Thaksin Returns As Pm

[ando]

I think Thaksin must justify why he dissolved Parliament to begin with. It is obvious it was self serving and not for the benefit of the country. Without that justification reason, it would add support to the democrats for not wanting to play Thaksin’s game. Hence the April 2nd action actually helped to strengthen democracy and country and not the opposite.

Cause and effect here guys! Go up one event.

Thaksin disolved parliment and called a fresh election because the PAD protests were creating a lot of political uncertainty in the country. I think that is pretty well common knowledge and indeed was the appropriate thing to do under the circumstances. But he messed up big time by calling it too soon and it was therefore annuled. He doesnt need to explain to anyone why he disolved parliment. Thats pretty obvious to all. But he does need to explain why he called it too soon. The Democrats exercised their right not to run candidates in protest. But it appears now that the Democrats may have messed up badly too by conspiring with smaller parties to prevent the formation of a government by TRT.

And I do agree with you that this process has actually strengthened democracy in Thailand. Not because it has removed Thaksin as a secure leader, but because the laws upheld by the courts (thanks to HM).

I guess it comes down to a question of -- do two wrongs make a right?

Interesting times indeed for Thailand. Hopefully the precedents set now will make it a lot harder for the crooks of any political persuasion to manipulate the democratic process in future.

[slimdog]

Just a note:

The term of the house of Representatives is four years. Only one person has the perogative to dissolve the House before this time, and it is not the Prime Minister.

Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand Section 116

[John K]

I think Thaksin must justify why he dissolved Parliament to begin with. It is obvious it was self serving and not for the benefit of the country. Without that justification reason, it would add support to the democrats for not wanting to play Thaksin’s game. Hence the April 2nd action actually helped to strengthen democracy and country and not the opposite.

Cause and effect here guys! Go up one event.

Thaksin disolved parliment and called a fresh election because the PAD protests were creating a lot of political uncertainty in the country. I think that is pretty well common knowledge and indeed was the appropriate thing to do under the circumstances. But he messed up big time by calling it too soon and it was therefore annuled. He doesnt need to explain to anyone why he disolved parliment. Thats pretty obvious to all. But he does need to explain why he called it too soon. The Democrats exercised their right not to run candidates in protest. But it appears now that the Democrats may have messed up badly too by conspiring with smaller parties to prevent the formation of a government by TRT.

And I do agree with you that this process has actually strengthened democracy in Thailand. Not because it has removed Thaksin as a secure leader, but because the laws upheld by the courts (thanks to HM).

I guess it comes down to a question of -- do two wrongs make a right?

Interesting times indeed for Thailand. Hopefully the precedents set now will make it a lot harder for the crooks of any political persuasion to manipulate the democratic process in future.

Political uncertainly is not a reason to dissolve parliament. That is a personal self serving reason. The only valid reason to dissolve parliament I can think of is if they were unable to function for whatever reason. They were running fine as far as I can recall.

Slimdog please find and post the Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand Section 116

Edited July 1, 2006 by john Krukowski

[chownah]

I think Thaksin must justify why he dissolved Parliament to begin with. It is obvious it was self serving and not for the benefit of the country. Without that justification reason, it would add support to the democrats for not wanting to play Thaksin’s game. Hence the April 2nd action actually helped to strengthen democracy and country and not the opposite.

Cause and effect here guys! Go up one event.

Toxin as already given us the answer to this. When the PAD first entered the spotlight long ago, they made statements to the effect that the people of Thailand want him to step down. Toxin answered this by saying that he had been elected by x million voters and he took this as a mandate to stay the course and to at least finish his term of duty since he was duty bound to his supporters to continue. The PAD (and the opposition political parties) replied to this by claiming that the people no longer supported him and he no longer represented a majority of the people. They pretty much kept up pressure on this front in their rhetoric....so...Toxin called their bluff and said, ok...you think that the people don't want me....then lets let the people decide who they want...lets have an election.

That's why he did it. He did it because it seemed that the opposition (indluding the PAD) viewed legitimacy as coming from the people and they claimed that Toxin lacked that legitimacy......how wrong they were. In the election it was clearly demonstrated that Toxin still commands a clear majority of the votes. Every unbiased count of votes and every reasonable allocation of what the no votes meant and what their impact would have been if they had been cast for someone still indicates that Toxin won a majority vote.

I think what happened was that in the heat of rhetoric the opposition made statements about who the majority supported without ever really checking out the popular sentiment in the country. After Toxin announced the election they quickly did some estimations and found out how wrong they were.....hence their need to find a strategy to thwart the democratic electoral process....which in a certain sense they had unleashed themselves.

[slimdog]

The Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand can be found at:

http://www.ect.go.th/english/laws/constitutioneng.html

The Organic Laws on the Election of members of the House of Representatives and Senate can be found at:

http://www.ect.go.th/english/laws/organiclawelection.html

[penzman]

As I see it there are two levels of exploitation available re the 20% law.

1. A party may pull their candidate in a very secure seat in an effort to prevent their opposition from forming a legitimate government.

Probably nothing really illegal about this as as some posters here have pointed out, its a parties legal right to choose to run a candidate or not.

2. A major party can seek to influence smaller parties, through collusion, to withdraw candidates in certain electorates with INTENT to ensure an opposition candidate with less than 20% of the vote is not entitled to represent the electorate. AND, such collusion is carried out with INTENT to prevent the formation of government by an opposition party that would otherwise have that entitlement.

Such a situation is obviously a little more serious than that outlined in example 1 of simply not running a candidate. It amounts to a conspiracy to derail the democratic process through collusion between parties.

I believe it is a situation as outlined in example 2 above that the Democrats are charges with.

I see nothing wrong with a party pulling out a candidate IF he is replaced with another or IF all of the party's candidates are removed as happened with the last boycott. I also see nothing wrong with parties consulting each other when the idea of a boycott is present amongst a few parties. Even if it was prohibited, they would still be abloe to exchange their views via the media, a slower process but with the same end result, and, I can't see the media being gagged on this subject in order to prevent parties exchanging views and ideas, unless the said media is run by the ruling government

[stumonster]

....so...Toxin called their bluff and said, ok...you think that the people don't want me....then lets let the people decide who they want...lets have an election.

That's why he did it.

I think the question concerning the sale of his ..cough.. families shares in shin corp and the subsequent ruling that no tax was owed had a bearing on why a snap election was called.

[penzman]

I think Thaksin must justify why he dissolved Parliament to begin with. It is obvious it was self serving and not for the benefit of the country. Without that justification reason, it would add support to the democrats for not wanting to play Thaksin’s game. Hence the April 2nd action actually helped to strengthen democracy and country and not the opposite.

Cause and effect here guys! Go up one event.

Toxin as already given us the answer to this. When the PAD first entered the spotlight long ago, they made statements to the effect that the people of Thailand want him to step down. Toxin answered this by saying that he had been elected by x million voters and he took this as a mandate to stay the course and to at least finish his term of duty since he was duty bound to his supporters to continue. The PAD (and the opposition political parties) replied to this by claiming that the people no longer supported him and he no longer represented a majority of the people. They pretty much kept up pressure on this front in their rhetoric....so...Toxin called their bluff and said, ok...you think that the people don't want me....then lets let the people decide who they want...lets have an election.

So, that was a personal issue, he had already been elected, why not simply ignore these protests and save the country huge costs and efforts if he felt he had been so strongly elected previously? He simply had nothing valuable to offer. Don't forget the snap election's intimidations and tactics with the new positioning of the ballot boxes, which by the way, were made of cardboard this year, what happened to the metal ones used a year ago? Why the sudden need of a rubber stamp that took away each and every voter's unique signature if he chose to do so, or there was just no pencil available for them to use? If you ever see the footage showing Chamlong at the voting booth, he grabs the pen attached to it and it has no ink or it has dried out. He reached into his pocket and used his own. There are many other opportunist irregularities the TRT party took advante of that I won't mention :whistling:

That's why he did it. He did it because it seemed that the opposition (indluding the PAD) viewed legitimacy as coming from the people and they claimed that Toxin lacked that legitimacy......how wrong they were. In the election it was clearly demonstrated that Toxin still commands a clear majority of the votes. Every unbiased count of votes and every reasonable allocation of what the no votes meant and what their impact would have been if they had been cast for someone still indicates that Toxin won a majority vote.

I think what happened was that in the heat of rhetoric the opposition made statements about who the majority supported without ever really checking out the popular sentiment in the country. After Toxin announced the election they quickly did some estimations and found out how wrong they were.....hence their need to find a strategy to thwart the democratic electoral process....which in a certain sense they had unleashed themselves.

Edited July 1, 2006 by penzman

[John K]

If I said I need you money because spent all mine gambling and then just take your money... I guess that makes it OK because I said I needed it.

Not a whole lot different from what Thaksin did. Totally self serving, not one shred of reason to help the country.

[hammered]

We must be getting bored we seem to be going over the why was the election called debate again. I bet nobody will change their opinion this time either.

[penzman]

We must be getting bored we seem to be going over the why was the election called debate again. I bet nobody will change their opinion this time either.

Well, now that Mr T seems to be trying to confuse everyone by pointing the finger at others while his party is charged with the most serious electoral fraud, I have nothing against a bit of a refresher after over 1000 replies to this topic.

Thaksin Returns As Pm 1,120 replies 19,671 views

[ando]

Quote. penzman.

"I see nothing wrong with a party pulling out a candidate IF he is replaced with another or IF all of the party's candidates are removed as happened with the last boycott. I also see nothing wrong with parties consulting each other when the idea of a boycott is present amongst a few parties. Even if it was prohibited, they would still be abloe to exchange their views via the media, a slower process but with the same end result, and, I can't see the media being gagged on this subject in order to prevent parties exchanging views and ideas, unless the said media is run by the ruling government "

Yes, there are a lot of "IFs". Nothing wrong with a party pulling a candidate for sure. And nothing wrong with parties consulting each other. But when multiple parties collude and conspire to withold candidates with the INTENT of preventing another party with majority voter support from forming government, then it becomes a problem.

This precedent here and now is not just something that affects this election just gone. It can affect all elections in future if left unchallenged.

To say that there was no "intent" to prevent TRT gaining government in the boycott can not be put as a valid argument. It is blatantly obvious what the "intent" was. What the court needs to decide is that if there was collusion between parties to block the democratic process.

Edited July 1, 2006 by ando

[penzman]

The democratic process was quasi non-existent already, just look at this caretaker government still going full steam with projects demanding beaucoup bucks, which are badly needed elsewhere. This whole situation had to happen eventually, the sooner the better. What we've observed in the last few years will not be allowed to happen again.

[John K]

Thailand's new political party set up

BANGKOK, June 30 (TNA) - A new political party was set up in Thailand on Friday to be the "home" and "voice" of Thai Muslims.

A ceremony to launch the newly-established party, the Santiparp Thai or the Thai Peace Party, was organized at the Foundation of Islamic Centre of Thailand here, in which 18 foreign ambassadors to Thailand, some of whom represent member countries of the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC), were invited, among other distinguished guests, to take part.

Pichet Sathirachawan, a veteran politician and a former member of the ruling Thai Rak Thai (TRT) Party, who now heads the advisors' panel of the newly-set up party, said the Thai Peace Party would be spearheaded by moral, rather than political, principles although it is emerging amid the country's political uncentainties and the unrest in the Muslim-majority deep South.

"The party is not a nominee of the TRT Party, nor is it funded by any Muslim group overseas," Mr. Pichet affirmed.

"The Thai Peace Party is a home built by Thai Muslims themselves to represent their own voices and to be the place where they can think and work out their own policies independently to resolve problems," he said.

The party's successful inception reflects the openness of the Thai society to welcome a Muslim party, which will benefit the nation in the long run both directly and indirectly, according to Mr. Pichet.

Meanwhile, Sombat Tasanaprasert, the party's leader, told journalists that the party would run in the forthcoming general election.

"If the next general election is set on October 15, we'll run in some constituencies, but if the poll is further adjourned, we'll run in all the 400 constituencies across the country," Mr. Sombat said.

[robint]

Remember the way Saddam Hussein behaved, ducked and dived all over the place - fights like a woman I said to myself. Says one thing then does the opposite. Im not running the country, then in the nect breath he is calling the shots. Expect to see the same tactics for Mr T . he has alreaDY demonstrated his capicity of lying through his teeth and giving the media a complete runaround. may I call it monkey business, why not its all very childish in terms of the world arena. One thing your can be sure of is that his mega millions will be quiently syophoned off into safer havens - thats not rocket science and after all its not as iff he is a terrorist is it?

No doubt his recent round of visits to influential countries was to see how much favour he could curry if he needed to? Remember his famous quote after the tsunami disaster "We dont need help from outsiders"

Looks like he needs friends from his much hated outsiders (flangs!!!!!!!!!)

Did he put the crap in hypocracy - nb if you take the crap out of it you are left with "ay hoy" which mean you <deleted> in isaan dialect.

ho hum

[Martin]

'john K.' finished post #1097 with:

"Because they are natural at it, their subconscious minds are communicating as they pass each other on the street. The messages they are sending each other are not good. This whole episode if not resolved quickly could leave several people with emotional scars. Thaksin is doing far more harm to Thailand that just the country, he is hurting the Thai people too. For the pro Thaksin people who read and contribute to this thread, take a look around and ask yourself where have the smile gone and why. Then ask yourself if it is worth it."

I don't think the question should be: "Is it worth it?"

In my opinion, the question should be: "How will they cope, and move forward, now that this has all happened?"

Some major political and social modernisation was so overdue in Thailand that it would have been precipitated quite soon by something else, even if Thaksin hadn't masterminded and bankrolled the TRT parliamentary domination, and then gone 'over the top' with his sale of the Shin shares to foreigners.

1932 brought in a democratic parliamentary constitutional monarchy system to try to co-exist with a strongly-hierarchical class-based system.

But the two simply cannot exist as they are and both together, any more than two (or three) tectonic plates can co-exist in the same space. One has to over-ride the other, either smoothly (but that is highly unlikely) or with periodic re-adjustment lurches.

The political re-adjustment lurches have come, with the most memorable being in the early seventies and the early nineties, but also there was a quiet, smoother one following the end of World War II.

There is a fundamental dis-joint when the great majority of the votes are held by the poor who are politically-unsophisticated and -uninterested, and the great majority of the income (though not much capital) is held by the middle-class who are politically-aware, but -outnumbered.

I would interpret the vanished smiles as an indication of awareness that this liitle lot can't be shrugged off with either a "Mae pen rai" or a "Bo pen yang", but will have to be thought through and put to tests.

(And the prospect of having to think, reach consensus, test and implement, is enough to wipe the smile off anybody's face.)

[John K]

I see what you are saying about the change of question. But actually you question is past tense. I think past continuous applies here. Thai culture and any culture is conscious based. So the attempt to put a mask on to hide what is going on inside may only worsen the problem. The passive nature of Thais has it’s limits and I suspect we are very near that point. When people begin to connect that this is more than just politics and it has a real negative effect on the ability to provide for themselves and their family, guess what kicks in... that good old survival instinct. Fight of flight is part of that. I would think fight applies and that does not mean more PAD rallies.

[Siripon]

Thaksin's mouth really let him down at the meeting of top civil servants.

2 or 3 months ago Thaksin's minions on TV, namely Samak and Dusit, had their morning show abusing Thaksin's opponents cancelled because they criticised General Prem.

That must have hurt The Great Leader,' I control everything!'

Later, Bowornsak and Visanu, 2 of the leading servant lawyers of Thaksin resigned, they are both from Songkla province, the same province as General Prem, there were banners in his home town urging Visanu to go, that must have embarrassed his family who live there.

It was clear who Thaksin meant and hopeless backtracking by admirers such as Sudarat only adds to the sense of disgust.

[Plus]

Chownah, I don't remember PAD asking for new elections and I don't remember PAD claiming that the majority of Thai people don't want Thaksin anymore, as you said on one of the previous pages. I think you are wrong here. The main reason was Thaksin's corruption. We've been going back and forth on that issue countless times.

Corruption charges are for the courts, popularity issues are for elections. Constitution Court refused to take on Thaksin's case at that time and so people took to the streets, to demand justice, not elections.

About Opposition parites colluding with the intent to prevent the ruling party from forming the government - how is it illegal? It's the main point of their existence.

I find it perfectly reasonable rule that if the party can't muster 20% of votes while running alone, it shouldn't be allowed to represent people of that area.

So, boycott in itself is not illegal. Charges of hiring other parties are a different matter. I said so earlier - it's the most serious charge facing Democrats, and we don't have enough information to even speculate on possible outcome.

[danone]

I heard thais suggesting/fearing that with the "charismatic" person thaksin was refering to HM.

[chownah]

Plus,

You wrote:

Chownah, I don't remember PAD asking for new elections........."

My reply: I never said that PAD asked for new electoins.

You worte:

".... and I don't remember PAD claiming that the majority of Thai people don't want Thaksin anymore, as you said on one of the previous pages. I think you are wrong here.

My reply: I think I do remember this....maybe I'm wrong or maybe you're wrong. I know for sure that someone was making a big deal about it because there was alot of discussion right here on TV about whether he did still have a majority backing or not.

You wrote:

The main reason was Thaksin's corruption. We've been going back and forth on that issue countless times.

My reply: The main reason for what? My post that you are replying to was a response to another post that asked about why Toxin called the elections....I simply replied with the reason Toxin gave for calling the elections...namely to let the people decide who they wanted and if Toxin no longer commanded a majority then he would be gone. I'm not going back and forth on that issue as you claim...all I did was respond to someone's post and in a rather direct way....seems to me that you want to go back and forth on this....suit yourself. And infact I don't think we have ever discussed this before....but I'm not sure.

You wrote:

About Opposition parites colluding with the intent to prevent the ruling party from forming the government - how is it illegal? It's the main point of their existence.

My reply: You have asked a question here....I'm wondering if I respond to it if you will say that we are going back and forth on this issue.....I'm wondering if you will come back and forth if i do answer your question....anyway....here goes. What is illegal will be determined by the courts. Whether the parties colluding to boycott the election is judged to be undermining the democratic process is not precisely defined (or whatever the wording is in the constitution that talks about not messing with the democratic process)....and in my opinion it leaves the courts alot of leeway for their own interpretations. Another example of how the law can be interpreted to mean things that are not explicitly called out in the constitution is the question of whether Toxin called the April 2 election for a proper reason. I don't think that the constitution provides any restrictive reasoning concerning calling elections and does not call for a reasonable reason to apply. I believe that its left up to the PM's discression....but there are many who insist that him calling the elecion was illegal because he had no acceptable reason for calling one. So he illegally called an election because he didn't have a good reason even though the constitution does not require any reasoning for calling an election. Maybe I'm wrong in my understanding of what the constitutions says and would be happy to read the section of the constitution that shows me to be wrong.

You worte:

I find it perfectly reasonable rule that if the party can't muster 20% of votes while running alone, it shouldn't be allowed to represent people of that area.

My reply: I understand your feelings here but the law does make a realatively easy way for a major political party to tie the country up in knots. I think that if they leave the 20% rule in then they should allow the gov't to be installed and become operable with those MP's not attending so that the business of the country can proceed while the people of that region decide who they do want to represent them. It seems reasonable to me that if 21% of the people of a region can not decide who should represent them then the gov't should go ahead without them....then maybe there would be an incentive for the people of that region to get their heads together and find someone to represent them.

You wrotea:

So, boycott in itself is not illegal.

My reply: Maybe your right and maybe you're wrong...in my opinion.

You wrote:

Charges of hiring other parties are a different matter. I said so earlier - it's the most serious charge facing Democrats, and we don't have enough information to even speculate on possible outcome.

My reply: Definitely a different matter. My opinion is that probably both the TRT and the Democratic Party offered incentive to small parties for various actions. It's part of my general synicism towards politics in general. Of course I have no proof. I think that one option for Toxin is that if TRT is dissolved his vast fortune could easily fund several small parties with the intent that after they each get a few MP's they form a coalition. That way you don't have all your eggs in one basket and if you think the gov't is tied up in knots now you should see the mass confusion possible when an unholy alliance of small parties start sueing and making allegations!!

I want to state once again that my personal opinion is that dissolving political parties is anti democratic and I'm against it as a matter of principle with the exception of parties who advocate the violent overthrow of the gov't.

[John K]

I would think that many of the rules like the 20% rule were put in to help deal with corruption.

A boycott is just another voice of the people that politicians are suppose to represent. So if the politician(s) is angry at the voice of the people and is suing them because of it ( insert your opinion here.) To me it seems like there is some serious mental instability with a person(s) like that. Any person(s) with that level of instability should not be in public office. Being under psychiatric observation is more appropriate. Saddam Hussain acted exactly the same way but Saddam just had them taken out back and shot. You can come to your own conclusions about Saddam’s mental state or read about his diagnosis by psychiatrists on the Internet.

Chownah, I see you regularly trying to subtly suggest the problem is not Thaksin or the TRT, but you are throwing boomerangs my friend. Even if he does manage to survive, he will need to spend significant time not doing the work of the people, and covering his back side. So at any rate he would not be effective. He has more enemies than friends. His enemies are by his own hand. He personally built the army that is marching on him, not the PAD. The issue of right or wrong about the court issues is secondary and is only the result of a long list of Thaksin’s actions. Thaksin is the center of the problem no matter how you cut it.

Dissolving the parties was meant as a heavy duty deterrent to corruption. It was never meant to be used as a tool by corrupt politicians or Election Commissions. I can see the thinking behind this law was much like weeding. You need get the root or it will soon grow back. Right or wrong it is needed. If the corrupt have their way with it then it has become a tool of corruption and not of democracy.

[chownah]

John Krukowski,

You wrote:"Chownah, I see you regularly trying to subtly suggest the problem is not Thaksin or the TRT"

I guess I will subtly suggest that you really need to read my posts more carefully if you want to understand where I'm coming from because by writing this you have indicated a total misunderstanding of my views on current political events in Thailand. As a suggestion to send you in the right direction in detemining the meaning of my posts I'll just say that there are a lot of really serious problems in Thai politics...and I see Toxin as being just one of them. It is not completely incorrect to see Toxin as being a result of some of the other problems just as it is not completely incorrect to see that Toxin helps to create these problems. I know that this is a subtle point but I think that if you focus clearly on what all I have posted you will see this message come through. I must stress here that you will probably not understand what my views are if you focus too much on only one of my posts...you need to sum them up and then integrate their meanings over the domain of the entire political spectrum to catch my meaning...to get my drift....so to speak.

Chownah

[Plus]

Chownah, a quick reply.

I'm sorry I wasn't clear.

"The main reason was Thaksin's corruption. We've been going back and forth on that issue countless times.

My reply: The main reason for what?"

Reason for PAD's demonstrations, not for Thaksin calling elections.

"We went back and forth" - I don't mean you and me personally, I mean us, board members.

"My reply: I never said that PAD asked for new electoins."

You didn't, but you implied that Thaksin called the elections in response to PAD's claims that people do not support him anymore.

"....someone was making a big deal about it because there was alot of discussion right here on TV about whether he did still have a majority backing or not."

I don't remember anyone seriously claiming that. I DO remember people saying that demonstrators are only about 0.1% of population.

I'm pretty sure PAD were against elections to determine Thaksin's fate, maybe because they knew they didn't have the majority. Which was pointed out countless times by posters like Ando and Lukamar.

Is boycotting elections legal or not? True, it's up to the court to decide on that. My point was that it's a made up charge. Consider this - boycott was declared on Feb 25-26, four months ago, but we never heard anyone questioning it until last Monday. Who brough up this charge? Some faceless, ad hoc EC panel? Why so late? When was it formed? I think only after charges against TRT were made public - to retaliate.

[thailien8]

"Is boycotting elections legal or not? True, it's up to the court to decide on that. My point was that it's a made up charge. Consider this - boycott was declared on Feb 25-26, four months ago, but we never heard anyone questioning it until last Monday. Who brough up this charge? Some faceless, ad hoc EC panel? Why so late? When was it formed? I think only after charges against TRT were made public - to retaliate."

Exactly, Khun Plus. The Toxic political crap going down now is so transparent. Retaliatory charge #5 (out of 6) against the whistle-blowing Democrats, that they encouraged voters to check the no-vote box on a legal ballot, is utterly farcical. If this is illegal, why then was this option on the ballot??? Toxin has been angered, his minions are cowering, and the toxic political poison is spewing wildly.

[John K]

Chowna

OK I will go with your word that I don’t understand or misunderstood you. The fact is this thread is quite possibly record size for TV (mon can you verify that). I had to employ some skimming here and there to digest it. When I have a moment I will go and carefully read all your posts. So for now my comment is withdrawn.

On the topic of dissolving parties. I think is should be more severe. I mentioned this some place back in the thread but please don’t ask where. Right now the law reads like a death sentence that some may survive the execution.

If everyone active in the party (including all MPs) at the time of the alleged crime they should all get the 5 year vacation. This will insure self policing and reduce the need to have others do it. If by chance the violating person(s) survive five years rest assured they will probably never be elected again. Everyone that had their income modified or lost their MP seat by the violators will be gunning for them. It may look like a mafia hit occasionally, but think of it antibodies doing their job. Professionally speaking, Trust me I know that this will work.

Edited July 2, 2006 by john Krukowski

[John K]

Prem's aide urges Thaksin not to make more enemies

An aide of Privy Council President Prem Tinsulanonda Saturday warned caretaker Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra against creating more rifts and more enemies.

Gen Pongthep Thepprateep, an aide of Prem, said the way Thaksin thought ambiguously about a charismatic person plotting to topple him had caused rifts.

"The prime minister should not make ambiguous statement to create rifts. The prime minister must talk little and must create friendship instead of making enemies," Pongthep said.

He said Prem did not make any comment on Thaksin's statement because he did not pay any attention to it.

source: The nation website July 2, 2006

Some things never change.

[John K]

Thaksin hints of election delay

Caretaker Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra Saturday hinted that the next election could be postponed from the initial schedule of October 15.

Speaking to his "Prime Minister Thaksin Talks to the People" radio programme, Thaksin said he had to come back to resume his programme after nearly-four-month pause because his government would have to remain a caretaker administration for a long time.

"The election has been scheduled to be held on October 15, but now something happened in politics, which may cause us to wait longer," Thaksin said in the radio programme.

The Nation

Translation: my behind the scenes wheeling and dealing just are not going as well or as fast as before.

[chownah]

Plus,

I spent some time looking through old posts looking for news clippings where people claiimed that Toxin had lost his majority support and frankly didn't find as much as I thought I would. I didn't look through all of the posts on all of the related threads....there are many and finding them is a hunt and search sort of thing....time consuming and really not alot of fun at all!

Anyway...I did find a couple of things and I copied them to a Wordpad file so I could report about them today...but there is a problem with the file and most of what I saved is gone so I'll just report from memory. First there was a news article that was talking about the formation of PAD and one of the key players commented something like Toxin claims 19 million backers and we say there will be 38 million legs usher him out of office..... The second thing I found was a Newpaper article (can't remember which one) where in an editorial the author (the author was not named) stated that Toxin no longer had his 19 million backers or he said something like that...I really can't remember and I'm kind of disappointed that my file with the information got screwed up becasue I carefully not only copied the text I wanted to present today but I also recorded the date and time stamp for each post and a link to the thread.....oh well....I'm not going to go back into that swamp and try to find them again.

Anyway....I though I would find more of this kind of stuff but didn't. I think that my memory has exaggerated the claims of his loss of majority voters although it was mentioned at least twice.

My comment was a reply to this: "I think Thaksin must justify why he dissolved Parliament to begin with." I think that Toxin would justify his dissolution of parliament by saying that the opposition had questioned whether he still had the support of a majority of voters and it was clear that the protestors were determined to continue in their demonstrations and since these demonstrations are bad for Thailand the best democratic solution is to go to the voters and let them clarify whether I have the backing of the majority or not.

Let me make my view clear on this. I do not think that there is any constitutional reason why Toxin needs to justify dissolution of parliament. I think that the constitution only describes the steps and method for doing this but that it does not talk about any particular reasons needed nor about when it is appropriate or not....I think it is left entirely up to the PM. If I am wrong about this I would really appreciate someone pointing out where in the constitution it gives this information about appropriate reasons etc.

Chownah

[hammered]

'john K.' finished post #1097 with:

"Because they are natural at it, their subconscious minds are communicating as they pass each other on the street. The messages they are sending each other are not good. This whole episode if not resolved quickly could leave several people with emotional scars. Thaksin is doing far more harm to Thailand that just the country, he is hurting the Thai people too. For the pro Thaksin people who read and contribute to this thread, take a look around and ask yourself where have the smile gone and why. Then ask yourself if it is worth it."

I don't think the question should be: "Is it worth it?"

In my opinion, the question should be: "How will they cope, and move forward, now that this has all happened?"

Some major political and social modernisation was so overdue in Thailand that it would have been precipitated quite soon by something else, even if Thaksin hadn't masterminded and bankrolled the TRT parliamentary domination, and then gone 'over the top' with his sale of the Shin shares to foreigners.

1932 brought in a democratic parliamentary constitutional monarchy system to try to co-exist with a strongly-hierarchical class-based system.

But the two simply cannot exist as they are and both together, any more than two (or three) tectonic plates can co-exist in the same space. One has to over-ride the other, either smoothly (but that is highly unlikely) or with periodic re-adjustment lurches.

The political re-adjustment lurches have come, with the most memorable being in the early seventies and the early nineties, but also there was a quiet, smoother one following the end of World War II.

There is a fundamental dis-joint when the great majority of the votes are held by the poor who are politically-unsophisticated and -uninterested, and the great majority of the income (though not much capital) is held by the middle-class who are politically-aware, but -outnumbered.

I would interpret the vanished smiles as an indication of awareness that this liitle lot can't be shrugged off with either a "Mae pen rai" or a "Bo pen yang", but will have to be thought through and put to tests.

(And the prospect of having to think, reach consensus, test and implement, is enough to wipe the smile off anybody's face.)

This a very good analysis. It remains to be seen which way it will go.