for the family but no sympathy for the mahoot. Won't change a thing TIT.

They have no one to blame but themselves, the fact the Police Chief called for foreign countries to supply fictitious software (to improve blurry footage) that only exists in Hollywood (CSI) doesn't exactly inspire confidence. When the PM advises the RTP to watch Blue Bloods to help with their investigation is also doesn't inspire confidence in their ability to solve this case.

Half the problem is the top ranking officials appear to know absolutely nothing about police techniques yet they drive investigations and are always the ones to speak to the media, rather than putting up a real CSI person or investigator (I assume they do have them, Pornthip?) to explain issues rather than some self important idiot who just wants to get on television.

After the PM’s great idea for the RTP to watch episodes of Blue Bloods to help their investigation into the Erawan bombing, the RTP have proudly deployed a method long used across America by law enforcement. The “Selleck” as it’s better know, has been in use across America since the 1970’s and despite the development of more modern investigative techniques, the Selleck is now a well established and reliable law enforcement tool.

Pol General Watthefekaporn was quoted as saying “We need to be equipped like US law enforcement if we are going to solve cases like this. We have studied the US police and have identified certain vital areas we need to address. Firstly what we need most of all is some Hummers to drive around in, like that ginger bloke in CSI. Everyone knows that all the US police have them, so why not us? Also those glass walled labs are really cool, we don’t have offices like that.”

Pol Gen Wongindahead said “When the initial tests of the “Selleck” are completed we will be seeking assistance from the top law enforcement specialist in America, Jerry Bruckheimer, to see if he can help us set up a CSI lab in Bangkok.”

Disgusting but to be expected as this is not the first time my compatriots have refused for the same flimsy excuse.

"Anna hit the police vehicle he was sleeping in"???

Why is that woman smiling? very disrespectful.

"He said that he will be asking the government to purchase modern up-to-date Biometric scanners which will enable a wide range of screening options such as fingerprints, retinal and photographic scans."

And then to suggest this would have resulted in catching the suspect just shows his ignorance of the limitations of this technology. The image of the bomber is so low res you cannot get anything from it that would make retinal or photographic scans effective.

Now finger prints could work (possibly from the moto taxi or tuk tuk), but how is it Cambodia has had finger print scanners on the borders for several years now and yet Thailand does not?

Without spending a fortune on the very latest high tech cctv cameras they are not going to get useable images... at least not until they can get that magical CSI software, lol.

It is almost certainly el-crappo translation again. I know it's fun for some people who make these incidents the big highlight of their day. Surely he was simply mistranslated in saying that the police still do not know if the bombing was work of local people doing it for local reasons or if it was all an overseas job (like ISIS, Al Qaeda etc). Or if it was locals paying overseas bombers to do their dirty work. And they will take strong evidence from some source to make them ignore any possibilities. In other words "All bets are still on the table. We are following every lead but we have no clear line of investigation"

If you read the item carefully there are several other curious comments like bricks not exploding and something silly about the similarity between bomb fragments. I put them down to poor translation again. They were probably talking about getting the trajectory of thrown bricks to follow where they originally thought the bomb had been thrown from. etc etc. Try to use common sense and not seize on everything to make others look stupid when there are simple alternatives

Like the other day they were saying in the headlines that the other two or three people who masked the bombers actions had "been identified." What they were saying was that they were positive that they had identified that they were involved as accessories in the plot. Many times these mis-translations are just poor journalism, poor English or poor translation. Other times i think they are trying to sell newspapers by making news where there is none.

While I agree that much of this is just bad translation, some quotes cannot be ignored. From elsewhere today...

"Have you seen CSI?" Pol Gen Somyot asked reporters. ''We don't have that,'' he said, referring to high-tech (and totally fictitious) equipment that can render blurry footage clear.

Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha earlier suggested that police and Pol Gen Somyot should watch another show from US television network CBS, Blue Bloods, to help them with their investigation.

After 15 years out this way I have heard some real dumb comments from leaders and high ranking officials, but "Have you seen CSI?..." goes straight to the top of the pile of dumb-assed comments that I will never be able to forget. I am not sure how he can regain face after that.