Thai talk: Even the government's 'good news' is badly handled

[iancnx]

I echo some of the comments above..... The silent ministers appear to be getting very uncomfortable, no doubt carefully considering options and planning their exit strategies. Lets hope on Monday morning things are more clear for the whole country.

[iancnx]

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra was supposed to have blown her top during a special meeting of Cabinet members

Must've been a very small explosion.

I was imagining the buttons on her blouse popping off and her bra strap breaking.

My only excuse is my age and perverted mind.

In all fairness it would make a cracking page 3.

[OzMick]

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra was supposed to have blown her top during a special meeting of Cabinet members

Must've been a very small explosion.

I was imagining the buttons on her blouse popping off and her bra strap breaking.

My only excuse is my age and perverted mind.

In all fairness it would make a cracking page 3.

She's no Sam Fox.

[waza]

"The only way out is for her to sack the ministers involved and take personal charge of the situation - if she finally comes to accept the full range of responsibilities as the country's CEO. That's where the buck stops."

That's the problem with being a puppet, you cop the flak while the puppet master pulls the strings.

Edited June 13, 2013 by waza

[bigbamboo]

"The only way out is for her to sack the ministers involved and take personal charge of the situation - if she finally comes to accept the full range of responsibilities as the country's CEO. That's where the buck stops."

That's the problem with being a puppet, you cop the flak while the puppet master pulls the strings.

What else does she think she's there for?

Surely the penny must drop soon.

[rubl]

Regarding good news, did anyone see news on Dept. Minister for Agriculture, Pheu Thai party list MP and UDD leader Nattawut who traveled all the way to Phitsanulok on Sunday to explain the 'rice pledging' to farmers? Surely such challenging, worthwhile task should get more profile in newspapers?

[kimamey]

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra was supposed to have blown her top during a special meeting of Cabinet members

Must've been a very small explosion.

I was imagining the buttons on her blouse popping off and her bra strap breaking.

My only excuse is my age and perverted mind.

In all fairness it would make a cracking page 3.

She's no Sam Fox.

I haven't seen Sam Fox lately. How's she looking?

Good idea with the page 3. I believe they now have bimbos making obviously made up comments about current affairs. Sounds a perfect fit to me and great for those who prefer the more mature woman.

BTW I'm dribbling again. Maybe I should get back on topic.

[steveromagnino]

I feel quite bad for her. Because she has never actually had to find employment in her life, and has solely relied on the benefits of working for the family business following orders, it must be an enormous surprise to encounter normal life where criticism, appraisals of performance and handling enquiries are part of the job.

It must be extremely difficult to have to answer questions using basic knowledge required to perform the job she is appointed to do, and to also have to elaborate on statistics and data using simple logic and apply understanding of basic economics and finance.

Personally, I think it is extremely unfair that the public should have any involvement in public office at all. After all, the public only pay for all of the policies through tax. It is better that the public are kept away from any involvement in decision making, as occurred in the negotiation of free trade agreements, the recent conclusion to the water policy and also infrastructure projects. The public, after all, have no knowledge or expertise compared to the vast knowledge of elected officials, who by nature of their election, have clearly demonstrated a superior understanding of all matters relevant to Thailand.

Indirectly elected officials appointed via the party list or living in Dubai are also more valuable than the general public (also known as 'ai-heea public according to the deputy PM, the expert Plodprasop - the genius who wanted to eat the exotic animals as a feast at ChiangMai night safari - which is far better than looking after them after all they just lie around and poo all the time) because 'richer than' means 'better than'. So for instance, the word of a convicted fugitive is better than the word of say, Albert Einstein, because let's face it, Einstein was not a billionaire, so his opinion is worthless. That's why Floyd Mayweather and Lance Armstrong are better than, say, Gandhi, as the Mahatma made a very small salary indeed.

Regarding the media, they are only out to stir up trouble. They should be completely excluded from anything important. Unless it is crowing and good news. All newspapers should only report good stories. They should not report bad stories. Bad stories make people feel bad. Especially our PM. So all papers are hereby required to serve up only good news about how clever the government are.

So for instance, this is acceptable.

PM Wins World Spelling Bee - "overcome spelt correctly"

This would not be acceptable:

"Thai Rice Mountain Reaches 100m tall - cannot sell anywhere says rice exporters association"

So journalists should rewrite as follows:

"Government launches new monument to Thai rural farmers - 100m tall rice mountain sets new record, Finance minister says mountain will be sold as work of art for 25,000b per meter of height"

Or "Thai Stockmarket Tanks on Global Fears - Thailand risks Moody Downgrade" is not acceptable. That's fear mongering. And the only monger should be fish mongery. So let's rewrite it

"Thai Government Generates Special Price Discounts for Stock Market Investment - Invest Now Says Finance Minister"

Man, I wish I was in media. I have all the good ways to make those bad stories turn good.

[GeorgeO]

I'm very pleased to see the Thai Press is growing a spine. It seems the incompetence/unprofessionalism of the Ministers is breeding contempt by the press. I sincerely hope this trend continues.

This is the beginning of the end.

One hyena obviously gets nowhere on its own, but as a pack, they can take away the prey of a strong lion. The various media outlets have been, somewhat inadvertently, pulled together and now they have the strength of the hyena pack, and there's no way you can censor such a group once it has become this vociferous.

The lady will find herself facing ever stronger questions, and will also find that her cabinet doesn't have what it takes (the balls) to help her. There will be those amongst her faithful followers who start requesting less onerous positions, and there will be those who are forced into positions they do not want. The whole government will be increasingly questioned with regard to its competence in a number of areas, and internally, they will be looking for a way out; indeed, praying for a coup.

The coup should not be allowed to happen; the opposition should allow this government to fall on its sword and prove that, right from the very start, they were only in it for the same reason as their feuhrer, to extract whatever they can from the trough.

When this government falls, the new government should act swiftly to restrict the exodus of the redshirt government to their offshore havens where all of their ill-gotten gains are currently stored. There are billions of Thai Baht in those offshore havens, all of which belong to the country and its people. These vast riches, currently unaccounted for, should be investigated and brought back into the public coffers, and those who are found to have fraudulently extracted such monies should be made to serve time, a considerable period of time.

That is the only way they will ever be able to reveal just how bad this current government is, and that is also the only way they can ever demonstrate that they are serious about ridding this country of it's greatest disease, corruption....!

[waza]

I'm very pleased to see the Thai Press is growing a spine. It seems the incompetence/unprofessionalism of the Ministers is breeding contempt by the press. I sincerely hope this trend continues.

This is the beginning of the end.

One hyena obviously gets nowhere on its own, but as a pack, they can take away the prey of a strong lion. The various media outlets have been, somewhat inadvertently, pulled together and now they have the strength of the hyena pack, and there's no way you can censor such a group once it has become this vociferous.

The lady will find herself facing ever stronger questions, and will also find that her cabinet doesn't have what it takes (the balls) to help her. There will be those amongst her faithful followers who start requesting less onerous positions, and there will be those who are forced into positions they do not want. The whole government will be increasingly questioned with regard to its competence in a number of areas, and internally, they will be looking for a way out; indeed, praying for a coup.

The coup should not be allowed to happen; the opposition should allow this government to fall on its sword and prove that, right from the very start, they were only in it for the same reason as their feuhrer, to extract whatever they can from the trough.

When this government falls, the new government should act swiftly to restrict the exodus of the redshirt government to their offshore havens where all of their ill-gotten gains are currently stored. There are billions of Thai Baht in those offshore havens, all of which belong to the country and its people. These vast riches, currently unaccounted for, should be investigated and brought back into the public coffers, and those who are found to have fraudulently extracted such monies should be made to serve time, a considerable period of time.

That is the only way they will ever be able to reveal just how bad this current government is, and that is also the only way they can ever demonstrate that they are serious about ridding this country of it's greatest disease, corruption....!

There is nothing stopping them from dissolving parliament and holding early elections.

[Thai at Heart]

I'm very pleased to see the Thai Press is growing a spine. It seems the incompetence/unprofessionalism of the Ministers is breeding contempt by the press. I sincerely hope this trend continues.

This is the beginning of the end.

One hyena obviously gets nowhere on its own, but as a pack, they can take away the prey of a strong lion. The various media outlets have been, somewhat inadvertently, pulled together and now they have the strength of the hyena pack, and there's no way you can censor such a group once it has become this vociferous.

The lady will find herself facing ever stronger questions, and will also find that her cabinet doesn't have what it takes (the balls) to help her. There will be those amongst her faithful followers who start requesting less onerous positions, and there will be those who are forced into positions they do not want. The whole government will be increasingly questioned with regard to its competence in a number of areas, and internally, they will be looking for a way out; indeed, praying for a coup.

The coup should not be allowed to happen; the opposition should allow this government to fall on its sword and prove that, right from the very start, they were only in it for the same reason as their feuhrer, to extract whatever they can from the trough.

When this government falls, the new government should act swiftly to restrict the exodus of the redshirt government to their offshore havens where all of their ill-gotten gains are currently stored. There are billions of Thai Baht in those offshore havens, all of which belong to the country and its people. These vast riches, currently unaccounted for, should be investigated and brought back into the public coffers, and those who are found to have fraudulently extracted such monies should be made to serve time, a considerable period of time.

That is the only way they will ever be able to reveal just how bad this current government is, and that is also the only way they can ever demonstrate that they are serious about ridding this country of it's greatest disease, corruption....!

It's got nothing to do with the balls to help her, it is that they have finally tied themselves into a knot they can't get out of.

Risk their financial credibility by admitting the truth about where the rice stands, or risk p******g off their electorate by showing that the rice system is bust, and they have to either stop it, or modify the subsidy way down.

Either way, they reached the end of the financial string in terms of being able to access money easily from the foreign markets. That means, change the rice, can't borrow for their flood plans, and lots of other stuff they wanted to do, but now find it much harder. They would have got away with it if they hadn't insisted on making the whole rice thing secret. One could say they knew the writing was on the wall the moment that India started exporting so much, but they tried to stick it out, and get through the problem, but now, the goose is cooked.

It's possible that if India hadn't started exporting, a large percentage of the thai crop would have been bought at higher prices, how much no one will know. But, the idea is now bust. It should be changed drastically or stopped, and I think it will be, and PTP will have to rapidly come up with something more affordable to throw into the countryside, which I doubt they can do quickly. The minute they modify the rice scheme they will lose a tonne of support in the villages. That's politics.