Pro-govt Red Shirts to counter 'Bangkok shutdown'

[webfact]

Pro-govt UDD to counter ‘Bangkok shutdown’
By Digital Content



BANGKOK, Jan 9 - Red Shirt activists will hold rallies at various locations this weekend in a prelude to their stand against anti-government protesters’ move to occupy the capital on Monday.

Thida Thavornseth, leader of the pro-government United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD), the Red Shirt group, today lashed out at protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban for alleged slander, charging the UDD with hiring people at Bt3,000 each to hold counter rallies.

She said Mr Suthep has repeatedly slammed the UDD as a violent group involved in the country’s riots.

Vorachai Hema, former Pheu Thai MP, said he would lead people in suburban Samut Prakan province to rally at the provincial hall on Sunday before moving to a yet-to-be-announced destination.

Yoswaris Chuklom, known by his stage name as a comedian, Jeng Dokchik, and Anuwat Thinrat said they will head another pro-government group to rally at the ThaiCom satellite station in Nonthaburi on Sunday before marching to the provincial hall and central market.

Another Red Shirt group, to be led by Prachuab Ramsoi, will gather at Pathum Thani province on the outskirts of Bangkok on the same day.

Mr Vorachai said UDD members will hold countrywide movement on Monday and set up four major stages in Chiang Mai, Ubon Ratchthani, Khon Kaen and Ayutthaya, but no activity will be carried out in Bangkok.

He said the anti-government movement of the People’s Democratic Reform Committee (PDRC), of which Mr Suthep is secretary general, has impacted the people’s daily life.

He warned the military against intervention, or it would be tantamount to staging a coup.

Mr Vorachai called on students, businessmen and people who disagreed with the PDRC’s Bangkok shutdown on Monday to gather and rally at eight major spots in the capital including Victory Monument, Asoke, Silom-Saladaeng, Ratchprasong, Pathumwan, The Mall Bangkapi, The Mall Tha Phra, and Imperial Lat Prao tomorrow from 4 pm to 6 pm.

“Let me emphasise that we will rally tomorrow. We will not demonstrate in the PDRC’s demonstration sites on Monday,” he said. (MCOT online news)


-- TNA 2014-01-10

[JRSoul]

"Suthep ......... charging the UDD with hiring people at Bt3,000 each to hold counter rallies."

Sounds like Suthep is renting out some of his excess protesters to the UDD, and knowing their problems getting numbers, is charging way too much.

Edited January 9, 2014 by JRSoul

[chooka]

I'll see your 7 sites and raise you one. I don't think the yellow shirts will take to kindly to this. Sure the reds have exactly the same right to protest as the yellows do but this could get nasty.

[whybother]

She said Mr Suthep has repeatedly slammed the UDD as a violent group involved in the country’s riots.

And? That's certainly not the slander part.

they will head another pro-government group to rally at the ThaiCom satellite station in Nonthaburi

Interesting that they choose this location given their history of violent protests there.

He warned the military against intervention, or it would be tantamount to staging a coup.

It seems that Yingluck HAS talked to the army about a coup, given she's called them in to help the police.

[Yunla]

Problems can all be solved within Parliament, and by essential urgent augmentation of the current Parliamentary profile, achieved by high-level State discussion between the various modules of State. There is no further need for reds yellows pinks or greens to 'Hit The Streets'. We all know what everybody wants from each social group. The problem is that the current Parliamentary build is not customised to Thailand's specific problems re; corruption and lopsided underclass voting block. The solution in /macro-sentence ; greatly restricting PM/ruling party powers, making the PM and ruling-party position into an honourable but decorative title, where you get to be Boss and feel all 'Facey' but at the same time you are essentially doing State Events / foreign dinners / hand-shaking - you become the figurehead on the prow of the Democratic ship - but you are not steering it without clear debate-based Parliamentary consensus, and enacting a stricter consensus-directive on all Bills, and creating an external Parliamentary Watchdog run by Legal and other other high-State sovereign modules - this Watchdog's primary objective is the strict monitoring of policy-queueing systems - where policies that are Good For Thailand are green-lighted and go to the front of the line, policies that are okay but not priority are marked with a semi-tick and are put mid-queue and thereupon will eventually receive intense cross-party debate & never leave the floor of debate until there is consensus at which point the Watchdog will re-examine the agreed nexus-point and greenlight it based (again) on the Good For Thailand primary objective, and thirdly all policies that are entirely criminal or self-enriching (Thaksin Passport policy) would be marked with a red cross by the Watchdog, blocked from the debating floor, and sent to walk home barefoot while being laughed at.

Re; Corruption. The above system can filter out internal corruption, which always dies when it is exposed to enough debate and scrutiny. It can also achieve consensus on the best model for establishing a permanent and ironshod Corruption Agency, and funding thereof, to monitor corruption in State, business and official modules across Thailand. Obviously, lowering corruption slightly is the main goal. Nobody expects miracles.

Why this is ontopic is that the pointless street action is gearing up for another long hot summer, and while I personally do pray daily that nobody will receive so much as a stubbed toe in the whole situation, the actual point is that its pointless, and the whole problem can be solved by repairs to the existing Parliamentary system, and within said system.

Edited January 10, 2014 by Yunla

[whybother]

Problems can all be solved within Parliament, and by essential urgent augmentation of the current Parliamentary profile, achieved by high-level State discussion between the various modules of State. There is no further need for reds yellows pinks or greens to 'Hit The Streets'. We all know what everybody wants from each social group. The problem is that the current Parliamentary build is not customised to Thailand's specific problems re; corruption and lopsided underclass voting block. The solution in macro-sentence ; restricing PM/ruling party powers, making the PM and ruling-party position into an honourable but decorative title, where you get to be Boss and feel all 'Facey' but at the same time you are essentially doing State Events / foreign dinners / hand-shaking - you become the figurehead on the prow of the Democratic ship - but not steering it without clears debate-based consensus, and enacting a stricter consensus-directive on all Bills, and creating an external Parliamentary Watchdog run by Legal and other other high-State soveriegn modules, this Watchdog's primary objective is the strict monitoring of policy-queueing systems, where policies that are Good For Thailad are green-lighted and go to the front of the line, policies that are okay but not priority are marked with a semi-tick and are put mid-queue and thereupon will eventually recieve intense cross-party debate & never leave the floor of debate until there is consensus at which point the Watchdog will re-examine the agreed nexus-point and greenlight it based (again) on the Good For Thailand primary objective, and thirdly all policies that are entirely criminal or self-enriching (Thaksin Passport policy) would be marked with a red cross by the Watchdog, blocked from the debating floor, and sent to walk home barefoot while being laughed at.

Re; Corruption. The above system can filter out internal corruption, which always dies when it is exposed to enough debate and scrutiny. It can also achieve consensus on the best model for establishing a permanent and ironshod Corruption Agency, and funding thereof, to monitor corruption in State, business and official modules across Thailand. Obviously, lowering corruption slightly is the main goal. Nobody expects miracles.

Why this is ontopic is that the pointless street action is gearing up for another long hot summer, and while I personally do pray daily that nobody will recieve so much as a stubbed toe in the whole situation, the actual point is that its pointless, and the whole problem can be solved by repairs tot he existing system, and within said system.

"Problems can all be solved within Parliament,"

Like with blanket amnesty bills and off budget infrastructure bills.

[Yunla]

"Problems can all be solved within Parliament,"

Like with blanket amnesty bills and off budget infrastructure bills.

Under the improvements listed, these proposals would not be able to be Steamrollered through. They would be assessed pre-debate, and then debated until nexus-point of near-consensus, and then re-assessed.

[JRSoul]

PRDC is going to block 7 sites in BKK, and to counter this red shirts will block other sites outside BKK and in the north. How does this counter, rather than help, paralyse the city?

[Emptyset]

"Problems can all be solved within Parliament,"

Like with blanket amnesty bills and off budget infrastructure bills.

Under the improvements listed, these proposals would not be able to be Steamrollered through. They would be assessed pre-debate, and then debated until nexus-point of near-consensus, and then re-assessed.

But they weren't 'steamrollered through' though, were they? Government tried it with the amnesty bill. There was a public backlash and they pulled it. Isn't that exactly how the parliamentary system is supposed to work? You can always push a bill through parliament if you have the numbers but the public can act as a check and balance by protesting. They did and deserve great credit for it.

Those same protests have now morphed into something else entirely though.

[Yunla]

But they weren't 'steamrollered through' though, were they? Government tried it with the amnesty bill. There was a public backlash and they pulled it. Isn't that exactly how the parliamentary system is supposed to work? You can always push a bill through parliament if you have the numbers but the public can act as a check and balance by protesting. They did and deserve great credit for it.

Those same protests have now morphed into something else entirely though.

But pre-protests, they wasted a lot of government worktime, and Parliamentary time, and there were also challenges to the legitimacy of Legal and other bodies, and it is all wasted time, because under a stricter system there would be no need for street action or for the debate to leave Parliament until it is resolved. You are missing my point re; steamrollered, I wasn't just talking about recent events but of multiple instances in the last few years when PTP have *tried to* push things through (even during floods), threatened Judges, camped outside highly-esteemed person's location, threatened civil war - unless their policy is accepted. This is known as Steamrollering. The augments I listed would prevent this, by isolating all proposals within the Parliamentary debate floor, where it can be discussed until resolved.

[Tatsujin]

Problems can all be solved within Parliament, and by essential urgent augmentation of the current Parliamentary profile, achieved by high-level State discussion between the various modules of State. There is no further need for reds yellows pinks or greens to 'Hit The Streets'. We all know what everybody wants from each social group. The problem is that the current Parliamentary build is not customised to Thailand's specific problems re; corruption and lopsided underclass voting block. The solution in /macro-sentence ; greatly restricting PM/ruling party powers, making the PM and ruling-party position into an honourable but decorative title, where you get to be Boss and feel all 'Facey' but at the same time you are essentially doing State Events / foreign dinners / hand-shaking - you become the figurehead on the prow of the Democratic ship - but you are not steering it without clear debate-based Parliamentary consensus, and enacting a stricter consensus-directive on all Bills, and creating an external Parliamentary Watchdog run by Legal and other other high-State sovereign modules - this Watchdog's primary objective is the strict monitoring of policy-queueing systems - where policies that are Good For Thailand are green-lighted and go to the front of the line, policies that are okay but not priority are marked with a semi-tick and are put mid-queue and thereupon will eventually receive intense cross-party debate & never leave the floor of debate until there is consensus at which point the Watchdog will re-examine the agreed nexus-point and greenlight it based (again) on the Good For Thailand primary objective, and thirdly all policies that are entirely criminal or self-enriching (Thaksin Passport policy) would be marked with a red cross by the Watchdog, blocked from the debating floor, and sent to walk home barefoot while being laughed at.

Re; Corruption. The above system can filter out internal corruption, which always dies when it is exposed to enough debate and scrutiny. It can also achieve consensus on the best model for establishing a permanent and ironshod Corruption Agency, and funding thereof, to monitor corruption in State, business and official modules across Thailand. Obviously, lowering corruption slightly is the main goal. Nobody expects miracles.

Why this is ontopic is that the pointless street action is gearing up for another long hot summer, and while I personally do pray daily that nobody will receive so much as a stubbed toe in the whole situation, the actual point is that its pointless, and the whole problem can be solved by repairs to the existing Parliamentary system, and within said system.

Translation into English please . . .

[Maha Sarakham Marty]

Several of the red shirt leaders mentioned in the OP are currently out on bail from the last time they created mayhem with bail conditions that they would not participate in such activities.

Where's Chalerm to re-arrest them for violating their bail activities?

Additionally, what happened to Natthawut's pledge the redshirts would stay out of the area?

[Yunla]

Translation into English please . . .

Augment and highly-regulate Parliamentary power/consensus processing to prevent abuse, and make policies that are *for the national benefit* high-priority, and for even those policies to go through a much more rigorous debating system before reaching conclusion.

In simpler terms, "please do anything that stops more blood being shed in the streets over what are basic social science issues."

[AryanicAristocrat]

Problems in this paradise started the day Thailand was "colonised" by the thai chinese. Period.

[WitawatWatawit]

Problems can all be solved within Parliament, and by essential urgent augmentation of the current Parliamentary profile, achieved by high-level State discussion between the various modules of State. There is no further need for reds yellows pinks or greens to 'Hit The Streets'. We all know what everybody wants from each social group. The problem is that the current Parliamentary build is not customised to Thailand's specific problems re; corruption and lopsided underclass voting block. The solution in /macro-sentence ; greatly restricting PM/ruling party powers, making the PM and ruling-party position into an honourable but decorative title, where you get to be Boss and feel all 'Facey' but at the same time you are essentially doing State Events / foreign dinners / hand-shaking - you become the figurehead on the prow of the Democratic ship - but you are not steering it without clear debate-based Parliamentary consensus, and enacting a stricter consensus-directive on all Bills, and creating an external Parliamentary Watchdog run by Legal and other other high-State sovereign modules - this Watchdog's primary objective is the strict monitoring of policy-queueing systems - where policies that are Good For Thailand are green-lighted and go to the front of the line, policies that are okay but not priority are marked with a semi-tick and are put mid-queue and thereupon will eventually receive intense cross-party debate & never leave the floor of debate until there is consensus at which point the Watchdog will re-examine the agreed nexus-point and greenlight it based (again) on the Good For Thailand primary objective, and thirdly all policies that are entirely criminal or self-enriching (Thaksin Passport policy) would be marked with a red cross by the Watchdog, blocked from the debating floor, and sent to walk home barefoot while being laughed at.

Re; Corruption. The above system can filter out internal corruption, which always dies when it is exposed to enough debate and scrutiny. It can also achieve consensus on the best model for establishing a permanent and ironshod Corruption Agency, and funding thereof, to monitor corruption in State, business and official modules across Thailand. Obviously, lowering corruption slightly is the main goal. Nobody expects miracles.

Why this is ontopic is that the pointless street action is gearing up for another long hot summer, and while I personally do pray daily that nobody will receive so much as a stubbed toe in the whole situation, the actual point is that its pointless, and the whole problem can be solved by repairs to the existing Parliamentary system, and within said system.

It seems to me that what you are advocating is another, alternative bureaucratic nightmare. I can't see how this would create a streamlined and efficient government. As well, if you want to build in extra checks and balances, then you will have a doubling up of this system, unless you get rid of the current bodies which in fact are adequate but riddled with political interference (in some cases), which is where the main problem lies. Also, who would want to vote for a parliament that would essentially be unable to make a decision on its own. That's not my idea of democracy. But nice idea, though, and worthy of debate.

[whybother]

Translation into English please . . .

Augment and highly-regulate Parliamentary power/consensus processing to prevent abuse, and make policies that are *for the national benefit* high-priority, and for even those policies to go through a much more rigorous debating system before reaching conclusion.

In simpler terms, "please do anything that stops more blood being shed in the streets over what are basic social science issues."

It doesn't matter how long debate goes for if in the end the same people vote for/against it.

[geriatrickid]

I'll see your 7 sites and raise you one. I don't think the yellow shirts will take to kindly to this. Sure the reds have exactly the same right to protest as the yellows do but this could get nasty.

It's already nasty.

[Pi Sek]

Translation into English please . . .

Augment and highly-regulate Parliamentary power/consensus processing to prevent abuse, and make policies that are *for the national benefit* high-priority, and for even those policies to go through a much more rigorous debating system before reaching conclusion.

In simpler terms, "please do anything that stops more blood being shed in the streets over what are basic social science issues."

Kudos for making an effort to try and define "political reform". I think a pertinent question is whether part of that reform would be the electoral process. Given the propaganda and intimidation we see thrown around, much of it based on lies, I would say "yes".

During the last election I went to see Suthep and Abhisit at Saphan Hin in Phuket Town. Suthep was regular as clockwork - "Us & Them" ranting and drawing cheers of "Thaksin auk pai", (whilst Abhisit was trying to talk about economic details - I don't think many were listening after the first 3 minutes). Elsewhere Jatuporn was still preaching his proven-doctored Abhisit "Kill 'Em All" voiceclip as fact. Where is the place for such incitement of hatred in a true democracy?

So I would also say that political reform must come before an election, not after. The PDRC protest movement would seem to agree with me (even if they're guilty of hate speech themselves), the government don't. Unfortunately we're running out of time before Feb 2 comes along and the very question of need for political reform is causing further division and animosity between the different sides of the argument.

Personally I agree that debate is the way forward, and in a true democracy this MUST be done under officially-controlled circumstances such as in Parliament. Unfortunately, this leads me to recall something I posted in a thread late last year...

<snip>

But what I've really noticed through these recent protests is that the Thai people only seem to sit up and take notice of what's being said when it's done from a rally stage. Newspapers and TV news don't seem to convey any message of untowards-ness in parliamentary affairs (or, if they do, the audience is apathetic). The country is becoming more divided, the economy is as bad as I've seen it since 2001 (OK, world factors have had a big impact), the government has absolutely failed on doing what it said it would do, and both the government and its opposition are leaning towards fascist traits - yet Thais still only come out to voice their objections when there's a protest on. So it makes sense that politics is successfully conducted on a stage rather than in parliament.

Sad really.

[geriatrickid]

Problems in this paradise started the day Thailand was "colonised" by the thai chinese. Period.

Today's problems can be traced to the last century;

1. The Anglo- Siamese Treaty of 1909: This sowed the seeds of the southern conflict,. The British colonial occupiers of Malaysia carved out the northern part of Malaya and gave the Sultanate of Pattani to Thailand. Had, the region been left with the region to which it belonged, we would not have a southern insurgency today.

2. The French Colonial rule in Indochina left the region messed up and sowed the seeds for successful anti colonial movements led by communists. The fear of communists led the USA to back any country that was "anti communist". Thailand played off this fear to the hilt taking advantage of the US generosity/largesse which put large amounts of money into play, sowing the seeds of mega corruption.

3. The failure of the allies after WWII to purge Thailand of the nationalists who had supported and emulated the Nazis &/Japanese. These ultra nationalists remained, causing a blight on the country and sowing the seeds for a reliance upon dictatorships and the suppression of basic human rights.

4. The refusal of the west to reprimand Thailand for its human rights abuses and defacto support of human trafficking. (The change in attitudes only came about recently after Australia and Canada came close to sending warships into Thailand's territorial waters in an effort to stop the deluge of bogus Tamil refugees who were using Thailand as a jumping off point. The tough response led by Australia sent a strong message never given before.) Unfortunately, the continued support of the USA to Thailand in the hopes of countering Chinese influence in the region reinforces the Thai presumption of being untouchable.

5. The quiet support the Chinese have shown to whatever regime suits its interests, also reinforces the Thai presumption of being untouchable.

Edited January 10, 2014 by geriatrickid

[MaxLee]

Let the Bangkok annihilation party begin,.... IF anything else will be left on Monday....

Problems can all be solved within Parliament, and by essential urgent augmentation of the current Parliamentary profile, achieved by high-level State discussion between the various modules of State. There is no further need for reds yellows pinks or greens to 'Hit The Streets'. We all know what everybody wants from each social group. The problem is that the current Parliamentary build is not customised to Thailand's specific problems re; corruption and lopsided underclass voting block. The solution in macro-sentence ; restricing PM/ruling party powers, making the PM and ruling-party position into an honourable but decorative title, where you get to be Boss and feel all 'Facey' but at the same time you are essentially doing State Events / foreign dinners / hand-shaking - you become the figurehead on the prow of the Democratic ship - but not steering it without clears debate-based consensus, and enacting a stricter consensus-directive on all Bills, and creating an external Parliamentary Watchdog run by Legal and other other high-State soveriegn modules, this Watchdog's primary objective is the strict monitoring of policy-queueing systems, where policies that are Good For Thailad are green-lighted and go to the front of the line, policies that are okay but not priority are marked with a semi-tick and are put mid-queue and thereupon will eventually recieve intense cross-party debate & never leave the floor of debate until there is consensus at which point the Watchdog will re-examine the agreed nexus-point and greenlight it based (again) on the Good For Thailand primary objective, and thirdly all policies that are entirely criminal or self-enriching (Thaksin Passport policy) would be marked with a red cross by the Watchdog, blocked from the debating floor, and sent to walk home barefoot while being laughed at.

Re; Corruption. The above system can filter out internal corruption, which always dies when it is exposed to enough debate and scrutiny. It can also achieve consensus on the best model for establishing a permanent and ironshod Corruption Agency, and funding thereof, to monitor corruption in State, business and official modules across Thailand. Obviously, lowering corruption slightly is the main goal. Nobody expects miracles.

Why this is ontopic is that the pointless street action is gearing up for another long hot summer, and while I personally do pray daily that nobody will recieve so much as a stubbed toe in the whole situation, the actual point is that its pointless, and the whole problem can be solved by repairs tot he existing system, and within said system.

Wrong, in countries like Thailand, which was colonized by a certain type of Chinese elite, rules and laws can be changed in ANY way it benefits the most corrupt criminal High-so feudal dudes... "nough said

Edited January 10, 2014 by MaxLee

[smileydude]

As expected but until our politicians get their heads out of their asses and stop playing the crowds I doubt there will be any progress. True reform starts with true intentions and its obvious this is not the case with politicians who would pimp even their mothers to win the election. Why don't we try to start fresh by developing job descriptions for MP's, KPI's and minimum requirements such as:

IQ above 100 (I don't ask much)

4 years studying ethics and good governance courses

pass psychological profile screening (neither narcissistic nor psychotic)

Inspection by certified proctologists to make sure nothing is stuck up there

Edited January 10, 2014 by smileydude

[millwall_fan]

Problems can all be solved within Parliament, and by essential urgent augmentation of the current Parliamentary profile, achieved by high-level State discussion between the various modules of State. There is no further need for reds yellows pinks or greens to 'Hit The Streets'. We all know what everybody wants from each social group. The problem is that the current Parliamentary build is not customised to Thailand's specific problems re; corruption and lopsided underclass voting block. The solution in /macro-sentence ; greatly restricting PM/ruling party powers, making the PM and ruling-party position into an honourable but decorative title, where you get to be Boss and feel all 'Facey' but at the same time you are essentially doing State Events / foreign dinners / hand-shaking - you become the figurehead on the prow of the Democratic ship - but you are not steering it without clear debate-based Parliamentary consensus, and enacting a stricter consensus-directive on all Bills, and creating an external Parliamentary Watchdog run by Legal and other other high-State sovereign modules - this Watchdog's primary objective is the strict monitoring of policy-queueing systems - where policies that are Good For Thailand are green-lighted and go to the front of the line, policies that are okay but not priority are marked with a semi-tick and are put mid-queue and thereupon will eventually receive intense cross-party debate & never leave the floor of debate until there is consensus at which point the Watchdog will re-examine the agreed nexus-point and greenlight it based (again) on the Good For Thailand primary objective, and thirdly all policies that are entirely criminal or self-enriching (Thaksin Passport policy) would be marked with a red cross by the Watchdog, blocked from the debating floor, and sent to walk home barefoot while being laughed at.

Re; Corruption. The above system can filter out internal corruption, which always dies when it is exposed to enough debate and scrutiny. It can also achieve consensus on the best model for establishing a permanent and ironshod Corruption Agency, and funding thereof, to monitor corruption in State, business and official modules across Thailand. Obviously, lowering corruption slightly is the main goal. Nobody expects miracles.

Why this is ontopic is that the pointless street action is gearing up for another long hot summer, and while I personally do pray daily that nobody will receive so much as a stubbed toe in the whole situation, the actual point is that its pointless, and the whole problem can be solved by repairs to the existing Parliamentary system, and within said system.

width=32 alt=coffee1.gif pagespeed_url_hash=2220208811>

This is exactly the flaw in the current system. Those 'legal and other high state sovereign modules' that you talk about will, by their very definition be drawn from the ranks of the 'ruling elite' and will be biased against what they see are 'populist policies' ie those designed to redress Thailands huge wealth gap.

Edited January 10, 2014 by metisdead
30) Do not modify someone else's post in your quoted reply, either with font or color changes, added emoticons, or altered wording.

[iancnx]

"Problems can all be solved within Parliament,"

Like with blanket amnesty bills and off budget infrastructure bills.

Under the improvements listed, these proposals would not be able to be Steamrollered through. They would be assessed pre-debate, and then debated until nexus-point of near-consensus, and then re-assessed.

Comedy post of the day. Take time to watch, listen and assimilate the debating skills of the government and consider the outrageous bias of the speaker. Democracy at its worst. Yunla in cloud cuckoo land. The whole political system needs reform. It's plain for the world to see.

[iancnx]

As expected but until our politicians get their heads out of their asses and stop playing the crowds I doubt there will be any progress. True reform starts with true intentions and its obvious this is not the case with politicians who would pimp even their mothers to win the election. Why don't we try to start fresh by developing job descriptions for MP's, KPI's and minimum requirements such as:

IQ above 100 (I don't ask much)

4 years studying ethics and good governance courses

pass psychological profile screening (neither narcissistic nor psychotic)

Inspection by certified proctologists to make sure nothing is stuck up there

Can I please add. "Accountable and Transparent"

[whybother]

This is exactly the flaw in the current system. Those 'legal and other high state sovereign modules' that you talk about will, by their very definition be drawn from the ranks of the 'ruling elite' and will be biased against what they see are 'populist policies' ie those designed to redress Thailands huge wealth gap.

Except that most of the money from the "populist policies" isn't actually doing anything to reduce the wealth gap. The money is just going to the middlemen and rich business men that have controlled the regions for decades.

[tezzainoz]

Its a lie

The Red shirt or Governement did not offer 3000 baht for people to cause trouble

How do I know this

My Thai Wife's sister's husband was only offered 2000 baht

is he being ripped off 1000 baht

[iancnx]

Problems in this paradise started the day Thailand was "colonised" by the thai chinese. Period.

Today's problems can be traced to the last century;

1. The Anglo- Siamese Treaty of 1909: This sowed the seeds of the southern conflict,. The British colonial occupiers of Malaysia carved out the northern part of Malaya and gave the Sultanate of Pattani to Thailand. Had, the region been left with the region to which it belonged, we would not have a southern insurgency today.

2. The French Colonial rule in Indochina left the region messed up and sowed the seeds for successful anti colonial movements led by communists. The fear of communists led the USA to back any country that was "anti communist". Thailand played off this fear to the hilt taking advantage of the US generosity/largesse which put large amounts of money into play, sowing the seeds of mega corruption.

3. The failure of the allies after WWII to purge Thailand of the nationalists who had supported and emulated the Nazis &/Japanese. These ultra nationalists remained, causing a blight on the country and sowing the seeds for a reliance upon dictatorships and the suppression of basic human rights.

4. The refusal of the west to reprimand Thailand for its human rights abuses and defacto support of human trafficking. (The change in attitudes only came about recently after Australia and Canada came close to sending warships into Thailand's territorial waters in an effort to stop the deluge of bogus Tamil refugees who were using Thailand as a jumping off point. The tough response led by Australia sent a strong message never given before.) Unfortunately, the continued support of the USA to Thailand in the hopes of countering Chinese influence in the region reinforces the Thai presumption of being untouchable.

5. The quiet support the Chinese have shown to whatever regime suits its interests, also reinforces the Thai presumption of being untouchable.

Best post of the day. Someone who knows what's what. Another British cock up of which I am not proud. As far as the present goes. The Chinese will decide, but it doesn't have to begin with Shin.

[Johnnie99]

Isn't Thailand just amazing

[waza]

Thida is trying to deteriorate these protests into a numbers game now, we are more democratic than you because we have the mandate by attracting more protestors than you. But again she has missed the point, Sutheps group isn't protesting to gain control of Thailand they are protesting for good honest governance, for end to corrupt and illegal practices. They know it cant be achieved from the honour system, it must be mandated by the legislature, policed by the judiciary and set in stone through the constitution and achieve by debate, conciliation and consensus.

Edited January 10, 2014 by waza

[jaidam]

If Thida carries on promoting and facilitating the uneducated mass and their propensity for violence, she may well find herself on this years Nobel prize shortlist.