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CaptHaddock
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Posts posted by CaptHaddock
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20 hours ago, bazza73 said:
As a non-American, I totally fail to understand how Trump has managed to stay in the Presidency. His latest comment to the grieving mother of a dead soldier " He knew what he signed up for " has to be the most insensitive ever. Doubled down by the fact he dodged military service himself.
In a worst case scenario, I can see the National Guard posted on every street corner in America. That's how much Trump has polarised Americans.
Apparently people find it hard to process that Trump is a psychopath. That's not a casual slur. He really is a clinical psychopath. Psychopaths are incapable of empathy. The smart ones can fake it, but Trump is not one of the smart ones. So, from time to time he will do or say something that displays yet again that empathy is utterly beyond him.
If he is like the psychopaths I have known, Trump probably thinks that everyone else is a psychopath like him, i.e. no one really has any empathy for anyone else. They are all just faking it like he is. That's how psycopathy works.
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50 minutes ago, Opl said:
Even for non-Americans, it's painfull to watch "America" as brand deeply damaged by Trump as POTUS combining paramount arrogance with abyssal incompetence in every circumstances.
Even before Trump, in what did any high-value of the American brand consist? The murder of up to one million Iraqis in Bush II's war, every single one of whom we know to have been innocent of involvement in 9/11 and/or developing weapons of mass destruction? So, the justification for those one million deaths was what, exactly?
Number of countries other that the US to have killed one million or more innocent people since WWII? Umm, Pol Pot's Cambodia. Am I missing anyone? The Russians, Chinese, and Muslim terrorists haven't even come close.
Speaking stupidly and crudely is not a war crime. Making aggressive war is a war crime.
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36 minutes ago, TKDfella said:
There were many 'offshoots' from this and I learned a lot. (I didn't brake the work permit law by the way as most of the time I did it for free.). I still do so, to a lesser degree of course.
But you have since learned that, according to the Thai Dept. of Labor that the definition of work that requires a work permit in Thailand includes unpaid volunteer work, right?
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The OP should have done his research ahead of time, before leaving the US. He should have opened multiple US bank accounts, transferred his landline number to a VOIP service, set up a mail forwarder to provide him with a mailbox with (what looks like) a US street address, changed his address at all of his banks and brokers to the mail forwarder's, setup his Google Voice account, made sure he had US credit cards with no foreign exchange fee, etc.
Having moved out of the US all of that becomes much harder to accomplish, and sometimes impossible.
This US credit union is willing to open an account for a US expat, if you can meet their documentation standards:
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On 10/11/2017 at 3:23 PM, Pib said:
This is going to be a tough one for Donald to decided on.
If he doesn't block release that means people will be much more interested for several weeks in the JFK docs versus Donald's tweets...less readers of his tweets.
But if Donald blocks the releases of the JFK docs this means people will continue to read his tweets.
Donald will probably go with the latter to ensure the attention remains focused on him....then again if he blocks the release that will gain him a lot of attention. Yeap, going to be a tough decision for Donald.
I expect the documents to be released, but it is unlikely that they will cause any stir. A batch of documents was released on July 25. So far, no one has found anything very interesting. For instance, it was revealed that Earl Cabell, the mayor of Dallas in 1963, had been a CIA asset in the 1950's, but it was always assumed that he had some kind of ties to CIA since his brother Charles had been a deputy director of the CIA under Dulles. That's the kind of tidbit these last files contain. Smoking guns are unlikely, although some additional CIA files on Oswald should be in the group, so it's possible.
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Biggs went through the four-year program in Thai language at Ramkhamhaeng U. at a time when very few foreigners attempted such a thing and speaks Thai very fluently. He deserves a lot of credit for that. I have come across some of his think pieces in the Bangkok Post, which were not very interesting.
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1 hour ago, Jingthing said:
Sadly, John McCain is now very, very ill.
So this speech can be seen as historic.
A very moving total take down of the isolationist fascism of the trumpist movement, without even mentioning trump or fascism.
You have to be careful about taking all the hype about McCain at face value. "Isolationist" in this context is a pejorative term applied to those Americans who oppose the perpetual war program of Bush, Cheney, and the US government since. The warm gloss on the term "Globalist" suggesting a positive engagement with the world is just propaganda.
McCain is the enemy of my enemy, so that's fine, but he's been a lifelong conservative and militarist.
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6 hours ago, Thakkar said:
It’s not as innocent as them just being dupes.
As a non white person who grew up around racists, I *felt* I knew why Trump won. But everyone kept telling me I was wrong—that it was really economic anxiety. Well, turns out my spidey sense was right:
On July 3 researchers released the most comprehensive survey data yet aimed at understanding what actually went down in Election 2016. The group includes academics but also right-leaning outlets such The Heritage Foundation and left-leaners like the Center for American Progress.
They [voters] did flock to Trump. But the reason they did so in enough numbers for Trump to win wasn’t anxiety about the economy. It was anxiety about Mexicans, Muslims and blacks.
Here’s how they put it in academese: “What stands out most, however, is the attitudes that became more strongly related to the vote in 2016: attitudes about immigration, feelings toward black people, and feelings toward Muslims,” writes George Washington University professor John Sides. He notes that the media focused on less-educated whites, but negative racial attitudes fueled by Trump were a big motivator for college-educated whites, too.
A substantial share of Trump voters “appeared to embrace a conception of American identity predicated on birthplace and especially Christian faith,” Sides found.
It makes sense, considering the candidate himself was maligning Mexicans and openly calling for banning Muslims.
“I’ve got three words for you: scared white people,”
“I get it, nobody wants to be told what they don’t want to hear,” Parker says. “People want there to be a more innocent explanation, about jobs or trade or something. But sorry, everyone — it just isn’t there. My plea to people is we ought to start focusing on what’s real.”
Racism is the key to understanding American history and much of American politics. There is deep and persistent racism. However, racism is not a constant in American life. For example, during WWII the war in the Pacific was characterized by deep race hatred against the Japanese. For instance, some units would have a motto like "We Take No Prisoners," indicating that they simply killed Japanese prisoners, an action in deep violation of the Geneva Convention. The US military didn't operate like that in Germany although there was sporadic killing of German prisoners. The war propaganda against the Japanese was exterminationist in nature. In addition, in 1942 the American government locked up 120,000 US citizens of Japanese descent in camps in the desert. No such action was taken against German or Italian Americans.
Nevertheless, after WWII racist American attitudes against the Japanese began to change to the point that by the 1960's Japanese-Americans intermarried with Caucasians without opprobrium. Japanese-Americans became the second richest group in America on a per capita basis. Anti-Japanese hatred resurfaced in the 80's at a time when Japanese carmakers were out-competing American car companies.
Anti-black racism has far deeper roots in America than feelings against the Japanese, but it too depends on the economic climate as to how strong it is at any moment. So, the question is why has it re-emerged so strongly in the current environment when the US economy is doing fairly well. The answer, in my opinion, is that the economy isn't doing well for the working class and hasn't been since the seventies. Here is a graph that gives the picture. In the post-war period until 1973 American workers' income grew along with the gains in productivity. But from 1973 on workers' incomes stagnated while the gains in productivity were garnered almost entirely by the upper 10% or, especially, the upper 1%, whose share of the national income grew during roughly this period from 9% to 24%.
This profound change and the declining economic expectations of the working class put those Americans who were losing out into a bad mood, which they then direct toward traditional targets, especially, but not only, black people. The chant of the white racists in Charlottesville, "Jews will not replace us" is an economic complaint. The earlier post-war period, by contrast, in which economic gains were broadly shared across the workforce was the same period in which white Americans, feeling generous, acquiesced to the black civil rights movement, despite the significant pushback from diehard racists.
The well-being of the white working class is indeed threatened, although not by Muslims or black people. Racist demagogues, such as Trump, have always been ready to capitalize on their fear by turning it against the helpless.
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When the English speaker responds to his wife's question of where he is going with, "I have to see a man about a dog," he is pointedly refusing to answer the question in a way that will be understood by the questioner. He is not trying to mislead her.
A Thai would achieve the same effect by replying, "จะไปข้างนอก."
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There is something that I find interesting about Trump which doesn't draw much comment. When Trump says things like this latest false accusation against Pres. Obama, he knows that it is is not true, but he is not simply lying, because his intention is to make it true by force of his personality. This is the worldview that is uniquely that of psychopaths and which leaves normal people at a huge disadvantage, because they can't imagine how anyone can think like this. Trump does not experience a world full of both truths and falsehoods. He inhabits a world only of enemies and dupes. His perpetual goal is to defeat his enemies by coercing the dupes into his own worldview via force of personality. Therefore, the extent to which his falsehoods gain currency is a pure measure of his own potency and nothing else.
It's like listening to real poker players talk about playing poker. They never talk about the cards, because in the long run the cards don't matter.
The goto guy for understanding the peculiar and peculiarly vile personality of Trump is Tony Schwartz, who wrote Trump's book during the course of which he spent every day with Trump fro eighteen months. Schwartz appears on US news programs from time to time.
One corollary of the psychopathic mindset of Trump is that in his view he is the only person. There is no one else. Schwartz pointed out that during their eighteen months together Trump never got together with a friend, because he had no friends. Schwartz never heard the name of Ivanka or any of Trump's other children mentioned. Certainly he never had lunch with any of them, for instance.
Worth looking up interviews with Schwartz on youtube. Trump is at once fascinating and repugnant in the manner of a reptile.
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4 hours ago, Jingthing said:
Some more insight, from the PAST, about understanding trump. As an AGITATOR.
A brilliant analysis.
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8 hours ago, boomerangutang said:
It also doesn't help the equation, when religious/church groups and cults (like Scientology and Jehova's Witness) are 100% tax-exempt.
To say nothing of the Catholic Church, the Baptists, etc.
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6 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:
I bought a new computer in LOS. Several replies have pointed out that a bogus OS may have been installed. If I get a "fresh install" done what guarantee do I have that it isn't also a fake? They didn't include a disc with an OS on it when I bought it and Power Buy don't sell Lenovo with an OS installed.
Of course, you can't know. You can take steps to increase the likelihood that you have a clean OS, e.g. by downloading a disk image from a trusted source such as Microsoft's website and verifying the checksum. That would give you a high degree of confidence, but even taking those steps you could not be 100% sure. Modern pc operating systems contains tens of millions of lines of code. Microsoft has in the past shipped OS disks already infected with viruses. There is no way to verify them 100%. All protection measures are probabilistic.
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The short answer is that of course there is no "simple" way to verify that a computer has not been compromised. If there were, life would be a lot simpler. There are arbitrary ways that an operating system may be hacked. The more you know about systems the more likely you are to detect penetration.
If you are worried that your computer has been penetrated then you should do a fresh install of the operating system. I understand that many business travelers to China do a routine full wipe and reinstall of their laptops on return to the West.
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On 10/15/2017 at 9:26 AM, tgeezer said:
David's reply prompted me to look up ไปยิงกระต่าย and see that there are two euphonisms used for urinating or defecating. The other one is ไปเด็ดดอกไม้ . Shoooting a rabbit is done standing and picking flowers is done squatting down. These may work but I feel that they are more equivalent to "number one" and "number two" in English.
As you can tell it isn't easy to generate matching idioms, there must be many since so many people speak English but they are unlikely to be universal in my opinion.
Sent from my iPad using Thaivisa ConnectClose. ไปยิงกระต่าย is the euphemism for male urination. ไปเด็ดดอกไม้ is the euphemism for female urination.
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28 minutes ago, taipeir said:
You don't get to make up your own facts to suit your narrative.
Ireland for one has a massive IT and pharma industry with very large numbers of foreign professionals working in them as well as locals. It's not only about tax. The most important part is being an open economy and being able to bring in foreign workers pretty easily!
You totally ignored Israel and silicon valley and London.
You are wrong about Singapore which is absolutely dependent on foreign talent and investment. The two go hand in hand. Same in Ireland (which houses European HQ of most American IT multinationals).
I don't have time to go through them one by one.
Here is a relevant article about Vietnam.
I work in high tech in Asia at the moment China is upgrading itself at a tremendous pace everybody else are minnows compared to them. In our industry they account for over 70 per cent of entire Asian sales! Incredible.
Last point: Thailand is in a very good location in South East Asia. It could most definitely be developed more as trading center and logistics hub and regional business location.
Ireland has a pharma industry the way Thailand has an auto industry, i.e. they rent out local workers to foreign companies. Big Pharma in Ireland is all foreign companies: Lilly, Abbott, Boston Scientific, Glaxo, drawn to Ireland by its low corporate tax rate as well as its well-educated workforce. There are virtually no foreign workers and no Irish-owned companies of any scale.
In the US Silicon Valley is where it is because of its proximity to universities like Stanford and UC Berkeley, which produced its educated workforce. Similar, if smaller, tech centers have grown up along Route 128 in Massachusets, in Pittsburgh near Carnegie-Mellon, and near UT Austin. The fondness that Bill Gates and Steve Jobs had for foreigners with H-1 visas was strictly about cutting compensation costs.
Singapore tries to attract educated foreigners, but not because it doesn't produce its own. With a population of only 5 million, Singapore has two universities rated among the top ten in Asia, hardly a case of developing their economy by relying on imported talent.
South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan did not become rich countries by relying on foreign workers.
You overestimate your own importance.
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2 minutes ago, taipeir said:
Singapore.
Ireland.
Hong Kong.
Australia.
New Zealand.
Lots of examples out there.
If greater London was a country you could throw it in there too.
Human talent is key in moving up the value chain.
If these not enough local talent it can be imported. They can also be used to train up locals, it's not either or!
Sent from my SM-G955F using Tapatalk
You don't know much about development. Singapore and Hong Kong are specialized depot economies based on trade only due to their size and location and do not offer an example that can be followed by countries without those advantages, such as Thailand. Although Singapore does attempt to attract foreign talent they nevertheless mostly grow their own, for instance, via the two of their universities that are ranked among the top ten in Asia. Ditto HK. Ireland has a highly-educated work force, but their economy is mainly based on tax incentives provided for foreign companies, without which they wouldn't have an economy. Immigration to Canada, Australia, and the US has mainly been uneducated workers. All of these three countries developed their own education systems to supply educated workers and did not rely on the importation of workers educated elsewhere. Indeed, the US limits the number of foreign-trained doctors permitted into the US healthcare system (via the bottleneck in the medical residency system) in order to maintain high compensation levels for US doctors.
For a country to develop from a middle-income economy, such as Thailand's, to join the group of rich countries, developing a competitive education system is a requirement. While many countries do make efforts to import educated workers, no country ever became successful relying on immigrants.
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41 minutes ago, Srikcir said:
The drawback is that there is a point where such educated immigrants begin finding better employment within their own country driven by modernization, social and judicial equality. On the last two aspects Thailand is now failing in part to ineffective government legacy, culture and tradition.
In practice a better educated domestic (vs foreign) work force can work against a nation in the form of brain drain. This is true for even developed countries.
https://www.voanews.com/a/us-trying-to-stop-reverse-brain-drain-131899558/146669.html
Of the countries in the post-war world that have succeeded in joining the group of rich countries, none have done so by importing foreigners. So, that would be South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and Finland. You could add the People's Republic of China if you consider GDP instead of GDP per capita. All of these countries developed excellent education systems to train highly educated work forces.
Where did you get the idea that importing a foreign work force is a model for successful development?
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On 10/13/2017 at 4:19 PM, craigt3365 said:
If I remember correctly, it was partisan bickering that caused many of the problems. Health care is a tough thing to get right. Remember Hillarycare? LOL. They can't get it right after all these years. They should all be fired.
The Republicans aren't trying to get healthcare "right." Their goal is to lower taxes on the rich. Period. Since Obamacare raised some taxes on the rich, they are opposed to it. Rich people don't need health insurance.
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43 minutes ago, Jingthing said:
Very American?
Surely, I'll never live that down.The flip side of that is that in tallying up their assets I'll bet none of the Americans estimated the present value of their Social Security and other annuities/pensions, if any. Although I did not answer the poll I can tell you that I estimate the present value of my own SS benefits (including my wife's eventual benefit based on my earnings) to be about two million dollars.
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1 hour ago, Neeranam said:
Like I said, this is about impeachment not bad things about him. However, good things should be said too.
He a good businessman, kinda the Taksin of the USA.
Look at the stock market.
Sorry I took the bait and am off topic.
Trump's businesses went bankrupt four to six times. Here's a Dutch documentary on how he laundered money of Russian and Central Asian dictators and thieves. Trump is a good businessman in the same way that any psycopath gangster is a good businessman.
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13 hours ago, Thongkorn said:
Europe is developed, Just look at it, two world wars, and infighting at the present, British pensioners deciding whether to eat or keep warm due to capitalist companies, So maybe not worth being developed,
A highly ignorant attitude. Countries definitely want to be developed;
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At the time the land tax was proposed my view was that it would never become law, because the wealthy and the middle class, who supported the coup, would successfully resist it. Now, according to the Newspaper Whose Name Cannot Be Spoken, it appears that the proposed land tax law is indeed unlikely ever to take effect.
Do you think Trump will be impeached or forced to resign?
in World News
Posted
I disagree. The word "psychopath" is a technical term with a precise meaning. There are mean people and even dangerous criminals who are not psychopaths. Psychopathy is a deep-seated personality disorder. These people do not change and they are not like us. They lack not only empathy, but a conscience and so are capable of anything. Identifying Trump as a psychopath is not merely a way of denigrating him; it is a definition like pointing out that a snake is a reptile, not a mammal.
Nearly every intellectual distinction is out of reach for Americans, because they are so poorly educated. The weakness on which psychopaths prey is the inability of ordinary people to comprehend just how different and incorrigible psychopaths are.