kimamey

They've not been named, but from the article. "Thai netizens tracked down the MP who posted the photo and bombarded his Facebook with harsh comments, forcing him to close his account."

Have to drink beer instead then.

Do insurance companies pay out if drivers don't have a licence, helmets ect? I know the insurance doesn't cover you if you don't have a licence. I can't see insurance companies paying out if they don't need to. Drink driving is only one part of the problem. It needs proper training, testing and enforcement. A big ask here.

There a certain amount of this in all countries. Some more than others. The difference between Thailand and the examples you give is that the ones in Thailand are mostly in the past. The double standards have already taken place and unless the Red Bull one leads to justice, which I doubt, that will be the same. In the US it's all ongoing. Hunter Biden's case is going through the courts. There doesn't seem to be any evidence against Joe Biden, but that might change so at this stage nothing has been dropped due to wealth or influence. Donald Trump doesn't seem to be able to avoid criminal charges either through wealth or position. In the UK we had the expenses scandal and some did go to prison for their part. Without looking it up Jonathan Aitken and Jeffrey Archer both went to prison despite a certain wealth and position. There's a list of 70s celebrities that went the same way. Jimmy Saville did avoid detection due to the danger of accusing him of acts without sufficient evidence, so it does happen, but if he had gone to court and been found guilty, he wouldn't have been able to avoid prison. I assume you're referring to contracts for PPE during Covid. I don't know if there's any possible litigation there, either in the future or ongoing. It may be that a lot of it, whilst being unethical, wasn't illegal. Let's hope that in future Thailand can change. The Thaksin story doesn't bode well, although that's not easy to talk about here.

It seems as if she was initially able to pay, but then something happened to prevent that. After that it's a slippery slope that's difficult to avoid. It also appears she's not trying to avoid paying, just not at the high rates. I give her credit for making an effort to earn money after losing her job. I don't know if she went to a bank first, and if she didn't then why not. I suspect its probably due to banks being a bit intimidating and doing it online just seems easier.

If you go to link it had the full list and dates.

I don't think that was for all the trips. 'It was estimated that on some trips as much as 5 million baht was spent with the permanent secretary flying by either First or Business class and upon arrival at the destination often travelling on a separate vehicle than the rest of the delegation.' Your last point is a very good one. As others have said, taking your wife and girlfriend would be a bold move, especially given how expert Thai women are with knives. Sorry for the bold text. It's probably due to copying and pasting

I don't know where you are but here in Mahasarakham it rained heavy on Tuesday night. Then again on Wednesday late morning. In between there's been lighter rain. Today (Thursday) it rained overnight and then eased off until it stopped. My wife works in Roi Et and they had rain on Tuesday where she was. She's just north of KhaoYai now for meetings so I'll ask her when she calls.

It does mention a dust allergy. I'm not sure how he manages to avoid dust that isn't in the carpets.

I thought the 4km limit didn't make sense but I heard that was one of the things they were looking at changing. Having said that I worked out the problem in about 15 seconds so I wonder which highly intelligent people came up with 4kms? I'm not sure a 6 month time limit is such a good idea either. I can see it getting spent too quickly, creating a sudden boom abs then taking back again. Or it will just get lost if its not used in 6 months which won't help the economy. Maybe be better to spread it out a bit.

That's what I was thinking. However he did say Thaksin would be treated like any other prisoner. That seems a bit contradictory.

Seen it on Reuters

You were suggesting that the previous poster, who thought that 95% of 'potheads' weren't using it for medical purposes hadn't checked that. I was just pointing out that neither had you. They didn't claim that as a fact, it was just what they thought. Are you suggesting my post was just to make myself seem superior, or amaze you? If you are then you're incorrect. I don't need to. Feel superior that is. I know there are some medical benefits and in the UK some years ago they started testing it to see if it could help with the symptoms of MS which my first wife had. Unfortunately it was too late for her. I'm unbiased as I don't use cannabis so it makes no difference how easy or difficult it is to get. If a cannabis user has a detrimental effect on me then that would be different. I did read a lot about cannabis research after I was sent a post on Facebook a few years ago. It claimed that cannabis oil could cure all cancers with no side affects. This seemed unlikely to me and the suggestion that this could be backed up by Googling "cannabis oil cures cancer" made me realise this wasn't someone with a very scientific mind. I tried instead "does cannabis oil cure cancer". It seems there had, at that time been several studies that showed that cannabis oil did in fact have some beneficial affects on some cancers. Not all cancers and not without side affects. However there were other studies that showed the exact opposite. At the time the theory was, and as far as I know still is, that it depends on the type of cancer, the cannabis, THC, CBD, or both and the delivery method. I also saw some links to "10 websites that prove cannabis cures cancer". I must have had nothing much to do as I read each website in its entirety. None said that cannabis cures cancer. I can only assume that cannabis has a detrimental affect on reading skills. All apart from one were tests on animals and all showed some positive results but the authors suggested that further research was needed and in particular on humans. One site mentioned a study that I'd already seen. This was on humans with a specific type of cancer and delivery method. From memory it was injected directly into the brain, so not something you could do yourself and definitely not outside a shop in Pattaya. That answers those who think it's big pharma who want to stop cannabis sales to the public as they can't make money out of it. They seem to sell saline solution pretty well, due to the delivery method This was a small group and on a not very common type of cancer so again more research was suggested. That's only cancer and there are other uses of course. Having said that if I saw 10 people smoking weed and I had to decide how many were doing it for medical purposes I probably wouldn't put it very high and I wouldn't be surprised if it was none.

A good point. He did some good things but that may well have been just to get votes for his own benefit and from what I've read the economic situation at the time, in particular the level of the baht made those moves easier. It won't be so easy this time, and to some extent it wasn't under Yingluck either. What seems to have been illegal activity, and some of it fairly obvious wasn't a good move for Thaksin, except economically of course. There's a certain similarity with Trump in the US. If he'd just accepted the election result and started planning for 2022 and 2024 he might have found himself in less trouble.

They need to get Thaksin back to prison first and I can't see that happening.

There's a new one near where my wife works on the road into Roi Et from the west. I'm sure that's Esso.

I'm not sure it was that unthinkable to anyone who's been paying attention, but I know what you mean. Perhaps now more people will start voting based on the actions of a party rather than who's leading the party. It's not the first time Thaksin has broken a promise and sided with the military for his own purposes.

That's very true. We don't know if there's a medical reason for them smoking cannabis or how many that applies to. But neither do you.

Are the biscuits for dunking in the tea? I assume that's what the tea money is for.

I think the reason for the online test was because it's something they do now, and because I'd been unable to renew my licence for 2 years they just got me to do it. I got a 5 year one as well. The first time I tried it was just a guy talking in Thai for ages, even though it was supposed to be in English. Then it just froze and wouldn't go any further. The next time a few months later it was OK, although I noticed it all seemed to be in Bangkok, so nothing like rural Thailand which is completely different. The reaction test, I understood but the pedal wasn't fixed down so it just shot across the floor when I stamped down on it. There was an old guy one time and he'd tried and failed 4 or 5 times by the time I left. The depth perception test, because it's in a box I hadn't seen before I sat down and it wasn't explained. I guessed what I thought it was but I wasn't really sure. They seemed happy with what I did and I got my licence. I had my wife, or girlfriend at the time with me or it might have been difficult. She also knows a guy who works there as well.

I had heard of it being used elsewhere. To be fair I'm in Mahasarakham in Isaan. No airport, train station, car rental ect. We do have 2 universities where you can watch the future brains of Thailand riding around without helmets but using an umbrella if it's raining so they don't get their hair wet. Particularly the guys. "Behind the times" is pretty much a description of Thai driving from testing to traffic law enforcement. The Department of Land transport and the traffic police could both add it as part of their logos.

Yes there is a problem with over staffing and not only in stores. I wonder what the reason for this is, given the quest for profits. Maybe it's a case of more people at lower wages. That way it's easier to deal with busy periods and any absences. If you get rid of some then the unemployment levels go up which isn't good for politicians, or those who are then out of a job of course. There's also overmanning in government offices. I had to go with my now wife to, I think it was the Ministry of Interior Affairs, but I may have got the name wrong. It was to get an Affirmation of Freedom to Marry. There were several people we had to see, most of whom seemed to do very little. One woman in a uniform just stamped all our papers without looking at them. She'd done them before I could sit down. As for migrant labour, it seems a good idea but there may be problems. I don't know the situation now, but I think the minimum wages brought in under the Yingluck government were only applied to Thais and not migrants. That probably played well to those who are particularly nationalistic or anti migrant, and looked as if it was helping Thai nationals. Unfortunately that just meant that migrants were cheaper. There may well have been less regulations, such as safety laws to follow. I know some factories were built or moved close to the border to make it easier to employ migrants. Employing Thais, would then be more expensive. My main point in my post was that it seems easy to just raise wages, and that does increase spending power but these things are rarely simple.

I don't know but it's made me think, isn't it illegal to criticise the courts? What would that mean for anyone claiming Thaksin's convictions were politically motivated and therefore not valid?

Raising wages seems a good idea but won't it just make costs higher for companies, thus making them less competitive than other countries with lower labour costs. If some of the cost could come from the rich owners of big companies then great, and it would help with the large inequality in Thailand. Can't see it happening though.

Why?