Yingluck urged to defy courts, independent agencies

[siampolee]

fab4 post # 58

To save any further replies to all those who have come out of the woodwork to comment on my public pronouncement of being wrong on this occasion

1. You could have had the good grace of accepting my post without making further snide comments (but that would demonstrate a quality that's sadly lacking in some people)

2. I will not stoop to your respective levels

3. I really don't care what you think.

One can but hope that you will indeed follow your own good advice above when others post.

Edited February 26, 2014 by siampolee

[Prbkk]

They haven't convicted ANYONE for corruption or graft on the rice scheme yet.

I think even I as a non lawyer could defend her against this accusation. Is there one single proven complaint of corruption in the rice scheme nationwide?

So m'lord, there is no corruption.

Of course they haven't convicted anyone yet. No cases have gone through the court system yet and been judged.

It has been proved the DEM's have complained.

It has been proven Supa has complained.

It has been proven the IMF suggested restructuring the scheme due to corruption.

The list goes on.

As for proven corruption. There is ample evidence to suggest corruption and that is what the courts have to prove. It sounds like even if she is found guilty it won't matter. She will defy the courts due to no respect for the law. (Surprise surprise - A principle of democracy)

If there is anything else m'lord I suggest you refer to the below.

And when we look at the 'complaint' its substanceless political claims. Designed to shore up Suthep failed 'people coup', then his 'popcorn coup' now his 'made up corruption lies judicial coup'.

It's a bit sad.

You talk as though the court process is a mere formality which is surely the problem?! You want to remove her from power simply because Abhisit says the rice pledge scheme is corrupt, but the numbers don't support the claim and even the allegation is tiny. And yet, even before you prove any corruption, you presume to prosecute her for negligence.

In the Senate case, they got authority from the CC to propose constitutional changes one by one, they proposed an elected senate, senate rejected it, and now they're trying to remove her for proposing it. Claiming it's an unlawful power grab (except it was lawful, and a proposal is not a power grab).

So for people to have faith in the legal and judicial processes, they need to be fair, and balanced and ponder all the evidence in detail, reach a verdict and be transparent about how and why they reached that verdict. Proper judicial processes take years.

As opposed to the Kangaroo courts you see in Africa, where they meet on a Monday, decide on guilty on Tuesday, have dinner with the prosecutor on Wednesday, and nobody believes their verdicts, or can explain all the consistencies because the courts are not transparent.

So we'll wait and see how these pan out. Are we like a third world nation, or a developing nation heading to full development.

Refer to picture below.

I didn't know that Charles Manson is a PDRC supporter but I guess it fits

[Thai at Heart]

They haven't convicted ANYONE for corruption or graft on the rice scheme yet.

I think even I as a non lawyer could defend her against this accusation. Is there one single proven complaint of corruption in the rice scheme nationwide?

So m'lord, there is no corruption.

Of course they haven't convicted anyone yet. No cases have gone through the court system yet and been judged.

It has been proved the DEM's have complained.

It has been proven Supa has complained.

It has been proven the IMF suggested restructuring the scheme due to corruption.

The list goes on.

As for proven corruption. There is ample evidence to suggest corruption and that is what the courts have to prove. It sounds like even if she is found guilty it won't matter. She will defy the courts due to no respect for the law. (Surprise surprise - A principle of democracy)

If there is anything else m'lord I suggest you refer to the below.

Well could they at least get their ducks in a row and convict one underling before they go after the boss.

It tends to be that way. Of course there is probably corruption, it's just it looks better if an effort is made to not make it into a compete kangaroo court.

You can't exonerate thousands of people who committed corruption and only hang the person sitting behind a desk.

Edited February 26, 2014 by Thai at Heart

[Thai at Heart]

Well the facts are totally clear on the rice pledging, she enacted a scheme (against the advice of everyone) which took goods on the promise of paying for the goods, but then did not pay for many months. The victims of this scheme resorted to borrowing money from sharks and lived under debt-stress until they took their own lives, in several cases. This is gross negligence on the part of the PM, even assuming the scheme wasn't a cash-syphoning scam. In the latter case it goes from negligence into much more serious charges. If we are observing humanitarian laws, it is also a crime against humanity to forcibly deprive citizens of their livelihood and to force them into absolute poverty.

In a fair trial with all the facts laid bare, she would be pinned to the wall upside down, in a legal sense. Left with nothing but her eyes to cry with, etc.

Good thing too. Rich people scamming poor farmers is disgusting, it is breathtakingly vile and heartless.

If they locked up every politician for having a loss making subsidy programming, every politician from gw bush to chairman Mao would be jailed and Fox news would be partying.

[djjamie]

To even suggest the rice scheme has no corruption, while one policeman walking down the road will take 2000baht from me for dropping a cigarette butt and won't issue a ticket beggars belief.

I assume the rice coming from Myanmar was traveling through Thailand to go to Laos?

I assume the budget for the scheme that was 500 billion baht blew out to 770 billion baht with 130 billion baht still owing is because they forgot to carry the zero?

Chinese fake rice deals? Just a figment of my imagination I suppose?

Supa had an agenda against the rice scheme?

IMF had an agenda against the rice scheme?

The World Bank had an agenda against the rice scheme?

No one burnt the rice. It internally combusted?

Here is a hint. If yingluck told you the Titanic didn't sink, don't believe her. However there is more evidence the rice scheme is corrupt than the Titanic sank.

And it is exactly this ignorant refusal to believe there was corruption in the scheme that has got the government into the position it is in now.

To top it off you cannot even correctly explain to me the message being portrayed in my picture which in itself typifies why you should never argue with a UDD supporter. You have proven my point without me having to say anything!

Instead of telling me the numbers don't add up to show corruption (which in itself is an oxymoron) and even the allegation is tiny. You tell me with facts how it is not corrupt?

Edited February 26, 2014 by djjamie

[BlueNoseCodger]

To even suggest the rice scheme has no corruption, while one policeman walking down the road will take 2000baht from me for dropping a cigarette butt and won't issue a ticket beggars belief.

I assume the rice coming from Myanmar was traveling through Thailand to go to Laos?

I assume the budget for the scheme that was 500 billion baht blew out to 770 billion baht with 130 billion baht still owing is because they forgot to carry the zero?

Chinese fake rice deals? Just a figment of my imagination I suppose?

Supa had an agenda against the rice scheme?

IMF had an agenda against the rice scheme?

The World Bank had an agenda against the rice scheme?

No one burnt the rice. It internally combusted?

Here is a hint. If yingluck told you the Titanic didn't sink, don't believe her. However there is more evidence the rice scheme is corrupt than the Titanic sank.

And it is exactly this ignorant refusal to believe there was corruption in the scheme that has got the government into the position it is in now.

To top it off you cannot even correctly explain to me the message being portrayed in my picture which in itself typifies why you should never argue with a UDD supporter. You have proven my point without me having to say anything!

Instead of telling me the numbers don't add up to show corruption (which in itself is an oxymoron) and even the allegation is tiny. You tell me with facts how it is not corrupt?

Allegations without substance. If you believe smugglers brought in rice (=high volume low profit) from across the border in any significant amount, then why don't the border farms show unrealistic rice yields?! These farms would have to be showing rice that's impossible to grow, and outside the Thai rice farm yield. They don't.

Smugglers are not idiots, they smuggle high value small items, not low value bulk items!

"I assume the budget for the scheme that was 500 billion baht blew out to 770 billion"

My Google search on "government cost overrun" returns 4.9 million results, a cost overrun is not evidence of corruption.

"Chinese fake rice deals", even the NACC said they were genuine deals, it's claim is that it cannot prove the Chinese companies are authorized to buy by the Chinese government on the G2G scheme. The NACC could simply confirm it with the Chinese government, but chose not to.

Supa/IMF/WorldBank etc. an opinion on a policy is nothing to do with corruption.

14 tonnes of rice were burned in a warehouse fire, Bluesky made it sound like evidence was being hidden,

14 tonnes is 0.00007% of annual rice production, so their claim is just false.

Edited February 26, 2014 by BlueNoseCodger

[djjamie]

To even suggest the rice scheme has no corruption, while one policeman walking down the road will take 2000baht from me for dropping a cigarette butt and won't issue a ticket beggars belief.

I assume the rice coming from Myanmar was traveling through Thailand to go to Laos?

I assume the budget for the scheme that was 500 billion baht blew out to 770 billion baht with 130 billion baht still owing is because they forgot to carry the zero?

Chinese fake rice deals? Just a figment of my imagination I suppose?

Supa had an agenda against the rice scheme?

IMF had an agenda against the rice scheme?

The World Bank had an agenda against the rice scheme?

No one burnt the rice. It internally combusted?

Here is a hint. If yingluck told you the Titanic didn't sink, don't believe her. However there is more evidence the rice scheme is corrupt than the Titanic sank.

And it is exactly this ignorant refusal to believe there was corruption in the scheme that has got the government into the position it is in now.

To top it off you cannot even correctly explain to me the message being portrayed in my picture which in itself typifies why you should never argue with a UDD supporter. You have proven my point without me having to say anything!

Instead of telling me the numbers don't add up to show corruption (which in itself is an oxymoron) and even the allegation is tiny. You tell me with facts how it is not corrupt?

Allegations without substance. If you believe smugglers brought in rice (=high volume low profit) from across the border in any significant amount, then why don't the border farms show unrealistic rice yields?! These farms would have to be showing rice that's impossible to grow, and outside the Thai rice farm yield. They don't.

Smugglers are not idiots, they smuggle high value small items, not low value bulk items!

"I assume the budget for the scheme that was 500 billion baht blew out to 770 billion"

My Google search on "government cost overrun" returns 4.9 million results, a cost overrun is not evidence of corruption.

"Chinese fake rice deals", even the NACC said they were genuine deals, it's claim is that it cannot prove the Chinese companies are authorized to buy by the Chinese government on the G2G scheme. The NACC could simply confirm it with the Chinese government, but chose not to.

Supa/IMF/WorldBank etc. an opinion on a policy is nothing to do with corruption.

14 tonnes of rice were burned in a warehouse fire, Bluesky made it sound like evidence was being hidden,

14 tonnes is 0.00007% of annual rice production, so their claim is just false.

And this is why I never argue with a UDD supporter. You guys could literally argue the Titanic didn't sink and strut around like your victorious.

All you doing now is embarrassing yourself.

Refer to picture.

Edited February 26, 2014 by djjamie

[bigbamboo]

I didn't realise any politicians took any notice of the courts here, even when they actually get around to convicting someone.

[antimedia]

Throw the book at her I say, but make it a Thai comic book with pictures, she has a problem with reading words.

[Publicus]

fab4 post # 58

To save any further replies to all those who have come out of the woodwork to comment on my public pronouncement of being wrong on this occasion

1. You could have had the good grace of accepting my post without making further snide comments (but that would demonstrate a quality that's sadly lacking in some people)

2. I will not stoop to your respective levels

3. I really don't care what you think.

One can but hope that you will indeed follow your own good advice above when others post.

The bottom line is that the poster doesn't care what you think and neither do I as is also the case with many other posters. Members have the right of posting according to the TVF Rules. Not caring what you think is within the rules. All the same, the poster's point number one is determining and is the important statement. If you can't respect or honor point number one, then I refer you to the poster's point number three.

[Davidhere]

Can I ask all Suthep supporters to answer this openly and honestly,

If

You could if the topic was :

Suthep urged to defy courts, independent agencies

But, it's not.

It's:

Yingluck urged to defy courts, independent agencies

Could you ask a question that is on-topic to the topic at hand?

.

[Davidhere]

To save any further replies to all those who have come out of the woodwork to comment on my public pronouncement of being wrong on this occasion

.

.

Do you not see that most of the comments to you were related to your initial post with its own snidy, inflammatory diatribe?

Perhaps next time you are unaware of references or sources, you'll ask in courteous manner.

Then, if you are replied to as you have been here, you'd have a leg to stand on.

Your own first post set the tone for all the subsequent replies to it.

Your own follow-up posts, including above, continued the same tone.

.

Edited February 26, 2014 by Davidhere

[Scamper]

The defiance of the independent agencies and the courts is Pheu Thai/UDD/Thaksin in its purest form. It is the ultimate expression of their philosophy, and it will bring this crisis to a head. Indeed, without the independent agencies and the courts there is nothing that can ever evolve from that. That is the threat that this administration now poses. It has been nothing less than astonishing that - in the space of just four months - Yingluck has evolved from girl-guide-cookie statements - to open defiance of the judicial process. That's quite an evolution. And it shows the distressing influence her brother has had, to the detriment of the people.

Edited February 26, 2014 by Scamper

[Crushdepth]

To save any further replies to all those who have come out of the woodwork to comment on my public pronouncement of being wrong on this occasion

1. You could have had the good grace of accepting my post without making further snide comments (but that would demonstrate a quality that's sadly lacking in some people)

2. I will not stoop to your respective levels

3. I really don't care what you think.

Well I supported it. If more people were to admit when they get things wrong we might have more discussions and less slagging off.

[AleG]

Allegations without substance. If you believe smugglers brought in rice (=high volume low profit) from across the border in any significant amount, then why don't the border farms show unrealistic rice yields?! These farms would have to be showing rice that's impossible to grow, and outside the Thai rice farm yield. They don't.

Smugglers are not idiots, they smuggle high value small items, not low value bulk items!

"I assume the budget for the scheme that was 500 billion baht blew out to 770 billion"

My Google search on "government cost overrun" returns 4.9 million results, a cost overrun is not evidence of corruption.

"Chinese fake rice deals", even the NACC said they were genuine deals, it's claim is that it cannot prove the Chinese companies are authorized to buy by the Chinese government on the G2G scheme. The NACC could simply confirm it with the Chinese government, but chose not to.

Supa/IMF/WorldBank etc. an opinion on a policy is nothing to do with corruption.

14 tonnes of rice were burned in a warehouse fire, Bluesky made it sound like evidence was being hidden,

14 tonnes is 0.00007% of annual rice production, so their claim is just false.

Let's tear this post apart, shall we?

First:

Allegations without substance. If you believe smugglers brought in rice (=high volume low profit) from across the border in any significant amount, then why don't the border farms show unrealistic rice yields?! These farms would have to be showing rice that's impossible to grow, and outside the Thai rice farm yield. They don't.

Claim that the allegations have no substance, when in fact the allegations of rice being smuggled to be sold under the scheme have been numerous and detailed:

Example A: Thon Virak, director of Cambodian state-owned rice exporter Green Trade, estimated up to 300,000 tonnes of paddy rice was smuggled into Thailand in 2012 and a similar amount in 2011.

(Note: BlueNoseCodger pay attention to what I'm doing here, I support what I say with citations.)

Example B: As much as 15 percent of Cam­bodia’s rice crop is illegally ex­ported to Thailand and Viet­nam

Example C: The Army has prosecuted three captains of Burapa Task Force for involvement in smuggling of paddy rice across Thai-Cambodian border, its spokesman Col Sansern Kaewkamnerd said Friday.

The revelation came one day after Rak Prathet Thai MP Chuwit Kamolvisit took the House floor to show four video clips depicting the smuggling of paddy,

(Note: Example C is not just an allegation, but actual prosecution of suspects)

Example D:

Boats loaded with what the smugglers coyly describe as “chicken feed” travel daily across the narrow stretch of the Moei River that separates Myawaddy in Burma from the neighbouring Thai town of Mae Sot.

On the outskirts of Myawaddy, The Telegraph watched as lorries pulled into a compound close to the river bank guarded by Burmese soldiers. Sacks of rice were swiftly unloaded and transferred to waiting boats.

“We started sending ’chicken feed’ to Thailand in big quantities a couple of years ago,” said the officer in charge of the soldiers. “It’s transported mostly at night. Generally, we’ll send 100 sacks at a time.

So that completely disproves the first part of your opening paragraph: "Allegations without substance."

The second part is a non sequitur on the back of a straw man:

If you believe smugglers brought in rice (=high volume low profit) from across the border in any significant amount, then why don't the border farms show unrealistic rice yields?! These farms would have to be showing rice that's impossible to grow, and outside the Thai rice farm yield. They don't.

You construct a straw man, that the smuggled rice HAS to show up as extra farm yields, then you proceed to declare that since farms are not showing unrealistic yields (without actually proving that to be based in actual facts) therefore there is no smuggling (a conclusion that doesn't follow the premise, AKA a non sequitur) and the other person is wrong... in your own head.

Next paragraph: Smugglers are not idiots, they smuggle high value small items, not low value bulk items!

Proven wrong previously with citations to news reports of smugglers smuggling rice into Thailand... in bulk.

Next paragraph:

"I assume the budget for the scheme that was 500 billion baht blew out to 770 billion"

My Google search on "government cost overrun" returns 4.9 million results, a cost overrun is not evidence of corruption.

Another non sequitur (man, you really love those don't you). Cost overruns from other countries say absolutely nothing about the Rice Scheme in Thailand. Besides which, using Google search result numbers as an argument is patently stupid. For example a search for "Blue Nose Codger pathetic debating skills" yields 4190 hits, which proves absolutely nothing at all.

Next!

"Chinese fake rice deals", even the NACC said they were genuine deals, it's claim is that it cannot prove the Chinese companies are authorized to buy by the Chinese government on the G2G scheme. The NACC could simply confirm it with the Chinese government, but chose not to.

Let's compare what you assert without offering any citation to an actual quote from the NACC:

"The NACC also ruled there was no evidence substantiating the government-to-government rice deals claimed by Yingluck's government"

Which directly contradicts what you claim, that the NACC acknowledges this particular deal as genuine.

As for the NACC asking the Chinese government, I don't know if it's within the powers of the NACC to conduct investigations outside Thailand, in any case it is the Thai government who should provide the information.

Next paragraph (if it can be called that):

Supa/IMF/WorldBank etc. an opinion on a policy is nothing to do with corruption.

It does have to do with corruption if the opinion is that there is corruption or the unchecked potential for corruption.

In the case of Supa she exposed the figures of the costs of the Rice Scheme as provided by the government to be false.

A government "cooking the books" is grounds for suspicion of corruption.

In this insightful talk by Afra Raymond Three Myths About Corruption, postulates Expenditure of public money + No Transparency + No accountability = corruption.

All those elements are a recurring theme of PTPs Rice Scheme.

And finally, your last paragraph:

14 tonnes of rice were burned in a warehouse fire, Bluesky made it sound like evidence was being hidden,

14 tonnes is 0.00007% of annual rice production, so their claim is just false.

First fallacy, that the instance you mention "14 tonnes burnt" is the only one reported I presume you are referring to this incident Mystery fire at Lopburi rice warehouse? I don't know because you don't support any of your allegations with citations. If it is that case the n you... ejem, misrepresent the facts with an intention to mislead, because while 14 tonnes was the quantity damaged directly by the fire, a larger quantity was further damaged by the water used to douse the fire.

"He also said that when water was sprayed into the gutted warehouse, all rice kept would be destroyed and could be hardly proved whether they were spoilt or rotten before the fire or not."

Second fallacy on that paragraph, that the amount damaged bears any relation to whether or not it was done to hide evidence, it is the same nonsensical argument as saying that destroying a document proving a fraud worth 1 million Baht was committed is false because it represents only an insignificant percentage of the total GDP of the country.

So... that took some time, and I'm sure you'll pay absolutely no attention to any of it and will continue to spout unsupported and demonstrably false allegations as you have been doing since joining up.

Edited February 26, 2014 by AleG

[Publicus]

The defiance of the independent agencies and the courts is Pheu Thai/UDD/Thaksin in its purest form. It is the ultimate expression of their philosophy, and it will bring this crisis to a head. Indeed, without the independent agencies and the courts there is nothing that can ever evolve from that. That is the threat that this administration now poses. It has been nothing less than astonishing that - in the space of just four months - Yingluck has evolved from girl-guide-cookie statements - to open defiance of the judicial process. That's quite an evolution. And it shows the distressing influence her brother has had, to the detriment of the people.

You are referring to a constitution, the umpteenth one, written by yet another coup d'état government which had been ruling in military mutiny against legitimate civilian authority. In the subsequent referendum on the constitution, the military rulers established in law a prohibition of voting no on the jigsawed document, while simultaneously including in the referendum a pardon / amnesty of themselves and of their coup d'état military mutiny.

The same bogus agencies established by the illegitimate and reactionary military government's absolute constitution are at play here and also against the same people and their social movement.

“A coup consists of the infiltration of a small, but critical, segment of the state apparatus, which is then used to displace the government from its control of the remainder.”

http://thevelvetrocket.com/2009/11/14/coup-d-etat-an-operators-manual/

[rubl]

That's uncommonly good advise from the UDD to a caretaker PM "be defiant, ignore the courts".

Now, can anyone tell me how to recognise a failed state?

[rubl]

The defiance of the independent agencies and the courts is Pheu Thai/UDD/Thaksin in its purest form. It is the ultimate expression of their philosophy, and it will bring this crisis to a head. Indeed, without the independent agencies and the courts there is nothing that can ever evolve from that. That is the threat that this administration now poses. It has been nothing less than astonishing that - in the space of just four months - Yingluck has evolved from girl-guide-cookie statements - to open defiance of the judicial process. That's quite an evolution. And it shows the distressing influence her brother has had, to the detriment of the people.

You are referring to a constitution, the umpteenth one, written by yet another coup d'état government which had been ruling in military mutiny against legitimate civilian authority. In the subsequent referendum on the constitution, the military rulers established in law a prohibition of voting no on the jigsawed document, while simultaneously including in the referendum a pardon / amnesty of themselves and of their coup d'état military mutiny.

The same bogus agencies established by the illegitimate and reactionary military government's absolute constitution are at play here and also against the same people and their social movement.

“A coup consists of the infiltration of a small, but critical, segment of the state apparatus, which is then used to displace the government from its control of the remainder.”

http://thevelvetrocket.com/2009/11/14/coup-d-etat-an-operators-manual/

Didn't we have the NACC for a somewhat longer time already? At least in 1998 both Constitution Court and NACC were present and operational.

[BlueNoseCodger]

Let's tear this post apart, shall we?

First:

Allegations without substance. If you believe smugglers brought in rice (=high volume low profit) from across the border in any significant amount, then why don't the border farms show unrealistic rice yields?! These farms would have to be showing rice that's impossible to grow, and outside the Thai rice farm yield. They don't.

Claim that the allegations have no substance, when in fact the allegations of rice being smuggled to be sold under the scheme have been numerous and detailed:

Example A: Thon Virak, director of Cambodian state-owned rice exporter Green Trade, estimated up to 300,000 tonnes of paddy rice was smuggled into Thailand in 2012 and a similar amount in 2011.

(Note: BlueNoseCodger pay attention to what I'm doing here, I support what I say with citations.)

Example B: As much as 15 percent of Cam­bodia’s rice crop is illegally ex­ported to Thailand and Viet­nam

Example C: The Army has prosecuted three captains of Burapa Task Force for involvement in smuggling of paddy rice across Thai-Cambodian border, its spokesman Col Sansern Kaewkamnerd said Friday.

The revelation came one day after Rak Prathet Thai MP Chuwit Kamolvisit took the House floor to show four video clips depicting the smuggling of paddy,

(Note: Example C is not just an allegation, but actual prosecution of suspects)

Example D:

Boats loaded with what the smugglers coyly describe as “chicken feed” travel daily across the narrow stretch of the Moei River that separates Myawaddy in Burma from the neighbouring Thai town of Mae Sot.

On the outskirts of Myawaddy, The Telegraph watched as lorries pulled into a compound close to the river bank guarded by Burmese soldiers. Sacks of rice were swiftly unloaded and transferred to waiting boats.

“We started sending ’chicken feed’ to Thailand in big quantities a couple of years ago,” said the officer in charge of the soldiers. “It’s transported mostly at night. Generally, we’ll send 100 sacks at a time.

So that completely disproves the first part of your opening paragraph: "Allegations without substance."

The second part is a non sequitur on the back of a straw man:

If you believe smugglers brought in rice (=high volume low profit) from across the border in any significant amount, then why don't the border farms show unrealistic rice yields?! These farms would have to be showing rice that's impossible to grow, and outside the Thai rice farm yield. They don't.

You construct a straw man, that the smuggled rice HAS to show up as extra farm yields, then you proceed to declare that since farms are not showing unrealistic yields (without actually proving that to be based in actual facts) therefore there is no smuggling (a conclusion that doesn't follow the premise, AKA a non sequitur) and the other person is wrong... in your own head.

Next paragraph: Smugglers are not idiots, they smuggle high value small items, not low value bulk items!

Proven wrong previously with citations to news reports of smugglers smuggling rice into Thailand... in bulk.

Next paragraph:

"I assume the budget for the scheme that was 500 billion baht blew out to 770 billion"

My Google search on "government cost overrun" returns 4.9 million results, a cost overrun is not evidence of corruption.

Another non sequitur (man, you really love those don't you). Cost overruns from other countries say absolutely nothing about the Rice Scheme in Thailand. Besides which, using Google search result numbers as an argument is patently stupid. For example a search for "Blue Nose Codger pathetic debating skills" yields 4190 hits, which proves absolutely nothing at all.

Next!

"Chinese fake rice deals", even the NACC said they were genuine deals, it's claim is that it cannot prove the Chinese companies are authorized to buy by the Chinese government on the G2G scheme. The NACC could simply confirm it with the Chinese government, but chose not to.

Let's compare what you assert without offering any citation to an actual quote from the NACC:

"The NACC also ruled there was no evidence substantiating the government-to-government rice deals claimed by Yingluck's government"

Which directly contradicts what you claim, that the NACC acknowledges this particular deal as genuine.

As for the NACC asking the Chinese government, I don't know if it's within the powers of the NACC to conduct investigations outside Thailand, in any case it is the Thai government who should provide the information.

Next paragraph (if it can be called that):

Supa/IMF/WorldBank etc. an opinion on a policy is nothing to do with corruption.

It does have to do with corruption if the opinion is that there is corruption or the unchecked potential for corruption.

In the case of Supa she exposed the figures of the costs of the Rice Scheme as provided by the government to be false.

A government "cooking the books" is grounds for suspicion of corruption.

In this insightful talk by Afra Raymond Three Myths About Corruption, postulates Expenditure of public money + No Transparency + No accountability = corruption.

All those elements are a recurring theme of PTPs Rice Scheme.

And finally, your last paragraph:

14 tonnes of rice were burned in a warehouse fire, Bluesky made it sound like evidence was being hidden,

14 tonnes is 0.00007% of annual rice production, so their claim is just false.

First fallacy, that the instance you mention "14 tonnes burnt" is the only one reported I presume you are referring to this incident Mystery fire at Lopburi rice warehouse? I don't know because you don't support any of your allegations with citations. If it is that case the n you... ejem, misrepresent the facts with an intention to mislead, because while 14 tonnes was the quantity damaged directly by the fire, a larger quantity was further damaged by the water used to douse the fire.

"He also said that when water was sprayed into the gutted warehouse, all rice kept would be destroyed and could be hardly proved whether they were spoilt or rotten before the fire or not."

Second fallacy on that paragraph, that the amount damaged bears any relation to whether or not it was done to hide evidence, it is the same nonsensical argument as saying that destroying a document proving a fraud worth 1 million Baht was committed is false because it represents only an insignificant percentage of the total GDP of the country.

So... that took some time, and I'm sure you'll pay absolutely no attention to any of it and will continue to spout unsupported and demonstrably false allegations as you have been doing since joining up.

Terrific! Finally someone prepared to discuss it and back up their claims!

Lets look at the claimed size of this smuggling:

Example A: Thon Virak, director of Cambodian state-owned rice exporter Green Trade, estimated up to 300,000 tonnes of paddy rice was smuggled into Thailand in 2012 and a similar amount in 2011.

Rice production in Thailand for 2013 was 37.9 million metric tons. So even Thon Viraks claim is only 1% of Thai rice production, and he offers nothing to back his claim up. It would be the equivalent of 7500 40 tonnes trucks smuggled across the border.

How much of has been intercepted of all this rice, from your article:

Noppadol Thetprasit, head of a customs post in the Aranyaprathet district of Sa Kaeo, said he recently intercepted 30 tonnes of rice being smuggled from Cambodia, but he knows more must be getting through at smaller crossing points that lack his facilities.

Only 30 tonnes intercepted??? Must be more? What like 100 tonnes, 200? Tiny!

Example B: As much as 15 percent of Cam­bodia’s rice crop is illegally ex­ported to Thailand and Viet­nam

“I would estimate that between 5 percent and 15 percent of Cambodia’s rice crop leaves the country this way,” Ekin said.

Between 5 and 15%? Based on what?, ok lets go with 10%, Cambodia rice production is 4.9 million tonnes, 10% = 500k, half to vientnam and Thailand is 250k each, so in line with your Reuters claim of 300k.

Example C:

3 Soldiers caught and prosecuted for rice smuggling on vans. Yep that's how you enforce the law against smuggling.

Example D:

"“It’s transported mostly at night. Generally, we’ll send 100 sacks at a time.“Each sack is 50 kilos.”"

100*50* 365 (nights in a year ) = 1825 metric tonnes/year = tiny and easy to catch.

Note that all of these are smuggling crimes, not corruption in rice pledge scheme. The fix for cross border smuggling is to catch the smugglers, see link C, not set agricultural policy based on it. Smugglers concentrate on small high value goods because the risk of capture is low, and the profit is high.

You construct a straw man, that the smuggled rice HAS to show up as extra farm yields

I'm saying it doesn't show in ridiculous rice yields for areas next to the borders where smuggled rice would enter the system.

NACC from theNation:

The NACC also ruled there was no evidence substantiating the government-to-government rice deals

To be corruption, NACC has to have evidence of corruption, not lack of evidence it is government to government!

IMF:

IMF takes aim at rice pledging scheme.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has urged Thailand to drop its costly rice-pledging scheme and scale back other fiscal stimulus measures to achieve a balanced budget and make room for spending on projects that bolster economic growth.

And? They're suggesting switching from rice subsidy to capital projects. I expect the government to reduce the buy price on the rice pledging scheme and spend on stuff like railways. So? This is government decisions. It does not reflect corruption, it's fiscal policy.

14 tonnes at Lopburi, it is too small a quanityt to be significant in any claimed coverup, even with extra water damage.

So to sum up, you are alleging smuggling cross border. The numbers don't correspond to the amount of rice captured at the border, and even the hyperbole numbers don't count as corruption in the rice pledging scheme.

Edited February 26, 2014 by BlueNoseCodger

[rickirs]

Thai Courts appear to be a little too independent.

Thailand Trial Court does not have a jury system like in the United States. There is only a judge or judges who specializes in the dispute at hand (ie., Criminal, Civil, Labor) to determine innocence or guilt. The judge(s) alone decides the issues of law and fact. Rulings from the Trial Courts can be appealed to the Appeals Court, then onto the Supreme Court for furhter review of laws or facts being called into question.

If judges have been politicalized or have a conflict of interests, a defendent will have little or no alternatives to a fair trial, ie., judgement by a jury of peers. Application of "facts" at every level of the Thai judicial system can differ in terms of importance as well as to the facts themselves. There is no stipulation as to facts that would establish consistency of facts used in court judgements as a defendent moves through the appeals process.

Any Thai, whether a public official or an private eindividual, should be concerned with lower court judgements and the appeals process lacking deterents to inconsistent rulings, fair and unbiased rulings.

[AleG]

Terrific! Finally someone prepared to discuss it and back up their claims!

Lets look at the claimed size of this smuggling:

Example A: Thon Virak, director of Cambodian state-owned rice exporter Green Trade, estimated up to 300,000 tonnes of paddy rice was smuggled into Thailand in 2012 and a similar amount in 2011.

Rice production in Thailand for 2013 was 37.9 million metric tons. So even Thon Viraks claim is only 1% of Thai rice production, and he offers nothing to back his claim up. It would be the equivalent of 7500 40 tonnes trucks smuggled across the border.

How much of has been intercepted of all this rice, from your article:

Noppadol Thetprasit, head of a customs post in the Aranyaprathet district of Sa Kaeo, said he recently intercepted 30 tonnes of rice being smuggled from Cambodia, but he knows more must be getting through at smaller crossing points that lack his facilities.

Only 30 tonnes intercepted??? Must be more? What like 100 tonnes, 200? Tiny!

Example B: As much as 15 percent of Cam­bodia’s rice crop is illegally ex­ported to Thailand and Viet­nam

“I would estimate that between 5 percent and 15 percent of Cambodia’s rice crop leaves the country this way,” Ekin said.

Between 5 and 15%? Based on what?, ok lets go with 10%, Cambodia rice production is 4.9 million tonnes, 10% = 500k, half to vientnam and Thailand is 250k each, so in line with your Reuters claim of 300k.

Example C:

3 Soldiers caught and prosecuted for rice smuggling on vans. Yep that's how you enforce the law against smuggling.

Example D:

"“It’s transported mostly at night. Generally, we’ll send 100 sacks at a time.“Each sack is 50 kilos.”"

100*50* 365 (nights in a year ) = 1825 metric tonnes/year = tiny and easy to catch.

Note that all of these are smuggling crimes, not corruption in rice pledge scheme. The fix for cross border smuggling is to catch the smugglers, see link C, not set agricultural policy based on it. Smugglers concentrate on small high value goods because the risk of capture is low, and the profit is high.

You construct a straw man, that the smuggled rice HAS to show up as extra farm yields

I'm saying it doesn't show in ridiculous rice yields for areas next to the borders where smuggled rice would enter the system.

NACC from theNation:

The NACC also ruled there was no evidence substantiating the government-to-government rice deals

To be corruption, NACC has to have evidence of corruption, not lack of evidence it is government to government!

IMF:

IMF takes aim at rice pledging scheme.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has urged Thailand to drop its costly rice-pledging scheme and scale back other fiscal stimulus measures to achieve a balanced budget and make room for spending on projects that bolster economic growth.

And? They're suggesting switching from rice subsidy to capital projects. I expect the government to reduce the buy price on the rice pledging scheme and spend on stuff like railways. So? This is government decisions. It does not reflect corruption, it's fiscal policy.

14 tonnes at Lopburi, it is too small a quanityt to be significant in any claimed coverup, even with extra water damage.

So to sum up, you are alleging smuggling cross border. The numbers don't correspond to the amount of rice captured at the border, and even the hyperbole numbers don't count as corruption in the rice pledging scheme.

Well, that was rubbish. I'll keep it short this time.

Regarding the amounts of smuggled rice, you changed the goalpost from not being any substantiation of smuggling to playing number games. For example using the amount of smuggled rice intercepted on a single instance being given as an example of the smuggling as having any bearing on the total amount smuggled in.

Then again, now you are talking about smuggling that you said didn't happen...

Then you claim that smuggled rice entering the Rich Scheme is not corruption, to which I say, get a grip.

If the government can't prove that the G2G it claimed to have done existed, that's grounds for a corruption prove to find out were the rice and the money actually went.

Finally you insist with your feeble numbers game regarding the 14 tonnes (still waiting for you to provide a cite on this) You are just repeating the same worthless argument that since it is a small amount (which it isn't since the entire stocked rice was damaged by the fire AND the water used to extinguish it) then it can't be a coverup.

Regarding the IMF I have no idea were does that come from because I didn't mention the IMF in my post.

To sum it up, you claimed the smuggling allegations were unsubstantiated, I proved you wrong and now you continue to obfuscate to save face.

[Skywalker69]

They haven't convicted ANYONE for corruption or graft on the rice scheme yet.

I think even I as a non lawyer could defend her against this accusation. Is there one single proven complaint of corruption in the rice scheme nationwide?

So m'lord, there is no corruption.

Of course they haven't convicted anyone yet. No cases have gone through the court system yet and been judged.

It has been proved the DEM's have complained.

It has been proven Supa has complained.

It has been proven the IMF suggested restructuring the scheme due to corruption.

The list goes on.

As for proven corruption. There is ample evidence to suggest corruption and that is what the courts have to prove. It sounds like even if she is found guilty it won't matter. She will defy the courts due to no respect for the law. (Surprise surprise - A principle of democracy)

If there is anything else m'lord I suggest you refer to the below.

The Dems would complain about anything

she used the wrong toilet - file a complaint!

she used wrong brand of toothpaste - file a complaint

she went to a province - file a complaint!

they are a pathetic opposition who cannot get their act together to even fight an election!

Hoe old are you? Turned ten yet?

[Publicus]

The defiance of the independent agencies and the courts is Pheu Thai/UDD/Thaksin in its purest form. It is the ultimate expression of their philosophy, and it will bring this crisis to a head. Indeed, without the independent agencies and the courts there is nothing that can ever evolve from that. That is the threat that this administration now poses. It has been nothing less than astonishing that - in the space of just four months - Yingluck has evolved from girl-guide-cookie statements - to open defiance of the judicial process. That's quite an evolution. And it shows the distressing influence her brother has had, to the detriment of the people.

You are referring to a constitution, the umpteenth one, written by yet another coup d'état government which had been ruling in military mutiny against legitimate civilian authority. In the subsequent referendum on the constitution, the military rulers established in law a prohibition of voting no on the jigsawed document, while simultaneously including in the referendum a pardon / amnesty of themselves and of their coup d'état military mutiny.

The same bogus agencies established by the illegitimate and reactionary military government's absolute constitution are at play here and also against the same people and their social movement.

“A coup consists of the infiltration of a small, but critical, segment of the state apparatus, which is then used to displace the government from its control of the remainder.”

http://thevelvetrocket.com/2009/11/14/coup-d-etat-an-operators-manual/

Didn't we have the NACC for a somewhat longer time already? At least in 1998 both Constitution Court and NACC were present and operational.

Carried forward from 1988 to the military's 2007 absolute democracy constitution that reconstituted the agencies to suit the military and the established elites, to include getting the 2006 coup makers and military rulers pardoned. I forget the section of the current constitution that gets the 2006 coup makers and military rulers of the time pardoned. Do you remember which section that is? Kindly let me know, thx..

[BlueNoseCodger]

Terrific! Finally someone prepared to discuss it and back up their claims!

Lets look at the claimed size of this smuggling:

Example A: Thon Virak, director of Cambodian state-owned rice exporter Green Trade, estimated up to 300,000 tonnes of paddy rice was smuggled into Thailand in 2012 and a similar amount in 2011.

Rice production in Thailand for 2013 was 37.9 million metric tons. So even Thon Viraks claim is only 1% of Thai rice production, and he offers nothing to back his claim up. It would be the equivalent of 7500 40 tonnes trucks smuggled across the border.

How much of has been intercepted of all this rice, from your article:

Noppadol Thetprasit, head of a customs post in the Aranyaprathet district of Sa Kaeo, said he recently intercepted 30 tonnes of rice being smuggled from Cambodia, but he knows more must be getting through at smaller crossing points that lack his facilities.

Only 30 tonnes intercepted??? Must be more? What like 100 tonnes, 200? Tiny!

Example B: As much as 15 percent of Cam­bodia’s rice crop is illegally ex­ported to Thailand and Viet­nam

“I would estimate that between 5 percent and 15 percent of Cambodia’s rice crop leaves the country this way,” Ekin said.

Between 5 and 15%? Based on what?, ok lets go with 10%, Cambodia rice production is 4.9 million tonnes, 10% = 500k, half to vientnam and Thailand is 250k each, so in line with your Reuters claim of 300k.

Example C:

3 Soldiers caught and prosecuted for rice smuggling on vans. Yep that's how you enforce the law against smuggling.

Example D:

"“It’s transported mostly at night. Generally, we’ll send 100 sacks at a time.“Each sack is 50 kilos.”"

100*50* 365 (nights in a year ) = 1825 metric tonnes/year = tiny and easy to catch.

Note that all of these are smuggling crimes, not corruption in rice pledge scheme. The fix for cross border smuggling is to catch the smugglers, see link C, not set agricultural policy based on it. Smugglers concentrate on small high value goods because the risk of capture is low, and the profit is high.

You construct a straw man, that the smuggled rice HAS to show up as extra farm yields

I'm saying it doesn't show in ridiculous rice yields for areas next to the borders where smuggled rice would enter the system.

NACC from theNation:

The NACC also ruled there was no evidence substantiating the government-to-government rice deals

To be corruption, NACC has to have evidence of corruption, not lack of evidence it is government to government!

IMF:

IMF takes aim at rice pledging scheme.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has urged Thailand to drop its costly rice-pledging scheme and scale back other fiscal stimulus measures to achieve a balanced budget and make room for spending on projects that bolster economic growth.

And? They're suggesting switching from rice subsidy to capital projects. I expect the government to reduce the buy price on the rice pledging scheme and spend on stuff like railways. So? This is government decisions. It does not reflect corruption, it's fiscal policy.

14 tonnes at Lopburi, it is too small a quanityt to be significant in any claimed coverup, even with extra water damage.

So to sum up, you are alleging smuggling cross border. The numbers don't correspond to the amount of rice captured at the border, and even the hyperbole numbers don't count as corruption in the rice pledging scheme.

Well, that was rubbish. I'll keep it short this time.

Regarding the amounts of smuggled rice, you changed the goalpost from not being any substantiation of smuggling to playing number games. For example using the amount of smuggled rice intercepted on a single instance being given as an example of the smuggling as having any bearing on the total amount smuggled in.

Then again, now you are talking about smuggling that you said didn't happen...

Then you claim that smuggled rice entering the Rich Scheme is not corruption, to which I say, get a grip.

If the government can't prove that the G2G it claimed to have done existed, that's grounds for a corruption prove to find out were the rice and the money actually went.

Finally you insist with your feeble numbers game regarding the 14 tonnes (still waiting for you to provide a cite on this) You are just repeating the same worthless argument that since it is a small amount (which it isn't since the entire stocked rice was damaged by the fire AND the water used to extinguish it) then it can't be a coverup.

Regarding the IMF I have no idea were does that come from because I didn't mention the IMF in my post.

To sum it up, you claimed the smuggling allegations were unsubstantiated, I proved you wrong and now you continue to obfuscate to save face.

The article you quoted cited this single small example as evidence of widespread smuggling to justify the bigger number they quoted. Noppadol Thetprasit, head of a customs post in the Aranyaprathet district of Sa Kaeo, is an authoritative source and should know far more examples than this one, since the claim is 10000 times bigger than his single known example. Hence implausible.

Then you claim that smuggled rice entering the Rich Scheme is not corruption [added: in the rice scheme], to which I say, get a grip.

You can't show any substantive smuggling, yet claim it. The people buying the rice are not then corrupt, as they buy it in good faith. It is not the rice scheme that is corrupt.

"If the government can't prove that the G2G it claimed to have done existed, that's grounds for a corruption prove to find out were the rice and the money actually went."

It's not the governments jobs to disprove groundless allegations. Even if the man wears a suit and calls himself the NACC.

Lopburi: 14 tonnes is too small to be a coverup, and the ashes are evidence anyway it existed.

To sum it up, smuggling is not corruption in the rice scheme at all. It's size is exaggerated for political effect. The financial impact on Thailand is likewise exaggerated for political effect.

This rice pledge scheme replaced a Democract minimum price scheme, which was far easier to corrupt. It was a paper only scheme, to defraud the scheme you did not need to smuggle any rice across the border, or sneak rice out of the warehouses, you just lied about the numbers you wrote on a bit of paper. Hence it had a serious problem and needed replacing.

The sky is not falling.

Edited February 26, 2014 by BlueNoseCodger

[AleG]

The article you quoted cited this single small example as evidence of widespread smuggling to justify the bigger number they quoted. Noppadol Thetprasit, head of a customs post in the Aranyaprathet district of Sa Kaeo, is an authoritative source and should know far more examples than this one, since the claim is 10000 times bigger than his single known example. Hence implausible.

Then you claim that smuggled rice entering the Rich Scheme is not corruption [added: in the rice scheme], to which I say, get a grip.

You can't show any substantive smuggling, yet claim it. The people buying the rice are not then corrupt, as they buy it in good faith. It is not the rice scheme that is corrupt.

"If the government can't prove that the G2G it claimed to have done existed, that's grounds for a corruption prove to find out were the rice and the money actually went."

It's not the governments jobs to disprove groundless allegations. Even if the man wears a suit and calls himself the NACC.

Lopburi: 14 tonnes is too small to be a coverup, and the ashes are evidence anyway it existed.

To sum it up, smuggling is not corruption in the rice scheme at all. It's size is exaggerated for political effect. The financial impact on Thailand is likewise exaggerated for political effect.

This rice pledge scheme replaced a Democract minimum price scheme, which was far easier to corrupt. It was a paper only scheme, to defraud the scheme you did not need to smuggle any rice across the border, or sneak rice out of the warehouses, you just lied about the numbers you wrote on a bit of paper. Hence it had a serious problem and needed replacing.

The sky is not falling.

"To sum it up, smuggling is not corruption in the rice scheme at all"

Really?, how convenient.

A few things to note, you haven't provided any citation of anything you have claimed. You resort to one non sequitur after the other, straw man arguments, move the goalposts around, you pick scraps of facts to fit into your narrative and ignore the rest that doesn't when not directly distorting facts or creating them out of thin air.

In short, a very poor show.

[plachon]

Yup. Who needs laws and courts in Thailand when anyone feels they can just break laws including lawmakers themselves? So easy for Thais to give up and give lip service as they please.

I suspect one of the underlying causes of this seemingly casual relationship with the principle of the rule of law, is that Thailand was never officially colonized and thus, unlike its neighbours, that basic concept was never culturally seeded here. This is not a defence of colonialism but merely an observation that may help to understand why obeying "the law" is such an alien concept for most Thais, especially those born into wealth and privilege, is so hard to grasp.

[Skywalker69]

Terrific! Finally someone prepared to discuss it and back up their claims!

Lets look at the claimed size of this smuggling:

Example A: Thon Virak, director of Cambodian state-owned rice exporter Green Trade, estimated up to 300,000 tonnes of paddy rice was smuggled into Thailand in 2012 and a similar amount in 2011.

Rice production in Thailand for 2013 was 37.9 million metric tons. So even Thon Viraks claim is only 1% of Thai rice production, and he offers nothing to back his claim up. It would be the equivalent of 7500 40 tonnes trucks smuggled across the border.

How much of has been intercepted of all this rice, from your article:

Noppadol Thetprasit, head of a customs post in the Aranyaprathet district of Sa Kaeo, said he recently intercepted 30 tonnes of rice being smuggled from Cambodia, but he knows more must be getting through at smaller crossing points that lack his facilities.

Only 30 tonnes intercepted??? Must be more? What like 100 tonnes, 200? Tiny!

Example B: As much as 15 percent of Cam­bodia’s rice crop is illegally ex­ported to Thailand and Viet­nam

“I would estimate that between 5 percent and 15 percent of Cambodia’s rice crop leaves the country this way,” Ekin said.

Between 5 and 15%? Based on what?, ok lets go with 10%, Cambodia rice production is 4.9 million tonnes, 10% = 500k, half to vientnam and Thailand is 250k each, so in line with your Reuters claim of 300k.

Example C:

3 Soldiers caught and prosecuted for rice smuggling on vans. Yep that's how you enforce the law against smuggling.

Example D:

"“It’s transported mostly at night. Generally, we’ll send 100 sacks at a time.“Each sack is 50 kilos.”"

100*50* 365 (nights in a year ) = 1825 metric tonnes/year = tiny and easy to catch.

Note that all of these are smuggling crimes, not corruption in rice pledge scheme. The fix for cross border smuggling is to catch the smugglers, see link C, not set agricultural policy based on it. Smugglers concentrate on small high value goods because the risk of capture is low, and the profit is high.

You construct a straw man, that the smuggled rice HAS to show up as extra farm yields

I'm saying it doesn't show in ridiculous rice yields for areas next to the borders where smuggled rice would enter the system.

NACC from theNation:

The NACC also ruled there was no evidence substantiating the government-to-government rice deals

To be corruption, NACC has to have evidence of corruption, not lack of evidence it is government to government!

IMF:

IMF takes aim at rice pledging scheme.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has urged Thailand to drop its costly rice-pledging scheme and scale back other fiscal stimulus measures to achieve a balanced budget and make room for spending on projects that bolster economic growth.

And? They're suggesting switching from rice subsidy to capital projects. I expect the government to reduce the buy price on the rice pledging scheme and spend on stuff like railways. So? This is government decisions. It does not reflect corruption, it's fiscal policy.

14 tonnes at Lopburi, it is too small a quanityt to be significant in any claimed coverup, even with extra water damage.

So to sum up, you are alleging smuggling cross border. The numbers don't correspond to the amount of rice captured at the border, and even the hyperbole numbers don't count as corruption in the rice pledging scheme.

Well, that was rubbish. I'll keep it short this time.

Regarding the amounts of smuggled rice, you changed the goalpost from not being any substantiation of smuggling to playing number games. For example using the amount of smuggled rice intercepted on a single instance being given as an example of the smuggling as having any bearing on the total amount smuggled in.

Then again, now you are talking about smuggling that you said didn't happen...

Then you claim that smuggled rice entering the Rich Scheme is not corruption, to which I say, get a grip.

If the government can't prove that the G2G it claimed to have done existed, that's grounds for a corruption prove to find out were the rice and the money actually went.

Finally you insist with your feeble numbers game regarding the 14 tonnes (still waiting for you to provide a cite on this) You are just repeating the same worthless argument that since it is a small amount (which it isn't since the entire stocked rice was damaged by the fire AND the water used to extinguish it) then it can't be a coverup.

Regarding the IMF I have no idea were does that come from because I didn't mention the IMF in my post.

To sum it up, you claimed the smuggling allegations were unsubstantiated, I proved you wrong and now you continue to obfuscate to save face.

The article you quoted cited this single small example as evidence of widespread smuggling to justify the bigger number they quoted. Noppadol Thetprasit, head of a customs post in the Aranyaprathet district of Sa Kaeo, is an authoritative source and should know far more examples than this one, since the claim is 10000 times bigger than his single known example. Hence implausible.

Then you claim that smuggled rice entering the Rich Scheme is not corruption [added: in the rice scheme], to which I say, get a grip.

You can't show any substantive smuggling, yet claim it. The people buying the rice are not then corrupt, as they buy it in good faith. It is not the rice scheme that is corrupt.

"If the government can't prove that the G2G it claimed to have done existed, that's grounds for a corruption prove to find out were the rice and the money actually went."

It's not the governments jobs to disprove groundless allegations. Even if the man wears a suit and calls himself the NACC.

Lopburi: 14 tonnes is too small to be a coverup, and the ashes are evidence anyway it existed.

To sum it up, smuggling is not corruption in the rice scheme at all. It's size is exaggerated for political effect. The financial impact on Thailand is likewise exaggerated for political effect.

This rice pledge scheme replaced a Democract minimum price scheme, which was far easier to corrupt. It was a paper only scheme, to defraud the scheme you did not need to smuggle any rice across the border, or sneak rice out of the warehouses, you just lied about the numbers you wrote on a bit of paper. Hence it had a serious problem and needed replacing.

The sky is not falling.

To sum it up, smuggling is not corruption in the rice scheme at all

Not even if you sell it to the Government under the rice sceme? Yes the sky is falling and it´s falling on Yingluck Thaksin and PTP. Look up you might see it.

[Skywalker69]

The article you quoted cited this single small example as evidence of widespread smuggling to justify the bigger number they quoted. Noppadol Thetprasit, head of a customs post in the Aranyaprathet district of Sa Kaeo, is an authoritative source and should know far more examples than this one, since the claim is 10000 times bigger than his single known example. Hence implausible.

Then you claim that smuggled rice entering the Rich Scheme is not corruption [added: in the rice scheme], to which I say, get a grip.

You can't show any substantive smuggling, yet claim it. The people buying the rice are not then corrupt, as they buy it in good faith. It is not the rice scheme that is corrupt.

"If the government can't prove that the G2G it claimed to have done existed, that's grounds for a corruption prove to find out were the rice and the money actually went."

It's not the governments jobs to disprove groundless allegations. Even if the man wears a suit and calls himself the NACC.

Lopburi: 14 tonnes is too small to be a coverup, and the ashes are evidence anyway it existed.

To sum it up, smuggling is not corruption in the rice scheme at all. It's size is exaggerated for political effect. The financial impact on Thailand is likewise exaggerated for political effect.

This rice pledge scheme replaced a Democract minimum price scheme, which was far easier to corrupt. It was a paper only scheme, to defraud the scheme you did not need to smuggle any rice across the border, or sneak rice out of the warehouses, you just lied about the numbers you wrote on a bit of paper. Hence it had a serious problem and needed replacing.

The sky is not falling.

"To sum it up, smuggling is not corruption in the rice scheme at all"

Really?, how convenient.

A few things to note, you haven't provided any citation of anything you have claimed. You resort to one non sequitur after the other, straw man arguments, move the goalposts around, you pick scraps of facts to fit into your narrative and ignore the rest that doesn't when not directly distorting facts or creating them out of thin air.

In short, a very poor show.

He is a Thaksin troll.

[Thai at Heart]

Let's tear this post apart, shall we?

First:

Allegations without substance. If you believe smugglers brought in rice (=high volume low profit) from across the border in any significant amount, then why don't the border farms show unrealistic rice yields?! These farms would have to be showing rice that's impossible to grow, and outside the Thai rice farm yield. They don't.

Claim that the allegations have no substance, when in fact the allegations of rice being smuggled to be sold under the scheme have been numerous and detailed:

Example A: Thon Virak, director of Cambodian state-owned rice exporter Green Trade, estimated up to 300,000 tonnes of paddy rice was smuggled into Thailand in 2012 and a similar amount in 2011.

(Note: BlueNoseCodger pay attention to what I'm doing here, I support what I say with citations.)

Example B: As much as 15 percent of Cam­bodia’s rice crop is illegally ex­ported to Thailand and Viet­nam

Example C: The Army has prosecuted three captains of Burapa Task Force for involvement in smuggling of paddy rice across Thai-Cambodian border, its spokesman Col Sansern Kaewkamnerd said Friday.

The revelation came one day after Rak Prathet Thai MP Chuwit Kamolvisit took the House floor to show four video clips depicting the smuggling of paddy,

(Note: Example C is not just an allegation, but actual prosecution of suspects)

Example D:

Boats loaded with what the smugglers coyly describe as “chicken feed” travel daily across the narrow stretch of the Moei River that separates Myawaddy in Burma from the neighbouring Thai town of Mae Sot.

On the outskirts of Myawaddy, The Telegraph watched as lorries pulled into a compound close to the river bank guarded by Burmese soldiers. Sacks of rice were swiftly unloaded and transferred to waiting boats.

“We started sending ’chicken feed’ to Thailand in big quantities a couple of years ago,” said the officer in charge of the soldiers. “It’s transported mostly at night. Generally, we’ll send 100 sacks at a time.

So that completely disproves the first part of your opening paragraph: "Allegations without substance."

The second part is a non sequitur on the back of a straw man:

If you believe smugglers brought in rice (=high volume low profit) from across the border in any significant amount, then why don't the border farms show unrealistic rice yields?! These farms would have to be showing rice that's impossible to grow, and outside the Thai rice farm yield. They don't.

You construct a straw man, that the smuggled rice HAS to show up as extra farm yields, then you proceed to declare that since farms are not showing unrealistic yields (without actually proving that to be based in actual facts) therefore there is no smuggling (a conclusion that doesn't follow the premise, AKA a non sequitur) and the other person is wrong... in your own head.

Next paragraph: Smugglers are not idiots, they smuggle high value small items, not low value bulk items!

Proven wrong previously with citations to news reports of smugglers smuggling rice into Thailand... in bulk.

Next paragraph:

"I assume the budget for the scheme that was 500 billion baht blew out to 770 billion"

My Google search on "government cost overrun" returns 4.9 million results, a cost overrun is not evidence of corruption.

Another non sequitur (man, you really love those don't you). Cost overruns from other countries say absolutely nothing about the Rice Scheme in Thailand. Besides which, using Google search result numbers as an argument is patently stupid. For example a search for "Blue Nose Codger pathetic debating skills" yields 4190 hits, which proves absolutely nothing at all.

Next!

"Chinese fake rice deals", even the NACC said they were genuine deals, it's claim is that it cannot prove the Chinese companies are authorized to buy by the Chinese government on the G2G scheme. The NACC could simply confirm it with the Chinese government, but chose not to.

Let's compare what you assert without offering any citation to an actual quote from the NACC:

"The NACC also ruled there was no evidence substantiating the government-to-government rice deals claimed by Yingluck's government"

Which directly contradicts what you claim, that the NACC acknowledges this particular deal as genuine.

As for the NACC asking the Chinese government, I don't know if it's within the powers of the NACC to conduct investigations outside Thailand, in any case it is the Thai government who should provide the information.

Next paragraph (if it can be called that):

Supa/IMF/WorldBank etc. an opinion on a policy is nothing to do with corruption.

It does have to do with corruption if the opinion is that there is corruption or the unchecked potential for corruption.

In the case of Supa she exposed the figures of the costs of the Rice Scheme as provided by the government to be false.

A government "cooking the books" is grounds for suspicion of corruption.

In this insightful talk by Afra Raymond Three Myths About Corruption, postulates Expenditure of public money + No Transparency + No accountability = corruption.

All those elements are a recurring theme of PTPs Rice Scheme.

And finally, your last paragraph:

14 tonnes of rice were burned in a warehouse fire, Bluesky made it sound like evidence was being hidden,

14 tonnes is 0.00007% of annual rice production, so their claim is just false.

First fallacy, that the instance you mention "14 tonnes burnt" is the only one reported I presume you are referring to this incident Mystery fire at Lopburi rice warehouse? I don't know because you don't support any of your allegations with citations. If it is that case the n you... ejem, misrepresent the facts with an intention to mislead, because while 14 tonnes was the quantity damaged directly by the fire, a larger quantity was further damaged by the water used to douse the fire.

"He also said that when water was sprayed into the gutted warehouse, all rice kept would be destroyed and could be hardly proved whether they were spoilt or rotten before the fire or not."

Second fallacy on that paragraph, that the amount damaged bears any relation to whether or not it was done to hide evidence, it is the same nonsensical argument as saying that destroying a document proving a fraud worth 1 million Baht was committed is false because it represents only an insignificant percentage of the total GDP of the country.

So... that took some time, and I'm sure you'll pay absolutely no attention to any of it and will continue to spout unsupported and demonstrably false allegations as you have been doing since joining up.

Terrific! Finally someone prepared to discuss it and back up their claims!

Lets look at the claimed size of this smuggling:

Example A: Thon Virak, director of Cambodian state-owned rice exporter Green Trade, estimated up to 300,000 tonnes of paddy rice was smuggled into Thailand in 2012 and a similar amount in 2011.

Rice production in Thailand for 2013 was 37.9 million metric tons. So even Thon Viraks claim is only 1% of Thai rice production, and he offers nothing to back his claim up. It would be the equivalent of 7500 40 tonnes trucks smuggled across the border.

How much of has been intercepted of all this rice, from your article:

Noppadol Thetprasit, head of a customs post in the Aranyaprathet district of Sa Kaeo, said he recently intercepted 30 tonnes of rice being smuggled from Cambodia, but he knows more must be getting through at smaller crossing points that lack his facilities.

Only 30 tonnes intercepted??? Must be more? What like 100 tonnes, 200? Tiny!

Example B: As much as 15 percent of Cam­bodia’s rice crop is illegally ex­ported to Thailand and Viet­nam

“I would estimate that between 5 percent and 15 percent of Cambodia’s rice crop leaves the country this way,” Ekin said.

Between 5 and 15%? Based on what?, ok lets go with 10%, Cambodia rice production is 4.9 million tonnes, 10% = 500k, half to vientnam and Thailand is 250k each, so in line with your Reuters claim of 300k.

Example C:

3 Soldiers caught and prosecuted for rice smuggling on vans. Yep that's how you enforce the law against smuggling.

Example D:

"“It’s transported mostly at night. Generally, we’ll send 100 sacks at a time.“Each sack is 50 kilos.”"

100*50* 365 (nights in a year ) = 1825 metric tonnes/year = tiny and easy to catch.

Note that all of these are smuggling crimes, not corruption in rice pledge scheme. The fix for cross border smuggling is to catch the smugglers, see link C, not set agricultural policy based on it. Smugglers concentrate on small high value goods because the risk of capture is low, and the profit is high.

You construct a straw man, that the smuggled rice HAS to show up as extra farm yields

I'm saying it doesn't show in ridiculous rice yields for areas next to the borders where smuggled rice would enter the system.

NACC from theNation:

The NACC also ruled there was no evidence substantiating the government-to-government rice deals

To be corruption, NACC has to have evidence of corruption, not lack of evidence it is government to government!

IMF:

IMF takes aim at rice pledging scheme.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has urged Thailand to drop its costly rice-pledging scheme and scale back other fiscal stimulus measures to achieve a balanced budget and make room for spending on projects that bolster economic growth.

And? They're suggesting switching from rice subsidy to capital projects. I expect the government to reduce the buy price on the rice pledging scheme and spend on stuff like railways. So? This is government decisions. It does not reflect corruption, it's fiscal policy.

14 tonnes at Lopburi, it is too small a quanityt to be significant in any claimed coverup, even with extra water damage.

So to sum up, you are alleging smuggling cross border. The numbers don't correspond to the amount of rice captured at the border, and even the hyperbole numbers don't count as corruption in the rice pledging scheme.

Kittirat telling white lies is wrong, but not illegal.

Claiming there to be GtoG deals is misleading, but probably not illegal. I can imagine that the GtoG deals may have been bogus, but to achieve it, would need to the complicit assistance of dozens of officials, customs people, local officials, etc. Why haven't they been rolled over?

People smuggling stuff across the border is illegal, but what would you have Yingluck do? Sit at the border herself?

Hanging her for corruption at a border post, oh my lord.

It isn't illegal to be crap at your job, yet....

[Thai at Heart]

Yup. Who needs laws and courts in Thailand when anyone feels they can just break laws including lawmakers themselves? So easy for Thais to give up and give lip service as they please.

I suspect one of the underlying causes of this seemingly casual relationship with the principle of the rule of law, is that Thailand was never officially colonized and thus, unlike its neighbours, that basic concept was never culturally seeded here. This is not a defence of colonialism but merely an observation that may help to understand why obeying "the law" is such an alien concept for most Thais, especially those born into wealth and privilege, is so hard to grasp.

I heard a brilliant interview with a city banker the other day, who was a dodgy as they come and ruined people. He made an interesting statement about how he came to change his moral outlook on what he was doing.

He claimed that he stopped judging choices on the basis of "consequence" and changed to judging things on the basis of "right and wrong". I thought to myself, someone finally summed up Thailand. It is the ultimate contradiction with most western attitudes, that even if something is of minor consequence, but it is wrong, you don't do it.

Powerful corrupt Thais face no consequence for their actions, and so, do "wrong" things. It is a universal human trait.