connda

When the PM came through out neck of rural Thailand in his massive motorcade of vans and police escorts, I'm assuming that he didn't get out and talk to the rural folks who are having problems feeding themselves and who have no assets, just debt owed to the local farmer's bank. Compassionate elitism. Love it, don't ya?

Maybe he's looking for an IMF handout, some of which might 'trickle-down' to the po' folk.

Some people say a man is made out of mud
A poor man's made out of muscle and blood
Muscle and blood and skin and bones
A mind that's weak and a back that's strong

You load 16 tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store

16 Tons
Written by Merle Travis
Sung by Tennessee Ernie Ford

Not much difference between a poor Kentucky coal miner and a poor Thai rice farmer

I'd suggest to the OP he is going to see old falangs with younger Thai women all over Thailand, so he'd better get used to it.

My teerak is 50 and looks about 30. So the OP is probably jumping to a few false conclusions anyway.

Cringe all you want; however, bear in mind the younger Thai women attached to the old falangs are probably having the time of their lives - comfortable bed and board, getting away from their home village where they may have been sleeping on pallets under the trees. Working their butts off in the rice fields for 100 baht a day. And no drunk, gambling, unfaithful and abusive village Thai men to cope with.

My teerak is 55, and looks...55. How'd you get lucky. I bet she hasn't hit menopause yet, has she? Wait for the fun. Lol Mine at 50 looked like she was in her late 30s. Thai gals (and Asian gals) hold their looks for quite a while, but when they age, they age fast. Well, imho.

I like Pattaya because I like the kinkiness of getting pushed around by middle-aged Chinese women on tour. Not so much of that in CM. Dang!

I hope this is helpful. Though there is much better music available in CM. Oh hum.

In CM you just have to dodge the Chinese walking in groups down the middle of the street, or driving two or three motorcycles down the Right Hand lane of the road. lol

I was in Pattaya in 1986. Navy R&R. It was a great place: laid back, mellow, fun. I had a great time. Came back in 2007 and booked a trip down planning to stay for a week or so. I lasted 1 day, stayed the night, and headed back to BKK, probably for all the reasons that are causing you to reconsider.

Pattaya in 1986 reminded me of Hua Hin where I vacationed with the wife a couple of years ago. Hua Hin's more built up and crowded, but it's laid back. Or go a little further north of Hua Hin to Cha-am. More Thai, less farang, cheaper.

From where you are though, you might want to consider heading South then East along the coast toward Rayong, or North up toward Chom Buri. Stop where it looks interesting. Toss expectations and consider it a "Magical Mystery Tour. You might have more fun. Best of luck.

I cannot get Google Earth to install in English. Running Win 7. All my info in the Region/Language is set to US and English other than having a Thai keyboard installed. I've uninstalled the POS program, deleted all references to Google Earth from Progam Files and Users, ran CCleaner to delete any GE register entries, and then ran a search on the system drive to find an delete all reference to Google Earth that I could find. The only possible reference to my location would be my time zone setting which I cannot change, otherwise my VPN software will not connect to the US.

Then, VPNed to the US, and downloaded a version of Google Earth setup from a page that explicitly said "English". Reinstalled, launched, and sh*t, it's still in the Thai Language. I detest software company that insist on determining your location and language instead of allowing you to pick it from a drop-down list while installing.

Any suggestions? From day 1 I've considered Google Earth to be a poorly written, pig of a program that doesn't particularly run very well, and is flaky on a good day. But it is useful to be able to create 'placemarks' that I can send to other people, and it's faster that using Google Map which can really get bogged down if you go into Street view, and Street view can be useful.

Note: When I originally loaded the program many months ago, it was in English, but it decided sometime since the last time I used it, about a month ago, to suddenly change itself to Thai. I read some Thai, but not well enough to drill down through the Tools menu (I don't even know what word they are using for 'Tools', it's not 'Kruang') to get to the Language Preference tab. If I could get at least that far, I know the Thai words for English language.

Anyway, any help would be appreciated. I don't particularly like the program, but is has it's uses and there ain't anything else out there like it that I know of. If there is, let me know. I run both Win7 and Linux.

I've been living with Thais since I got here. There are 'Thai' apartments in the 2000 THB range around Kampandin Soi 1 area. My wife and I have maintained an apartment in that area for over 8 years. There are at least 4 in the immediate area. I don't know the names right off hand. This area is between Thapae Road and Loi Kroh Road and is within walking / biking distance of multiple markets (Thai and farang), businesses, and attractions (Sunday Market, Night Market, Worarot Market, Anusan Market, Thapae Gate, and the Old city). Actually, if you walk/bike the Thapae Road and Loi Kroh sois, there are a number of 'Thai' apartments to be found, all in the 'cheap' price range, and a lot of guest houses that rent monthly. Depends how comfortable you are with that. If not, take the other TV members advice and look for apartments that other farangs live in. Then you're in the 4000 and up range. One of the primary 'farang' apartment is Verachai Court off of Thapae soi 2, but I believe these are all furnished with A/C and over 5000THB/mo.

Just a word of warning though. This area totally sucks between about mid-February until mid to late April. The air quality is horrendous if not down-right dangerous. That's the down side. There is a pinned post in the Chiang Mai forum about the suckola air quality. You should read it. Other than that...

Best of luck. Happy apartment hunting.

Simple Answer. unnamed.jpg

Simple idiocy and ignorance generates simplistic answers I should say. Pity.

Wrong. He has hit the nail on the head.

Australia also refused to let anybody in while they have plenty of empty land there.

They wouldn't let me in either even though I was in the IT industry when I looked into it...40 years old...too old. So I don't have any tears for their immigration policy. It's strict, but it's their country. No different than Thailand.

Why aren’t rich Gulf states welcoming Syrian refugees…

Just a guess, but maybe they're not fond of Shia muslims, Alawites, or Christians? Hence the Wahhabi/radical Sunni backed genocide in the first place. Something to consider, 'eh?

3bb does throttle connections between 17.00 to 24:00 I download a lot and my speeds go down from 6mb/s to 760kb/s around that time.

Test it with Glasnost during those times. http://broadband.mpi-sws.org/transparency/glasnost.php

At least you'll know if it's ISP or not. I'd be interested.

This crime is getting difficult for me to follow. The police lie so much,change their story regularly etc. i have a hard time grasping anything I feel is real or believable. I find it a complete waste of time to make sense of the investigation or arrests. Will wait till the courts are finished with the scapegoats and forget about the whole thing like a thai would.

That's sort of my feelings too about the judicial system here. They don't necessarily need the actual perpetrator to prosecute, they just need someone convenient to prosecute.

Here's a reference. Et should not be abbreviated. The correct usage is et al.

www.thefreedictionary.com/et+al.

Thanks!

IMO ISIS will not be dealt with until they finish their mission to dispose of Assad

A letter from an A-10 pilot:

QUOTE:

The squadron is doing fine. Everybody is happy to be here and we are doing some good work. The A-10s are holding up well and the technology we have on the jets now (targeting pods, GPS guided bombs, Laser Guided bombs, Laser guided missiles, tactical data link, satellite comms), and of course the gun, make the A-10 ideal for this conflict. We are killing off as many ISIS as we can, mostly in ones and twos, working with the hand we are dealt. I've never been more convicted in my career that we facing an enemy that needs to be eradicated.

With that being said...I've never been more frustrated in my career. After 13 years of the mind-numbing low intensity conflict in Afghanistan, I've never seen the knife more dull. All the hard lessons learned in Vietnam, and fixed during the first Gulf War, have been unlearned again. The level of centralized execution, bureaucracy, and politics is staggering. I basically do not have any decision making authority in my cockpit. It sucks. In most cases, unless a general officer can look at a video picture from a UAV, over a satellite link, I cannot get authority to engage. I've spent many hours, staring through a targeting pod screen in my own cockpit, watching ISIS <deleted> perpetrate their acts until my eyes bleed, without being able to do anything about it. The institutional fear of making a mistake, that has crept into the central mindset of the military leadership, is endemic. We have not taken the fight to these guys. We haven't targeted their centers of gravity in Raqqa. All the roads between Syria and Iraq are still intact with trucks flowing freely. The other night I watched a couple hundred small tanker trucks lined up at an oilfield in ISIS-held northeast Syria, presumably filling up with oil traded on the black market, go unfettered. It's not uncommon to wait several hours overhead a suspected target for someone to make a decision to engage or not. It feels like we are simply using the constructs build up in Afghanistan, which was a very limited fight, in the same way here against ISIS, which is a much more sophisticated and numerically greater foe. It's embarrassing.

Be assured that the Hawg drivers are doing their best under the circumstances, with the crappy hand we have been dealt. END QUOTE:

The Warthog is just an awesome plane...to bad the pilots aren't allowed to do their jobs.

Even more interesting is that 'Bibi' Netanyahu flew up to Moscow to have a powwow with Putin.

The game just gets more and more interesting by the day.

We're either gonna end up with WWIII or a complete reordering of strategic alliances.

Russia delivered also the MIG-31FE, which is an interceptor, designed to fight other fighter jets. Not really made for bombing missions.

ISIS/ISIL/FSA has no aircraft.

Perhaps the one shepherds are going to use them against the other sheperds...

Yeah, I picked up on that too. Interesting, huh? lol Ever see the videos of the MIG-31SA flying in the French air show. Impressive.

Maybe the US will deploy a few F-35s to 'counter the threat'. Puut len.

Haven't they developed engines that can get 300 miles/gallon? I'm sure the petro-dollar elites need to put a stop to that technology.

Xenophobia has it's positives. The West seems to be knocking itself out to completely destroy all vestiges of the cultures of individual countries within the EU, UK, and US. But here in Asia, they seem to be embracing their nationalism with a fervor.

There's gotta be a happy medium between these two points of view. No wonder Prayut told the West to take a long walk off a short pier.

Thai police confirm main suspect IS the Bangkok bomber (from my TV email)

Now, shouldn't that be, alleged Bangkok bomber? Wait a minute. TIT. Never-mind.

There are plenty of old bar girls in Chiang Mai. Oh, wrong type of 'laying hens'. Nevermind.

Years ago Citibank rejected me too. The reason? I was over 60. Never mind that I had held a platinum card from another bank for 35 years. However, that was a foreign card, in a foreign currency but from a major bank. Later on I learned that Citi is not exactly the safest bank in the world. So, why would you want a credit card from them?

Look at their derivatives exposure (and other TBTF banks) and then ask yourself why you'd bank with them at all. Plus as a depositor, your at the bottom of the list when it comes to a bankruptcy and probably at the top of the list when it come to "bail-in time". Lol

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Thai Credit Cards do not offer fraud protection. Why would you want one?

I have a US credit card which has federally mandated fraud protection based on the Fair Billing Credit Act. About the only time I use a credit card in the LOS (Land of Scams) is to book hotel or flight reservations.

I put the cornmeal. It is resistant to rain, the ants convey the flour into the anthill, they gavent in and explode. veracious

McGarrett : pure corn flour

Really? Cool. If it doesn't work, cornbread and chili for dinner.

Thailand should use the US model of data collection and incarceration, and build on it.

First, 'hoover' and archive every bit of information flowing in or out of Thailand;

Second, build more prisons;

Third, privatize said prisons;

Fourth, analyze archived data;

Fifth, identify thought crimes and opinions;

Sixth, incarcerate as many people as possible.

That way they don't have to block any websites. They just arrest, convict, and toss citizen into jail. Privatized prisons become extremely lucrative and add substantially to the GDP. Bonuses for the top brass. Then no international agency can accuse Thailand of 'censorship'.

'“President Obama will make it clear once again that Russia doubling down on their support for the Assad regime is a losing bet. The likely consequence of them doing so is only to deepen and expand the ongoing crisis in that country that doesn’t serve the interests of the Russian people or the American people ...' Doubling down? Odd phrase, especially in the particular context.

But not only do we now have the U.S. once more interfering in the government of a middle east country, but questioning the Syrian government's bombing of ISIS. The mind boggles.

Read articles and books by F. William Engdahl, and you'll find the thread that holds this tapestry together, and start understanding how it's woven.

Pepe Escobar is also another good source of both books and articles addressing the ME/NA/Asia/Eurasian connections.

Anybody who limits their viewing to Fox News, CNN, or Skynews, or limits their reading to the WaPo or NYTs will simply never understand how this 'game' is being played and who the actual players are or they're motivation. But then again - Ignorant is bliss. Most folks are happy basking in the rays of the normalcy-bias.

Comedy has been used at times to camouflage mean spirited attacks on political and religious figures...

I enjoy seeing lampooning of public figures as much as the next guy...but sometimes it crosses the imaginary and broad line of decency...

The clincher though, is that 'the imaginary and broad line of decency' is incredibly relative; where I consider that line, or you consider that line, or (RIP) George Carlin considers that line could be hugely different. Comedy, lampooning, satire: if it's making social comment, somebody is going to be offended. I'm sure that in his day, Mark (Samuel Clement) Twain probably offended many, but perhaps they needed to be offended? You can make an omelet without breaking some eggs. It all depends on individual viewpoint.