BURNING ISSUE
Plenty of talking, but no real attempts to fix problems
Attayuth Bootsripoom

BANGKOK: -- Those who saw the video of the joint press conference between caretaker Deputy Prime Minister Phongthep Thepkanjana and Election Commissioner Somchai Srisuthiyakorn after their meeting on Tuesday can imagine what transpired before they addressed the media.

The event itself was less a joint press conference than a debate in which each stated his stance to the public. Not only did they appear less than ready to cooperate, but the atmosphere was such that the two clung firmly to their respective positions. Since there was no agreement, the postponement of the election was not possible. The result was not unexpected, however.

Both sides looked prepared to win the "debate", and it appeared to be more of a case of seeking to win it for their side than achieving a victory for the country as a whole.

The side of the caretaker government had the upper hand, since the EC revealed its cards early through the media. It was known before the meeting that if the two sides couldn't agree, then there couldn't be a deferment of the election, because at the end of the day, it's the government that would have to propose a new royal decree for a new election date.

Insiders who discussed the matter with caretaker Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra thus insisted that the election would take place on February 2 as scheduled, and the administration would fully support the EC in carrying out its duty.

Questions thrown at the EC during the meeting left it stumped. These included whether, if the election was deferred, the EC could guarantee that the anti-government People's Democratic Reform Committee's protest would end, and whether the opposition Democrat Party would withdraw its boycott contest the vote on the later date.

No one has been able to offer an answer to these questions, and the government's point is that a postponement of the election would thus make no difference. This is an undeniable truth.

The EC was also asked if the prime minister could be held liable for unconstitutionally submitting a new royal decree seeking a new election date, as she would have sole responsibility for such an action. There has been no satisfactory answer to that question.

For its part, the EC asked what would happen if Sunday's election turned violent and a result could not be announced. This, the commission argues, envisages a scenario covering not only the 125 party-list MPs, or areas where no candidate could register, but in which poll results couldn't be announced at all.

The EC cited the troubled advance voting and said a new advance vote would have to be held after February 2 and could lead to none of the constituencies having a verified election result, possibly for as long as six months.

The government refused to buy this argument, however, because it is determined to hold the election on Sunday, and no one has acted as a mediator genuinely seeking a solution that would lead to a trouble-free poll.

It is now believed that Sunday's election will be one of the most troubled in the country's history - because those in charge of ensuring a smooth election have done nothing to fix the problems.


-- The Nation 2014-01-31

It is now believed that Sunday's election will be one of the most troubled in the country's history - because those in charge of ensuring a smooth election have done nothing to fix the problems.

This sums it up ....the Shinawatras will not change anything they like the system just as it is CORRUPT...Thailand is finished it will just be one demo after another now with violence growing until civil war ...just as the desert rat planned

There are no real attempts to fix the problems, because everyone concerned has their own agenda , the same as the political party members of the PTP , the slogan should read "What's in it for me P.T. Party", the immaturity of leaders on all sides beggars belief, the future of Thailand is in their hands ,all you really have is a choice of is a Red or Yellow shirt, nothing else, gutter politics is alive and well , until these so called leaders show just that, leadership , maturity, concern for the Thai people and Thailand as a nation, you are really pissing into the wind on everything, including reforms.

This make-it-up-as-you-go-along administration heeds not the advice of any regulatory committee or any court. They know what's right and that is that. The edicts of the Yingluck administration take on the air of a UDD meeting - where resolutions are made fast and furious and are considered endowed with the power of insight.

As long as no one can free talk about the role of the invisible hands as long nothing will change

It is now believed that Sunday's election will be one of the most troubled in the country's history - because those in charge of ensuring a smooth election have done nothing to fix the problems.

This sums it up ....the Shinawatras will not change anything they like the system just as it is CORRUPT...Thailand is finished it will just be one demo after another now with violence growing until civil war ...just as the desert rat planned

The shins did not make the system corrupt and without them it would still be corrupt. Thailands problems are much deeper than individuals and political parties.

The Buddha and Politics

A broad-minded person can understand the psychological motives of the ubiquitous followers of the PDRC,...that is, how pro-farm policies, high-speed rail proposals to Northern Thai cities, and a landslide election of non-elitist officials, are viewed as a direct attack on themselves, and their status quo. After all, according to the World Bank, the people of Bangkok have been enjoying 14 times more government services than those in the North; and thus any sort of equal progress for ALL Thai people will seem threatening.

Like the American Tea Party, the PDRC promotes elitist, sexist, authoritarian, solipsist ideologies, served up through hate speech, truth suppression, and the fabrication of negatively framed outcomes. They spew terms like kwai daeng or Thankin's servants at all not in lockstep with their Goebbelesque rhetoric. And when PM Lingluck made good on a campaign promise, following a landslide election, for a healing amnesty bill for ALL Thai's, they successfully changed the message that it was for Thaksin alone, and, on rumor alone, that Thaksin is really running Thailand from thousands of miles away.

PM Yingluck Shinawatra has been consistent in attempting to be a leader for all Thai's. She presided over the exceptional "Uniting for the Future" in Sept 2013, where the focus was on how all Thai's can participate in government. The PDRC not only refused to attend, but manufactured numerous lies about it and the presenters.

Beyond Bangkok, the "second-class" citizens in the North seem to pivot more upon Buddhist ideals. The Kalama Sutta, says “Do not accept anything by mere rumor. . . Do not accept anything acquired by repeated hearing. . . Do not accept anything upon specious reasoning." In my opinion, "Suthep's PDRC Servants" would be more aligned with the real values of traditional Thailand if they read the Kalama sutta before listening to Suthep's next hate speech, and ask for the proof of his allegations

Thing is after all this has passed the question will remain, why did everyone stoop so low ? the EC are clearly acting like a political arm and gives no confidence in being a neutral and responsible dept.. in fact in order to force out PTP ( and im not saying they dont deserve to be ) everything has been thrown to the wind.... all decency, all compromise, all responsibility by so many professions and groups it is very hard to find a credible and respected one out of all of them.

They talk about reforms but we all know 80% of what is rotten will never be looked at, no one will face any charges on the winning side, life will go on but all faith is gone in so much now its hard to see how it wont scar at least a generation.. you can put as much blame on Thaksin or PTP as you wish but the manner and action and attitude of everyone involved has been disgusting and they range from the guard thugs right up to the attitude and insults of the amart and so called professionals that quite frankly belong in the gutter, all that is bad has been shown and little of what is good.

All the systems here are broken and so are the social graces and face has been lost to the world and worse each other, im sure they wont care or admit it either and thats the biggest tragedy.... used to be such a good country and had such promise... dashed on the rocks now and seen as nothing more than a playground full of snarling selfish children

social media has a new slang term too ... "don't Thai to me" meaning dont lie to me... a great accolade and slogan for the country I don't think.

"sigh"

No....we don't "all know 80% of what is rotten will never be looked at, no one will face any charges on the winning side"

PM Yingluck seeks dialogue (aka the exceptional "Uniting for the Future" in Sept 2013),...while PDRC (the minority) say our way or the highway.

My personal opinion is that devotees of the PDRC, like those of the American Tea Party, should be declared mentally ill, and removed from their obstructionist agendas.

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Society/Conservatives_Deconstruct.html

I've spent perhaps hundreds of hours looking for a single factual thing uttered by the Gahbot Suthep,...and have yet seen a single honest statement. If Thailand is being run by Thaksin,...show me something,...even a single e-mail.

The PDRC is all Goebbelesque propaganda,...and the insanity of a PDRC People's Committee will not fix their illness.

Pfft Suthep and the PRDC is just a sideshow propaganda machine,the rest of the establishment that put it there have got a lot to answer for... but they wont, they never do

Few thing came to mind.

Disruptive politics, destructive judiciary and destructive media.

Thailand appears to be at the jumping spot. No leadership. No values, no will to get priorities straight. Everything is self interest, and lack of any inkling of what leadership is all about. It's almost as if they are in a back game room - playing cards.

Fear mongering. The Nation doing to wishful thinking ... in the hope it will be prophetic.... the rats ...

What is leadership? PM Yingluck Shinawatra presiding over the exceptional "Uniting for the Future" in Sept 2013, where the focus was on how all Thai's can participate in government was certainly leadership,...but the "our way or the highway" PDRC not only refused to attend, but manufactured numerous lies about it and the presenters.

As Tea Party politics in America has shown,...there are people with absolutely no consideration for the Whole. What do you do with mad, uncompromising dogs? How does one lead hateful people like the PDRC? Even if you left the Country and let them have their unelected People Council of hateful , elitist, racist, sexist people, would that fix anything? Of course not,...except in minds of the delusional.

PDRC folks simply cannot live peaceably with the majority of Thai People,...just as in America, anti-government Tea Party folks cannot live with the majority. Ideally, it would be great to just offer them a grant to leave to some paradise of mentally ill folks like themselves, but there is no more open space for that,...except in Russia,...which is predominately a sexist, racist, homophobic Country.

I think there is plenty of leadership in Thailand,...but not yet the will of the people to allow the actions that must be taken to confront the self-centered, anti-government obstructionists. I would certainly arrest anyone attempting to interfere with anyone going to vote,...and convict them with a minimum of 2 years imprisonment and fines. And in case of their death, like Protest Leader Suthin, have his family be responsible for the fine,...let's say, 100,000baht per infraction.

What did Mr Suthep do 4 years ago before Yingluck's landslide? "If they violate the laws, such as blocking roads and intruding into government offices," he warned on March 12, 2010, "we will have to disperse" them. Now he is the one blocking roads and intruding into government offices,...I say arrest him, and send him to Russia.

It is now believed that Sunday's election will be one of the most troubled in the country's history - because those in charge of ensuring a smooth election have done nothing to fix the problems.

This sums it up ....the Shinawatras will not change anything they like the system just as it is CORRUPT...Thailand is finished it will just be one demo after another now with violence growing until civil war ...just as the desert rat planned

Not sure I understand. It is the EC that is in charge of ensuring a smooth election by providing a safe place for candidates to register

and citizens to vote. They have done neither but you want to blame the Shinawatras. Why not blame the EC?

There are no real attempts to fix the problems, because everyone concerned has their own agenda , the same as the political party members of the PTP , the slogan should read "What's in it for me P.T. Party", the immaturity of leaders on all sides beggars belief, the future of Thailand is in their hands ,all you really have is a choice of is a Red or Yellow shirt, nothing else, gutter politics is alive and well , until these so called leaders show just that, leadership , maturity, concern for the Thai people and Thailand as a nation, you are really pissing into the wind on everything, including reforms.

The election is being held according to the laws that the Dems/Army/CC wrote. The same laws that Yingluck won a landslide under. Allowing for the tilting of the election, she would have won with a lot more.

They have connived to overthrow yet another elected government as they just can't win an election, nor do they ever have the numbers to win.

Dems/PDRC have no policies and no plans other that to retake power. This will fail this time. They are too expose with what they are doing, too blatant with the Coup calls and now the Courts are falling under the same spotlight and will ultimately have to disgrace them selves again (Judicial Coup) or allow free and fair elections.

No violence here from voters. They are not the ones blocking. No bleeding hearts from us. Block a polling station, get arrested, beaten up, shot.... up to you. Nobody has to physically block a station and you would get the same outcome anywhere in the world.

100 days in, the Government is looking much stronger as they have fought off all comers, Medai campain, Army, Suthep, Coup, EC and now just a few more Elites courts to go. Hardly weak.

If you don't get democracy, you can support fascism... but you'll never have much support and the support you have will leave you when they realise they have given up their voting rights to Suthep.

What is leadership? PM Yingluck Shinawatra presiding over the exceptional "Uniting for the Future" in Sept 2013, where the focus was on how all Thai's can participate in government was certainly leadership,...but the "our way or the highway" PDRC not only refused to attend, but manufactured numerous lies about it and the presenters.

As Tea Party politics in America has shown,...there are people with absolutely no consideration for the Whole. What do you do with mad, uncompromising dogs? How does one lead hateful people like the PDRC? Even if you left the Country and let them have their unelected People Council of hateful , elitist, racist, sexist people, would that fix anything? Of course not,...except in minds of the delusional.

PDRC folks simply cannot live peaceably with the majority of Thai People,...just as in America, anti-government Tea Party folks cannot live with the majority. Ideally, it would be great to just offer them a grant to leave to some paradise of mentally ill folks like themselves, but there is no more open space for that,...except in Russia,...which is predominately a sexist, racist, homophobic Country.

I think there is plenty of leadership in Thailand,...but not yet the will of the people to allow the actions that must be taken to confront the self-centered, anti-government obstructionists. I would certainly arrest anyone attempting to interfere with anyone going to vote,...and convict them with a minimum of 2 years imprisonment and fines. And in case of their death, like Protest Leader Suthin, have his family be responsible for the fine,...let's say, 100,000baht per infraction.

What did Mr Suthep do 4 years ago before Yingluck's landslide? "If they violate the laws, such as blocking roads and intruding into government offices," he warned on March 12, 2010, "we will have to disperse" them. Now he is the one blocking roads and intruding into government offices,...I say arrest him, and send him to Russia.

You might want to take a look at your own comments before calling others hateful.

There are no real attempts to fix the problems, because everyone concerned has their own agenda , the same as the political party members of the PTP , the slogan should read "What's in it for me P.T. Party", the immaturity of leaders on all sides beggars belief, the future of Thailand is in their hands ,all you really have is a choice of is a Red or Yellow shirt, nothing else, gutter politics is alive and well , until these so called leaders show just that, leadership , maturity, concern for the Thai people and Thailand as a nation, you are really pissing into the wind on everything, including reforms.

The election is being held according to the laws that the Dems/Army/CC wrote. The same laws that Yingluck won a landslide under. Allowing for the tilting of the election, she would have won with a lot more.

They have connived to overthrow yet another elected government as they just can't win an election, nor do they ever have the numbers to win.

Dems/PDRC have no policies and no plans other that to retake power. This will fail this time. They are too expose with what they are doing, too blatant with the Coup calls and now the Courts are falling under the same spotlight and will ultimately have to disgrace them selves again (Judicial Coup) or allow free and fair elections.

No violence here from voters. They are not the ones blocking. No bleeding hearts from us. Block a polling station, get arrested, beaten up, shot.... up to you. Nobody has to physically block a station and you would get the same outcome anywhere in the world.

100 days in, the Government is looking much stronger as they have fought off all comers, Medai campain, Army, Suthep, Coup, EC and now just a few more Elites courts to go. Hardly weak.

If you don't get democracy, you can support fascism... but you'll never have much support and the support you have will leave you when they realise they have given up their voting rights to Suthep.

CUCKOO ! CUCKOO ! CUCKOOOOOO !!!

You might want to take a look at your own comments before calling others hateful.

The difference between hateful and critique, is that critique can be supported by facts,...nothing of the hundreds of hours looking for what makes PDRC tick has any underlying facts,...outside their delusional Tea Party like fanaticism.

As I posted above,..there have been numerous studies, all showing that these anti-government types have certain abnormal mental neuroses. Whereas I could prove they are hate-based in a court of law, they could prove my shining light on their neuroses is anywhere near hateful,...but actually quite compassionate.

Chögyam Trungpa correctly said, "Compassion is not so much feeling sorry for somebody, feeling that you are in a better place and somebody is in a worse place. Compassion is not having any hesitation to reflect your light on things. As light has no hesitation, no inhibition about reflecting on things, it does not discriminate whether to reflect on a pile of shit or on a pile of rock or on a pile of diamonds. It reflects on everything it faces."

HH Dalai Lama correctly said, If something is serious and it is necessary to take counter-measures, you have to take counter-measuresin fact, one of the precepts of the Bodhisattva vows is to take strong countermeasures when the situation calls for it. If a Bodhisattva doesn't take strong countermeasures when the situation requires, then that constitutes an infraction of one of the vows."

The PDRC, like their American Tea Party counterparts, have shown no evidence to support their hate speech and seditionist propaganda. What they use is tried and tested Goebbelesque truth suppression. For example,...here's a Tea Party flyer,...look how similar it is to the PDRC rhetoric:

Tea Party Christocrat Worksheet of Techniques for Truth Suppression, adopted from a seminar for Republican Activists

Strong, credible allegations of high-level criminal activity can bring down a government. When the government lacks an effective, fact-based defense, other techniques must be employed. The success of these techniques depends heavily upon a cooperative, compliant press.

Dummy up. If it's not reported, if it's not news, it didn't happen.

Wax indignant. This is also known as the "How dare you?" gambit.

Characterize the charges as "rumors" or, better yet, "wild rumors." If, in spite of the news blackout, the public is still able to learn about the suspicious facts, it can only be through "rumors." (If they tend to believe the "rumors" it must be because they are simply "paranoid" or "hysterical.")

Knock down straw men. Deal only with the weakest aspects of the weakest charges. Even better, create your own straw men. Make up wild rumors (or plant false stories) and give them lead play when you appear to debunk all the charges, real and fanciful alike.

Call the skeptics names like "conspiracy theorist," "nutcase," "ranter," "leftist", "commie", "kook," "crackpot", and, of course, "rumor monger." Be sure, too, to use heavily loaded verbs and adjectives when characterizing their charges and defending the "more reasonable" government and its defenders. You must then carefully avoid fair and open debate with any of the people you have thus maligned. For insurance, set up your own "skeptics" to shoot down.

Impugn motives. Attempt to marginalize the critics by suggesting strongly that they are not really interested in the truth but are simply pursuing a partisan political agenda or are out to make money (compared to over-compensated adherents to the government line who, presumably, are not).

Invoke authority. Here the controlled press and the sham opposition can be very useful.

Dismiss the charges as "old news."

Come half-clean. This is also known as "confession and avoidance" or "taking the limited hangout route." This way, you create the impression of candor and honesty while you admit only to relatively harmless, less-than-criminal "mistakes." This stratagem often requires the embrace of a fall-back position quite different from the one originally taken. With effective damage control, the fall-back position need only be peddled by stooge skeptics to carefully limited markets.

Characterize the crimes as impossibly complex and the truth as ultimately unknowable.

Reason backward, using the deductive method with a vengeance. With thoroughly rigorous deduction, troublesome evidence is irrelevant. E.g. We have a completely free press. If evidence exists that the Vince Foster "suicide" note was forged, they would have reported it. They haven't reported it so there is no such evidence. Another variation on this theme involves the likelihood of a conspiracy leaker and a press who would report the leak.

Require the skeptics to solve the crime completely. E.g. If Foster was murdered, who did it and why?

Change the subject. This technique includes creating and/or publicizing distractions.

Lightly report incriminating facts, and then make nothing of them. This is sometimes referred to as "bump and run" reporting.

Baldly and brazenly lie. A favorite way of doing this is to attribute the "facts" furnished the public to a plausible-sounding, but anonymous, source.

Expanding further on numbers 4 and 5, have your own stooges "expose" scandals and champion popular causes. Their job is to pre-empt real opponents and to play 99-yard football. A variation is to pay rich people for the job who will pretend to spend their own money.

Flood the Internet with agents. This is the answer to the question, "What could possibly motivate a person to spend hour upon hour on Internet news groups defending the government and/or the press and harassing genuine critics?" Don t the authorities have defenders enough in all the newspapers, magazines, radio, and television? One would think refusing to print critical letters and screening out serious callers or dumping them from radio talk shows would be control enough, but, obviously, it is not.

Does TV have a policy RE paid trolls? Because Ve37 is obviously one of them.

Thing is after all this has passed the question will remain, why did everyone stoop so low ? the EC are clearly acting like a political arm and gives no confidence in being a neutral and responsible dept.. in fact in order to force out PTP ( and im not saying they dont deserve to be ) everything has been thrown to the wind.... all decency, all compromise, all responsibility by so many professions and groups it is very hard to find a credible and respected one out of all of them.

They talk about reforms but we all know 80% of what is rotten will never be looked at, no one will face any charges on the winning side, life will go on but all faith is gone in so much now its hard to see how it wont scar at least a generation.. you can put as much blame on Thaksin or PTP as you wish but the manner and action and attitude of everyone involved has been disgusting and they range from the guard thugs right up to the attitude and insults of the amart and so called professionals that quite frankly belong in the gutter, all that is bad has been shown and little of what is good.

All the systems here are broken and so are the social graces and face has been lost to the world and worse each other, im sure they wont care or admit it either and thats the biggest tragedy.... used to be such a good country and had such promise... dashed on the rocks now and seen as nothing more than a playground full of snarling selfish children

social media has a new slang term too ... "don't Thai to me" meaning dont lie to me... a great accolade and slogan for the country I don't think.

"sigh"

The legal shortcomings of PTP are there to see, they hardly bothered even hiding them. Some choose to cry 'political coup' when the courts then investigate and eventually lay charges against them. 'Political coup', my arse.... they have it coming to them. Where each of the courts has actually stooped so low in the past is failing to enforce the laws as stringently as it should do..... and all political parties have tried to manipulate them as much as each other in the past. iOne cannot accuse the EC of being biased when it is doing it's role it was emplaced to do. Typical red rhetoric.

Other relevant legal entities should also catch up with Suthep, where he crossed the line also. The differences are, his crimes will not involve removing him power as a punishment. You do the crime, you should do the time..... although not according to PTP, who believed such cases should all be brushed under the carpet and 'forgiven'. This is exactly what ignited the protests in the first place, and I for one believe PTP deserve to have the book thrown at them, rightly so.

Does TV have a policy RE paid trolls? Because Ve37 is obviously one of them.

Ve37 is only a "troll" for those who rather kill the truth than recognize the truth. As T. S. Eliot said, "Human kind cannot bear very much reality,"...which is doubly so for conservatives. Thus people like vadimbz must strike through ad hominem, because to face their fear (of being a conservative) is unacceptable. Conservatives will not even accept reality even if their life depended on it. LOL

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Society/Conservatives_Deconstruct.html

[ You do the crime, you should do the time.....

I wholeheartedly agree. Democratic Country's should be nations of laws. The PDRC is irrefutably breaking laws,...it's time they get arrested,...and pay for their own incarceration. If any proof can be presented (which it hasn't) that PM Yingluck broke laws,...then she should be convicted.

Her brother was convicted,...but as everyone should by now know, there is no way he'd ever get out of prison alive,...so his unfortunate punishment is lifelong exile from his home.

In America, it's time all Tea Party people should be arrested for treason and sedition against the US. But the common folk have not yet had enough of these ill people, and liberals are still convinced that they can rehabilitated into reason. No way!

You're either Liberal or Illiberal. The American Tea Party and the PDRC are all Illiberal.

Plenty of talk with Face to save... Amazin S( C)HINAWATRA

Does TV have a policy RE paid trolls? Because Ve37 is obviously one of them.

Regardless of whether Ve37 is a troll or not, why not rebut his points with the same thought out clarity that he presents them?

I would rather read thought provoking posts, whether by paid trolls or not, than to inane posts with references to thugs, shopping, ear medicine... the list just goes on and is frankly boring.

[ You do the crime, you should do the time.....

I wholeheartedly agree. Democratic Country's should be nations of laws. The PDRC is irrefutably breaking laws,...it's time they get arrested,...and pay for their own incarceration. If any proof can be presented (which it hasn't) that PM Yingluck broke laws,...then she should be convicted.

Her brother was convicted,...but as everyone should by now know, there is no way he'd ever get out of prison alive,...so his unfortunate punishment is lifelong exile from his home.

In America, it's time all Tea Party people should be arrested for treason and sedition against the US. But the common folk have not yet had enough of these ill people, and liberals are still convinced that they can rehabilitated into reason. No way!

You're either Liberal or Illiberal. The American Tea Party and the PDRC are all Illiberal.

I don't disagree with what you say, however, I am not attempting to draw any comparison to any other 'democracy' such as the USA, which all have their failings.

Suthep's rants have been stupid, and the PDRC's overall rhetoric could have been handled in a far better way if it was to have any credibility, which it has proven to lack. They, likewise, deserve to, and should be dealt with legally.

The fact remains, that this ridiculous caretaker government deserves the law to be pursuing it, and the fact they have so arrogantly broken it on so many counts, does not mean that EC are 'taking sides' in conducting their necessary duty, which the PTP/ reds already advertise that they will cry foul on, with the 'judicial coup' rhetoric.

The point I make is that the red camp have made it clear that they do not support compliance to a legal framework, and have stuck two fingers up to it, so thus will only deserve what may be coming to them legally, and will be through their own fault, not a 'judicial coup' as they would want to sell it if or when that happens over the rice scam, amnesty bill debacle, 2.2 tn off-the-books loan attempt, etc.

BTW, my interpretation of Liberal is a political leaning, traditionally on the other end of political spectrum to being conservative in the way that a government works..... neither relates to being democratic on non-democratic, which I trust is not what you were meaning.

I don't disagree with what you say, however, I am not attempting to draw any comparison to any other 'democracy' such as the USA, which all have their failings.

BTW, my interpretation of Liberal is a political leaning, traditionally on the other end of political spectrum to being conservative in the way that a government works..... neither relates to being democratic on non-democratic, which I trust is not what you were meaning.

For me personally, I find comparisons helpful,...so I in turn, use them. The My Way Or The Highway policy of the American Tea Party is quite similar to the PDRC. Yingluck has gone out of her way, numerous times to have the PDRC play an important role in the government,...and each time it is met with hateful, sexist, Goebbelesque propaganda,...for example, the September 2013 "Uniting for the Future" conference.

The Bangkok Post which I read regularly, is like an American newspaper that thinks ink balanced reporting is allowing unsubstantiated claims by the PDRC to be passed off as news. Other news sources are based on the American model,...the PDRC has it own media, for Illiberals, and the others have its own media for the Liberals.

Yes,...Thailand has been considered conservative,...as in Goldwater Conservatism of the American 60's,...which was never Illiberal. Today's conservativism is very Illiberal.

The best definition of Liberal I've ever heard was the American JFK, who said, a Liberal is someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, that is what a Liberal means, and Im proud to say Im a Liberal."

I'd say that Yingluck has shown over and over that she is progressively Liberal,...for unlike the elitist PDRC's, she is concerned about the welfare, health, and civil Rights of all the people. The PDRC elitists are followers of the Ayn Rand paradigm,...take care of your own health and prosperity,...and if you can't, that's your problem,....if you want a high-speed train to the North, let the North pay for it themselves.

Plenty of Talking. All I hear is Suthep saying no talks, and the "Educated" mass, blowing their whistles to drown out any debate.

Time for some of the media to come off the fence here. Less than 300 total today on the march = failure.

Supposed intellects blowing whistles is neither a sign of intellegence or a sign of negotiating or taking part in the democratic process.

The creme de la creme of the Thai intelegentsia engaging in political dialog. Why not just arrest them, they are idiots who listen to nobody. And now the respect my vote fall into the same pattern. Absolutely no hope for the Country if you don't vote Thaksin back in.

Does TV have a policy RE paid trolls? Because Ve37 is obviously one of them.

Regardless of whether Ve37 is a troll or not, why not rebut his points with the same thought out clarity that he presents them?

I would rather read thought provoking posts, whether by paid trolls or not, than to inane posts with references to thugs, shopping, ear medicine... the list just goes on and is frankly boring.

Thats the problem with IT becoming more accessible. It is now availble to people with no reasoning skills and no maturity. So day in day out we read the above and also the Hilarious.

Man in Dubai

Thaksinistas" oh how we laugh

2010 references that come straight out of the blue from people with no idea of history.

People who call Troll when they lose arguements or try to incite Potential LM posts are the real vermin on here and should be banned based on their posting records.

I usually just satisfy myself that the moral argument on that side is so well lost, that they must know this and resort to this behaviour. Who , knows

I have to say Thaivisa is not that bad and there is a good balance and links to quite a bit of outside media. But, like you, I wish they could coral these sniping goons into some kind of play area where they can just insult each other all day.

Plenty of Talking. All I hear is Suthep saying no talks, and the "Educated" mass, blowing their whistles to drown out any debate.

Time for some of the media to come off the fence here. Less than 300 total today on the march = failure.

Supposed intellects blowing whistles is neither a sign of intellegence or a sign of negotiating or taking part in the democratic process.

The creme de la creme of the Thai intelegentsia engaging in political dialog. Why not just arrest them, they are idiots who listen to nobody. And now the respect my vote fall into the same pattern. Absolutely no hope for the Country if you don't vote Thaksin back in.

As I wrote in post #8....according to the World Bank, the people of Bangkok have been enjoying 14 times more government services than those in the North; and thus any sort of equal progress for ALL Thai people will seem threatening. They (the PDRC) see affordable Health Care going to what they consider to be Second Class Thai's, and the elitists freak out. They see their 14 times advantage slipping away. Let the people in the North take care of their own,...just send us the money to support our lifestyle in the South, and shut-up. We don't want to talk to you,...it is beneath our elitist dignity.

Of course Thaksin is popular in the North, and seen as an enemy to the South,...his policies were aimed at lifting all Thai peoples lives. And just because his sister has the same love for Thailand, through proposals like High-speed rail to Northern cities, Health care, pro-farm attitudes, participatory democracy for all,...she is label a Thaksin puppet.

When Mr Suthep says "the people"...he is only speaking of the elite, sexist, racist, conservatives,...not the people of Thailand. That is not my opinion,...it is the fact.

Any Thai who loves Thailand would have attended "Uniting for the Future" in Sept 2013.

I truly wish Thailand all the best,...but when you have elitist, obstructionist, authoritarians like the PDRC, I can the see point of view of those in the North, that the rivers may have to run red with the blood of Suthep Servants, before democracy can work for all the people.