spidermike007

Well the big question is whether or not Terravada Buddhism is an oddball form of Buddhism, or whether or not there's anyone in Thailand that's actually practicing it.

I've been to the PI several times and I like the place, but I don't feel secure there that's all. You may feel secure there, I don't. Many of my friends don't, it is what it is, I'm not making this stuff up. I do agree that it's easier to make friends there, I do agree that the place is a lot more Western, and I do agree that it feels like a foreign country, rather than a distant planet, which Thailand is.

Both candidates are a complete disaster, Joe is 81 going on 95, and the Democrats should have asked him to step aside, at the very minimum they should have asked him to get a real VP candidate not this horrific imposter Harris. Trump, where would I start? Who wants a mob crook as the leader of a democracy? A second term would enable him to the point where anything is possible, Mussolini comes to mind, fascism comes to mind. Anything but a free and open democracy.

It used to be an incredible scene the bars were fantastic, and the clubs were chock full of spectacular women. According to a friend of mine who lives there that's all gone underground, the bars started charging huge bar fines, and everything went online. So the nation is a pale shadow of its former self in that regard, though I think it's still possible to get with beautiful women, you just have to use different methods.

Though you are likely right, it was his store that these punks were hanging out in front of, loitering, smoking, and carrying on, so he certainly had every right to ask them politely If they could move on or stop smoking. I guess there was no way for him to know that they were juvenile pathological maniacs that he was talking to. Lock them up. They belong in a cage.

True. And what shocked me was that he was ousted from immigration after years of xenophobic rants, he disappeared for years and then he resurfaced as the national deputy director. How on earth did that happen, and why on earth did somebody make such an incredible mistake? How did this fool get promoted, it's mind-boggling that these guys are able to maintain these high positions despite consistent misbehavior. There's nothing clean about this guy, that was all just PR, that was just one big smoke job that many people bought into.

Which is a wild concept. I think the fear of losing face is perhaps the single most significant weakness most Thai people have. It is a pathological fear. Who cares what people think of you? For those of us with high self esteem, it just does not matter. Sure, close friends and family. But strangers on the street? Who gives a rat's butt about this? It means nothing what they think, nor what they say about you. Nothing, less than zero. They count for nothing. They are just people, and people you do not know, nor will ever see again. Face is rife with self doubt, and by subscribing to this weakness, and man or woman is made a far lesser person. I consider the practice of face to be the polar opposite of the practice of Buddhism, which teaches the need for introspection, contemplation, owning up to a problem, and taking responsibility for issues, problems and tragedies that you create in life. As many of us know, a percentage of the Thai population lives within fairly small boxes, of social convention, traditions and expectations, especially on the part of the family. That is not a life that some of us choose. Those that are bold and courageous, will find a way to break past conventions, and live a fulfilling life, based on their own choices, independence, and esteem.

It is a broken nation, on the decline. And the office is so toxic, and the campaigning is so horrific, that anybody noble or righteous would have no interest in putting themselves or their families through the process. Therefore the process only attracts the dregs.

The dowry is calculated based on how young the woman is, whether or not she's been married, and other factors. If she's 47, if she's been married before, and if she has kids her value is greatly diminished. 230k seems kind of high to me, but to each his own.

This whole thing is about as fishy as a seafood market. Number one it didn't look like much of a beating, number two she looks really hot and I might even consider letting her beat me! And number three if she truly was beating her employees I seriously doubt that they would encourage that behavior, as she claims.

One can only hope and pray that this man gets convicted and sentenced to a long stint in the big house. From my point of view there's absolutely no doubt about his guilt, he's top brass in the RTP, so he's guilty by association.

From what I've been told. I have a number of friends who live there and they're always telling me to watch my back, avoid certain areas at night, and be very careful.

Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo are as innocent as the day is long, many people from that area know what the truth is, that the son of the headman of Sairee Beach is a serial killer, and David and Hannah are not the only ones he's taken out. These guys were framed, this is a super rich family who own the police, and this entire thing was a big setup from the beginning. It is a despicable situation, where truth and justice have never mattered.

Much more so than Thailand, there's a lot more poverty, there's more desperation, and the average guy in the street has far more talent as a street fighter than the average Thai. They're trained with sticks knives and with some of them their hands are deadly weapons. So you do have to keep your eyes open. I don't worry about that in Thailand. I like the PI, I like the people but I find the whole place reminds me of one huge Tijuana. And I find their food to some of the worst on the planet unless you step up and spend a lot more money on international food.

When I was 13 or 14 all of my friends smoked, so I kept trying it and every single cigarette I smoked I hated. It was so filthy, it was so nasty I never got used to it. Fortunately after about 6 months I just said this isn't for me. My heart goes out to those poor people who are addicted to that garbage.

I suppose any excuse to not have big joke in front of the cameras is a good thing. Jeez was he tiring, talk about a publicity hound. Talk about insincere. But, a lot of people bought into his clean cop routine.

The quality of tourists in Thailand has been declining since well before covid and well before the legalization of pot, so that's barely an issue. There are a dozen other reasons why affluent and wealthy tourists avoid Thailand.

A friend of mine worked in Papua for a number of years as a miner, and he said one of the big problems there was alot of the kids carried around machetes, and when they got upset they would just start hacking each other. No thanks.

So very sorry to hear that, seems like the entire Western areas have been taking over by Russians. Yikes!

My point was from a sociological perspective, their history might explain a lot of their ugliness. I'm not making any excuses for them, I'm just trying to understand a nation of social misfits.

Yeah I know some pretty smart people who smoke, and while I think it's a dumb habit, I don't think it's necessarily a measurement of intelligence, though it is a filthy habit. It is a very hard habit to break once you start, from what I hear.

What can one even say about this, was he stabbed or was his arm hacked off with a machete? It's not an easy thing to cut off an arm, without a machete or a sword! Pretty incredible when you think about it, if the facts are correct. A man simply asks someone to not smoke in front of his store and they react like this? Who are these animals, what are these people, why are they such incomplete men, why are they such ridiculously petty, angry and juvenile souls? Where does this level of moral bankruptcy come from? Who were their parents? Hopefully they'll be caught, convicted and imprisoned for a very long time, where it's likely they will make a lot of "close friends".

I somehow doubt that they will have the audacity to pursue these charges at the judicial level. How many high-ranking RTP have been convicted in the past decade or two? Very, very few, they do appear to be above the law. In my mind I have no doubt of his guilt, look at his position and look at the organization he works for and tell me what are the odds that this man is clean?

It boggles my mind to think that this company was attributed this level of market capitalization knowing who the founder was. What were these people thinking? 17 of his businesses have failed in the past few decades. Some at huge losses. Trump Steaks, Trump Shuttle Airline ($120 million in losses between 1988 and 1990), GoTrump, Trump Vodka, Trump Mortgage, Trump University, Trump Ice, The New Jersey Generals, Tour de Trump, Trump Network, Trump Magazine, Trumped! Many businesses that licensed his name went bankrupt, or went out of business. And he had between four and six major bankruptcies (depending on the source), including the Trump Taj Mahal (which he spent $1.2 billion building, and was $3 billion in debt within a year of opening), Trump's Castle, Trump Place Hotel (which was very successful prior to Trump buying it in 1988, and he managed to put it into $550 million in debt by 1992!), Trump Hotels and Casinos Resorts ($1.8 billion in debt by 2004, bankrupt in 2009), and Trump Entertainment Resorts. There are likely others. And this does not take into account the 3,600 lawsuits he was involved in as of the time he took office, the vast majority of which were filed by small contractors against his companies for non payment, or total default. Many of these contractors were crushed. It is part of his M.O. This is how he has made most of his fortune. By de-frauding others. That is just who and what the man is. Nearly anything with his name on it, and his association with it, fails. The man simply cannot negotiate his way out of a paper bag.

Something smells fishy about this story how could her husband not notice his wife was 7 months pregnant? If this is indeed true and if this is indeed what happened, perhaps mandatory castration would be a reasonable place to start, then we can talk about long-term imprisonment.